I think you’ll agree with me that when you are asked this dreaded question “tell me
about yourself” in the most intense environment you can think of, the chances are that you
will blabber and will make little sense if you are not prepared.
Worst of all, it will most likely be the first question they will ask you in the interview.
Today, I will share you a very detailed answer that will increase your chances to win that
job a by a large margin.
I am Deniz Sasal.
I am a manager with PwC Consulting and also the creator of Landing Interviews Guaranteed
and The Career Mastery.
I have been interviewing 1000s of candidates as a hiring manager for a very long time.
In this video, my intention is to show you a different perspective than you find in conventional
wisdom.
Alright, let’s continue.
First I will cover what not to dos.
These will be short and sweet I promise.
Then, we will look at why they are asking this question.
And eventually, we will craft the perfect answer for you.
Sounds good?
Great!
What not to do?
- To start with, hiring manager has seen your resume and even cover letter most probably.
There is really no need for you to go over your resume bullet by bullet.
Having said this, it doesn’t hurt your chances to highlight some of your most important qualifications
and achievements.
- When you are presenting your background, don’t fall victim to under or over qualification.
Just give them what they need.
There is a very thin line between being an over-achiever and over-qualified.
- No need to share your life story.
And oh god please don’t you start from your high school years.
It’s really a waste of everybody’s time.
I recently interviewed a candidate for a graduate hire role at PwC.
She literally started her pitch like this; “I graduated from grade school in 1995 from
XXX school and then continued my education further with XXX junior high in London.
High school years were very challenging with new environment…”
By this point I was already done.
Horrible first impression.
I interrupted the candidate and asked her to talk about her current experience.
She definitely failed the interview.
Not necessarily only because of how she presented her background though.
- Don’t keep it too long.
It’s a monologue so nobody really has 20 minutes to listen to your background however
exciting that may sound to you.
- Don’t be boring.
Please...
You can show some serious enthusiasm in your pitch.
The more energetic you are the better it is.
Oh, remember to smile.
It makes a big difference.
OK.
Now, this is out of the way.
Let’s talk about why hiring managers ask this question.
First, I will cover what everybody else thinks why they ask that question.
Then, I will tell you what I think why hiring managers and I ask that question.
Everybody else thinks that you are asked to present yourself because;
- Hiring managers want to see how your response would be to a question that you are not prepared.
Not sure why they think you’d be unprepared…
- They want to know what you consider important in your background
For this one, I can agree to a certain degree.
I’d also want to see what you consider important in your background.
But, the real reason I and I know many other hiring managers in multinational organizations
ask this question is because we want to see your presentation skills!
Yeap, surprised?
After all, think about it, we all have seen your resume, your cover letter, you have probably
already passed the HR interview.
Why go over your background all over again?
Even if they haven’t seen it before, they are holding that CV in their hands when they
ask the question.
Know this Companies want employees who are; - presentable
- represent the firm professionally to their clients (especially true for consulting and
other professional services companies) - charismatic and likable especially if you
are in a client facing situation So, think about it; If they ask you to present
the company, it would be unfair to you as you have very limited knowledge.
But what better material is there then your background to present?
Right?
So, they are giving you an opportunity to present something.
They already know when you graduated, which company you worked for, when you left them,
what tasks you carried out for each of them.
What they are interested in is; Can you speak smoothly without stuttering?
Can you be charismatic?
Are you getting nervous when presenting?
When you speak, do you impress people?
How are your communication skills?
How is your language skills?
These and a lot more questions like this need to be addressed by the way you present.
See, this is actually an incredible opportunity for you.
It’s an unbelievable opportunity.
Why?
Imagine you are entering a college exam and you already know what the professor is going
to ask.
Wouldn’t it give you an almost unfair advantage?
It would, right?
This is exactly what it is.
You already know they will ask you that question.
So, you just need to put in the work.
You need to know how to present your background very clearly and impressively.
Alright so, how to do it?
I will present you 2 approaches.
Let’s call the first approach Toyota and the second one is Porsche.
In Toyota method, all you have to do is prepare a 1 minute pitch.
It will have 3 sections in it; 1 Talk about your current role
2 Talk briefly about your background 3 Talk about your future ambitions and why
that company is the perfect match to what you want.
Something similar to this ; So, this would be what I would say if I were
in an interview today;
I’ve been working as a manager with PwC Consulting for the past 4 years.
During this time, I’ve been providing incredible value to my clients through strategies we
developed and implemented for them.
These are typically projects lasted anywhere from a week to 4 months.
Looking back it now, I must have done a great job as engagement manager that our clients
particularly requested for me whenever they came back for new work packages.
Prior to PwC, I was with 2 other consulting companies again in professional services industry.
And finally, or I should say firstly in this case I guess, I started my career with S&P
as an analyst.
I was with S&P until 2008 which is when I was laid off – I guess some would find this
ironic…
In addition to this, I have an MBA degree from Cass Business School of City University
London and I hold various professional certifications including; PMP, PMI-RMP, and CMA.
Now I’m looking forward to taking my career to the next level with [the xxxx] and continue
to add more value to my clients under xxx]’s umbrella.
I think pitching above would be good enough but not necessarily something you would collect
so many points.
It would be like ticking the box.
If you want to gain even further points with your answer.
Then, I suggest you employ a technique which we use on a daily basis at work.
In my line of profession, in management consulting, we always present with supporting tools, for
example; a PowerPoint presentation, videos, charts, interviews with experts, the list
is long.
So, when I get interviewed by clients I always have at least a PowerPoint presentation made
up of only 3-4 pages which allows me to clearly highlight what my relevant experience is,
which methodologies we used, and how the results were.
I suggest you do the same.
When you are asked to present your background, or talk about your previous experiences, why
don’t you take your printed out presentation and walk them through the pages?
Try to get that presentation printed out professionally and binded with nice quality material.
So, when they say “tell me about yourself” then just say;
“Can I instead just show you?
I prepared a short presentation on this” They will definitely say yes.
This will work wonders if you are an experienced hire,
or at least have “some” experience to show.
This “some” experience can be small as an internships, on the job trainings, even
your part-time roles during studies will be fine.
The slides may look something similar to this; Imp
If you are interested, I will put a link to a page where you can download it.
Just remember to customize it to your needs.
You don’t need to sign up or enter your e-mail address.
It’s a direct download.
This template is a good starting point.
But you can make it more visually appealing.
While preparing your 3-slide presentation, focus on your;
- Key achievements - Make it relevant to the job you are applying
for - Demonstrate why you are qualified for this
role The final step is the most obvious one;
Practice!
You need to practice your speech and delivery until it becomes second nature to you.
There is no stuttering, uhmms, wells, it’s just smooth delivery with pauses and consistent
eye-contact.
Show them how charismatic you can be!
Before, I conclude the video, can you please do me a favor and like this video if you benefited
from it?
Also, this is a very new channel.
Creating these videos take so much time.
So, would you please subscribe to my channel if you’d like to see more videos like this?
They will be good indicators for me to see if I should spend more time on preparing more
videos.
Finally, I have one more awesomeness for you today.
I prepared a 3-day video training where I teach you how to prepare, pass, and most importantly
land interviews with multinational companies.
it’s a free training by the way.
It runs for 3 days so please make sure you are committed to it before signing up.
Trust me when I say I share some real life changing tips here.
Alright that’s it for today.