It is the first question in most interviews, it is not really a question, and almost everybody answers it badly — usually by reciting their CV in chronological order to somebody who has just read it.
What is actually being asked
Three things at once: can you speak clearly under mild pressure, do you understand what this job is, and is there an obvious reason you are sitting here. It is a framing question. Your answer sets what they ask next.
That last point is the one to exploit. Whatever you emphasise, they will follow up on. So put the thing you most want to talk about in this answer deliberately.
A structure that works
- Now — one sentence on what you do and roughly how long you have done it.
- Proof — two or three sentences on one specific thing you have done that is relevant to this posting. Not a career summary. One thing.
- Why here — one sentence connecting that to why you are in this room.
Sixty to ninety seconds in total. If you are past two minutes you have lost them, and they will not tell you.
A worked example
“I am a data analyst, four years, mostly in B2B software. The part I have got good at is the bit people find boring — getting two teams to agree on what a number actually means. At my current company sales and marketing had been reporting different revenue figures for a year, and I traced it back to how they each treated refunds, rewrote the definition and got both leads to sign off in a single meeting. Your posting mentions partnering with commercial teams three times, which is the part of the job I actually want more of.”
Eighty-eight words. One claim, one piece of evidence, one reason for being there. It also quietly invites the follow-up she wants: “tell me more about that.”
Four openings to avoid
- “Well, I was born in…” — they mean professionally. Everybody knows this and people still do it.
- Walking through your CV in order — they have it in front of them. Reading it aloud spends your best ninety seconds on information they already have.
- “I am a passionate, results-driven professional…” — adjectives with no facts behind them. Every candidate says this, which is precisely why it carries no information.
- “What would you like to know?” — it sounds collaborative and it reads as unprepared. They asked you an open question; answer it.
Should you mention personal things?
One short line is fine at the end if it is genuinely relevant or memorable. A sentence, not a paragraph, and never at the start — the first fifteen seconds are the most valuable ones you get.
The preparation that actually helps
Write it out once. Then say it out loud five times without reading it, and let the wording change each time. The goal is not a memorised script — a memorised answer sounds memorised and falls apart when they interrupt. The goal is knowing the three beats well enough that you can hit them in any order.
Record yourself on your phone once. It is uncomfortable, and it is the fastest way to notice that your setup is running forty seconds long.