How to answer 'TELL ME ABOUT YOURSELF' - Could you all give an ideal answer from your perspect

Dear Sirs/Madams, Could you all give an ideal answer from your perspective to the question, 'Tell me about yourself'' for an interview? I ask it for an experienced candidate, who has a career gap due to marriage and childbirth in between. Could you give your ideas about how to answer this question in the best possible way? I would be really grateful if you could help me.

Dear Priya,

"Tell me about yourself" this question is a most probably asked in the job interview to reduce the anxiety of the candidate. Everyone is comfortable with the past and telling about the past is the easiest thing. While giving an answer, the candidate has the luxury of filtering the negatives of one's career and can project the positive side of one's career. Secondly, the candidate can summarise his/her career.

There are many interviewers who pretend to be "busy" and do not read the CV of the candidate before calling the candidate for the interview. "Tell me about yourself", this question comes handy to those lazy interviewers. When the candidate starts giving the reply, these interviewers spend time in glancing over the CV and get time to prepare for the next question.

Frankly speaking, as per international standards, "Tell me about yourself" questions does not have any meaning. This question does not test any competency of the candidate.

On Google, sufficient information is available on how to give a reply to this question. You may browse and find out a suitable answer.

Thanks,

Dinesh Divekar

Sir,
I understand what you mean to say. Thank you so much for taking your time to clarify my doubt. But it would be great, if anyone could help me out by quoting an example about how the ideal answer should be.
Regards,
Priya

Dear Priya,
There is no ideal answer for "Tell me about yourself" question. It is impossible to imagine what is the psychology of the interviewer and what are his/her preferences.
To seek clarification, you ask the interviewer from where to start, whether from childhood or from your first job.
However, as written in the previous post, you may give a brief summary of your career. After completing your education, as you stepped into the professional world, start from that. Thereafter, tell in brief the nature of each job and what something new learnt in each job. Overall, you should project the positive side of your candidature. The career break if any may be mentioned. However, also mention what self-learning did you do during the break.
All the best!
Dinesh Divekar

Hello Priya,
I found one of the blogs on this topic interview questions answers, please visit for details.
https://hayaprojects.blogspot.com/
Zyn

I think it's better to point out what my answer would be...Then you can help me to improve it further.

''My name is Priya ,I am working as HR Business Partner for XYZ PVT LTD from March 2019.My current job responsibilities starts everything from recruitment, onboarding to off boarding.

My career can be described as 2 different innings, first before my marriage and then my second inning, which is my current job.

Before my marriage I was working with XYZ company from 2009 to 2012.First I joined there as Executive HR after completion of MBA, and then after 8 months I got promoted as HR officer, where in I was a was responsible for entire HR and Welfare department. I was directly reporting to Managing Director and the rest of the department was reporting to me.

And then I got married. It was our family decision was that I should focus on family .And then our kids are born .I was busy raising them.But I enjoyed the time,I could spend quality time with my kids and family and at the same time I kept my skills polished by making sure myself that daily I spend time to learn and read something about HR . Once my kids started full time schooling, I thought now it's the time to start my second innings. That's the reason I have joined a start up in 2019.''

Kindly help me to polish this in the best way possible.

With lots of gratitude,

Priya

You may start with furnishing your personal information in a brief manner - start your introduction with your name, something about your parents and family, then spouse, his job/employment/business, your educational background and after that you may start
your career details - begin with your first employment, name of company,designation and
brief work responsibility , then 2nd - in a chronological order; you may also cite your reason
for why you want a change from your existing job to a new one, then what will be your aim/ambition, after say 6-8 years at what level you would like to see yourselves.

The description focusses mainly on the career, suggest you to include your educational particulars including the school & college level education and a possible explanation on why you chose a career in HR management, after the first para.
Your description of the first innings and the gap thereafter as well as the present innings show you to be a determined, innovative and achievement oriented person and is a convincing answer. Possibly you could edit out the details of post marriage phase if you find the interviewer showing less interest.

Dear Priya,
How to give a reply to the question "Tell me about yourself" is your choice. However, I would like to highlight a different point about the proposed answer that you have posted at Post No 6 of this thread.
Yours is going to be formal employment and for formal employment, it will be an official job interview. Therefore, your tone is expected to be formal and not informal. However, when one reads your reply, one feels the description is as if you are talking with your friend in an informal manner. There are informal expressions in your reply. How do you describe yourself is one thing but how to keep the method of description formal is another.
To know the difference between formal and informal expressions, you may search it on Google or Youtube.
Thanks,
Dinesh Divekar

Dear Madam,
This is an open-ended , exploratory question. You can choose to present yourself by putting your best foot forward. Your attempt to do so in your own words is good.
There cannot be an ideal answer. You choose and highlight in brief your education, family background and contribution you made in your job.
Besides , highlight why you chose HR as a career.
Present it in such manner that
the interviewers will have to ask further on these aspects for which you can prepare well in advance. If necessary, do rehearsal in front of the mirror or video shoot this so that you can watch yourself live . This will boost your self- confidence and facilitate necessary modifications in your presentation.
Regards and best of luck.
Vinayak Nagarkar
HR and Employee Relations Consultant