Shadowing Practice: Describe Your Work Experience in English. Job Interviews & Networking | Business English - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Hey, everyone.
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Welcome back to the Business English Podcast.
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I'm Alex.
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And I'm Emily.
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And today, we're tackling a question that sounds easy and absolutely is not.
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It's four tiny words.
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So, what do you do?
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The most dangerous question at any party.
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Because you have about 10 seconds to describe your entire working life, and most of us completely fumble it.
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We do.
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We either say our job title and nothing else.
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I'm an accountant.
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Full stop.
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Conversation over.
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Or we panic and tell them everything start to finish until their eyes slowly glaze over.
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I know the glaze well.
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I get it every time.
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Someone asks what I do.
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I say, I talk into a microphone.
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And they nod, and they look around the room for someone more interesting.
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You do not say that.
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I have said exactly that.
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More than once.
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And this matters so much more than people think, because you talk about your work experience constantly.
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In a job interview, obviously.
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But also on your first day, when you meet new colleagues.
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At a conference.
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At a networking event where a stranger walks up and says, So, what's your line of work?
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And in every one of those rooms, the person who can describe their experience clearly and warmly just does better.
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They get remembered.
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They get the callback, the introduction, the, oh, you should meet my boss.
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So today, four scenes, four different rooms.
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A job interview, a first day meeting a new colleague,
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a conference, and one tricky situation how to talk about something you're proud of without sounding like you're showing off.
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And the good news is, it's the same core skill underneath all four, with the dial turned up or down.
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Describe what you do, make it human, and hand the conversation back.
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That's it.
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That's the whole game.
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And here's the reassuring part.
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You don't need perfect, fancy English for any of this.
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You need a handful of clear phrases and the confidence to hand the conversation back.
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We'll give you the phrases.
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The confidence just comes from saying them out loud a few times first.
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Confidence through repetition.
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My favorite kind of confidence.
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And these phrases travel.
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Say, I head up the design team.
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Or, I've spent most of my career in logistics.
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Or, what line of work are you in?
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In London, New York, Singapore, Sydney, or Dublin.
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And everyone you meet will know exactly what you mean.
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And think, this person is easy to talk to.
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So let's start in the highest pressure room of them all.
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The interview.
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Where someone looks you in the eye and says the scariest four words in business English.
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Tell me about yourself.
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Set it up for us.
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So Lina is interviewing for a marketing role.
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Across the table is Gaspard the hiring manager.
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He opens with the classic.
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Listen for how she gives a shape to her answer instead of just listing jobs.
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Thanks for coming in, Lina.
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So to get us started, tell me a little about yourself. Of course.
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So the short version.
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I've spent the last six years in marketing, mostly in the food industry.
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I started out as a content writer, then moved into campaign management.
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And for the last two years, I've been leading a small team.
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Great.
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And what drew you to apply here?
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Honestly, your brand.
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I've followed your campaigns for a while.
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In my current role, I'm responsible for our social media and email, and I've seen what good storytelling can do for a product.
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I'd love to do that at a bigger scale.
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Tell me about something you're responsible for day -to -day.
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Sure.
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Day -to -day, I look after our content calendar and manage two writers.
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But the part I enjoy most is the strategy, deciding what story we're telling each season.
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Last year, I led a campaign that we built entirely around customer stories, and it became our best -performing campaign to date.
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And how would you describe your strengths?
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I'd say I specialize in turning data into a story.
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My role these days is part creative, part analytical.
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I'm comfortable in a spreadsheet, and I'm comfortable writing the headline.
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That mix is fairly rare, and it's what I'd bring here.
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That's exactly the kind of thinking we need.
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Tell me more about that later.
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I'd be happy to.
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Now that is how you answer, tell me about yourself.
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Let's pull the phrases because she did several things really well.
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First, she gave it a shape.
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Past, present, and where she's going.
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She said, I've spent the last six years in marketing.
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Then, I started out as a content writer, then moved into campaign management.
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That little word then is doing a lot of work.
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It turns a list into a journey.
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You can say, I started out in sales, then moved into account management.
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Past to present in one clean line.
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And notice the phrase, I started out as.
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To start out means where you began your career.
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You can say, I started out as a junior developer or I started out in a call center.
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It's a lovely, humble way to begin.
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Everyone started somewhere and people warmed to it.
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Then the present day phrases, and these are gold.
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I'm responsible for and I look after.
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Both mean the things that are your job.
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You can say, I'm responsible for the budget or I look after our key accounts.
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Look after is a touch warmer and more natural in conversation.
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You look after clients the way you'd look after a garden.
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And she used, I've been leading a small team.
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Not, I am the leader, I've been leading.
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In English, when you talk about something you started in the past and are still doing, you use that I've been form.
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You can say, I've been managing this project for a year.
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Or, I've been working in finance since 2019.
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It quietly signals experience and continuity.
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And when Gaspar asked about her strengths, she said, I specialize in turning data into a story.
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To specialize in something means it's your particular strength, your focus.
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You can say, I specialize in tax for small businesses.
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Or, we specialize in software for hospitals.
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It tells people not just what you do, but what you're especially good at.
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And she framed the job itself with, my role is.
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You can say, my role is to keep the project on track.
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Or, my role is part design, part research.
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It's a clean, confident way to say what you own.
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And that little pattern, part this, part that, is perfect for a job that's really a blend of two things.
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And one more she slipped in. To date.
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Her best performing campaign, to date, means up to now, so far.
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You can say, it's our biggest client to date, or that's the best result to date.
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It's a small professional phrase that makes you sound measured rather than boastful.
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Right, that's the interview.
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High stakes, prepared answer.
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Now let's walk into a much more relaxed room.
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Because your first week in a new job is its own kind of interview, just friendlier.
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You meet a dozen people, and every one of them asks some version of, so what do you do here?
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Here's Pavel, who started on Monday, grabbing a coffee in the office kitchen.
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Esme, who's been there for years, introduces herself.
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Listen for how they keep it light.
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This is small talk, not a performance review.
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You must be the new person.
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I'm Esme.
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I'm in finance.
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Pavel, nice to meet you.
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I just started on Monday, actually, still finding my feet.
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Welcome.
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So what are you doing here?
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What's your role?
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I've joined the product team.
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I'm a product designer, so basically I work on how the app looks and feels.
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In practice, that means a lot of drawing boxes and asking people why they can't find the button.
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Ha!
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We definitely need that.
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Where were you before?
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I was at a smaller startup for three years.
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I kind of wore a lot of hats there.
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Design, a bit of research, even some customer support.
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Here it's more focused, which honestly is a nice change.
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Nice.
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And are you a designer by trade, or did you fall into it?
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Fell into it, honestly.
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I studied psychology, worked my way up through a few odd jobs, and found design somewhere along the way.
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Best accident I ever had.
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You'll fit right in.
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If you ever need anything from the finance side, just come find me.
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I'm two desks down.
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I appreciate that.
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I'll probably take you up on it.
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So much lighter, right?
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Nobody's being graded.
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Let's grab the phrases because casual self -introductions have their own little toolkits.
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First, the softener for being new.
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I'm still finding my feet.
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To find your feet means to get comfortable in a new situation.
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You can say, I'm still finding my feet, or give me a week to find my feet.
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It's perfect for a first day.
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honest, relaxed, and nobody expects you to know everything yet.
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And Pavel gave a brilliant, plain English version of his job.
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He said, I'm a product designer, the title, and then immediately, so basically I work on how the app looks and feels.
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That word basically is your best friend.
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You can say, I'm a data analyst, so basically I turn messy numbers into clear answers.
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Title first.
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then the human translation.
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Nobody's eyes glaze over when you do that.
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And the phrase, in practice that means, that's how you show what the job really looks like day to day,
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with a bit of honesty and humor.
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Pavel said, in practice that means a lot of drawing boxes and asking people why they can't find the button.
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You can say, I'm in HR, and in practice that means I spend half my day listening.
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It makes you relatable, not just a job title.
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And then a wonderful idiom, I wore a lot of hats.
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To wear many hats means you do lots of different jobs, not just one.
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You can say, at my last place, I wore a lot of hats.
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Or, in a small company, you wear every hat there is.
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It's the perfect way to describe a role that was really five roles.
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People in big companies hear it and feel a little envious.
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And two more Pavel gave us.
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By trade, your official profession, the thing you trained as.
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You can say, I'm an engineer by trade, or she's a lawyer by trade, but she runs a bakery now.
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And admitting you fell into a job by accident is a warm and very human thing to say.
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And I worked my way up.
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That means you started low and climbed step by step.
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You can say, I worked my way up from the warehouse to management.
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Or, she worked her way up over 10 years.
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People love that phrase.
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It's the sound of someone who earned every bit of it.
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And one tiny natural phrase for moving on to your history.
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Where were you before?
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And the answer, I was at.
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You can say, I was at a marketing agency before this.
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Or, before here, I was in banking.
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Simple past because it's finished.
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In, then at, then before.
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The little words that stitch a career together.
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Now let's take all of this into a room full of strangers.
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The networking event.
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Because this is where a lot of learners freeze.
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A conference, a drinks reception, a room full of people you've never met.
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And you have to walk up and talk about your work to someone who owes you nothing.
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Here are Mateo and Juno, two people who've never met, standing near the coffee at a tech conference.
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Watch how a good, what -do -you -do conversation actually flows.
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It's a rally, back and forth, not a speech.
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This coffee line is the real conference, isn't it?
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I'm Mateo, by the way.
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Juno, nice to meet you.
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And yes, I've done more networking right here than in any of the talks.
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So what brings you here, Juno? what's your line of work?
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I work in cybersecurity.
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I help companies figure out where they're vulnerable before someone else does.
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Sounds dramatic, but mostly it's spreadsheets.
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How about you?
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I'm in the same world, sort of.
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I'm a software engineer, but I've been drifting toward the security side, which is honestly why I'm here.
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I'm trying to learn the ropes.
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Oh, then you should go to the two o 'clock session.
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What kind of engineering is your background?
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Mostly back -end.
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I've been at a fintech company for about four years.
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Payments, mostly, which is how I got interested in security in the first place.
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You can't do payments without thinking about risk.
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That makes total sense.
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Here, let me give you my details.
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If you have questions about making the jump, I'm happy to help.
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That would be fantastic.
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Thank you, Juno.
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I'll definitely reach out.
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A perfect little networking exchange.
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Nobody oversold.
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Nobody lectured.
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Let's pull the phrases.
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Start with the questions, because at a networking event, asking is just as important as answering.
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What brings you here?
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And what's your line of work?
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Your line of work just means your field, your profession.
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You can say, what's your line of work?
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Or what line are you in?
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And what brings you here is the perfect opener.
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It works at any event on Earth.
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And Juno answered her job with a formula worth memorizing.
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I help.
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She didn't say, I'm a cybersecurity consultant, which means nothing to most people.
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She said, I help companies figure out where they're vulnerable.
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You can say, I help small businesses pay less tax, or I help hospitals run more smoothly.
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The pattern is, I help plus who plus what.
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It instantly makes your job make sense.
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And she did something clever and very likable.
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She undersold the glamour.
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She said, sounds dramatic, but mostly it's spreadsheets.
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A little self -deprecation makes you human and easy to talk to.
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You can say, it sounds exciting, but it's mostly email.
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People relax when you don't take yourself too seriously.
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Then, the single most important word in the whole episode.
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After she answered, she said, how about you?
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She handed the conversation back.
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You can say, how about you?
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Or, what about yourself?
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Or, and you?
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This is what turns a nervous exchange into a real conversation.
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The best networkers aren't the best talkers.
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They're the ones who ask the next question.
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And one more for keeping it short and painless, in a nutshell.
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It means the very quick version, and it's a gift when you can feel a conversation getting too long.
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You can say, in a nutshell, I keep the website running.
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Or, my job, in a nutshell, is to stop us spending money we don't have.
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Short, friendly, done.
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And when the other person's job sounds interesting, the kindest, most memorable thing you can do is lean in.
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You can say, Oh, tell me more.
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Or, how does that actually work?
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Or, what's that like?
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At a networking event, being interested beats being interesting every single time.
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And Mateo gave us the phrase for changing direction in your career.
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I've been drifting toward.
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And the lovely idiom, learn the ropes.
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To learn the ropes means to learn how something is done, the basics of a new area.
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You can say, I'm still learning the ropes, or she taught me the ropes.
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And my background, what's your background, is the professional way to ask what someone did before.
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You can say, my background is in engineering, or I come from a finance background.
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Right, one more room.
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And this one is the trickiest of all.
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Because at some point, in a review, a pitch, an interview, you have to talk about something you did well.
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And a lot of people, especially outside the U .S., find this genuinely uncomfortable.
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They either shrink it down to nothing, or they overdo it and feel like they're bragging.
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Here's Sadie talking to Wendell, a senior manager in a career check -in.
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He asks her about a project she led.
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Listen for how she takes full credit without once sounding arrogant.
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Sadie, I wanted to hear about the onboarding project in your own words.
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That was a big one.
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It was.
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So, the background.
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We were losing a lot of new users in the first week.
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They'd sign up and then disappear.
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I was asked to lead a small team to fix it.
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And how did it go?
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Really well in the end.
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We rebuilt the whole first -time experience.
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It took about three months, and we brought first -week drop -off down by nearly half.
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I was lucky to have a brilliant team on it.
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That's a huge result.
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What was your role specifically?
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I set the direction and kept everyone aligned.
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I won't pretend I wrote the code.
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That was the engineers.
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But I was the one who kept us focused on the user, and I'm proud of how we pulled together.
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And if you had to do it again?
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I'd pull the engineers in even earlier.
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If I took one lesson from it, it's that the best ideas show up when everyone's in the room from day one,
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not just at the end.
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That's leadership.
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That's exactly what I was hoping to hear.
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She just gave a master class.
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She took real credit, stayed warm, and never once sounded full of herself.
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Let's see how she did it.
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First, she set the scene before the result.
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She said, we were losing a lot of new users.
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Then, I was asked to lead a small team to fix it.
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That phrase, I was asked to, is quietly powerful.
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It means someone trusted you with it.
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You can say, I was brought in to turn the project around, or I was asked to lead the rollout.
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The task found you.
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You didn't have to boast.
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And she talked about results with a real number, but plainly.
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We brought first week drop -off down by nearly half.
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You can say, we cut costs by about a third, or we doubled our output in a year.
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A concrete before and after is the most convincing thing you can say, and it doesn't feel like bragging because numbers just sound like facts.
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Then the magic move, the word we.
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Listen again to how often she said we.
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We rebuilt.
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We brought it down.
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How we pulled together.
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Generous people say we for the work and save I for their specific part.
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You can say, we hit the target and my piece was the planning.
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It makes you sound like a leader, not a show -off.
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And she was honest about what wasn't hers.
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She said, I won't pretend I wrote the code.
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That was the engineer's.
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That little bit of honesty makes everything else she says more believable.
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You can say, I can't take credit for the design.
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That was the team.
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Owning your real part and only your real part is what makes you trustworthy.
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And to finish, the soft, confident phrases.
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I was lucky to have a brilliant team and I'm proud of how we pulled together.
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I'm proud of is the grownup way to express achievement.
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It's warm, it's genuine, and it isn't bragging.
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You can say, I'm really proud of that launch, or I'm proud of what the team built.
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Proud, not boastful.
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There's a world of difference, and English hears it instantly.
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So think back over those four rooms, because talking about your experience is really one skill.
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Dress differently each time.
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In the interview, you give your story a shape, past, present, and direction.
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You say, I started out as, and, then I moved into, and, I've been leading.
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You talk about what you're responsible for and what you look after.
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And you keep it measured with little phrases like, to date.
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With a new colleague, you turn the dial down and keep it human.
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You admit you're still finding your feet.
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You give your title and then the plain English version.
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Basically, I, you say what the job looks like in practice.
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And if you did a bit of everything, you say you wore a lot of hats.
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At the networking event, you make it a rally, not a speech.
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You ask, what's your line of work?
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And what brings you here?
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You explain your job with I help plus who plus what.
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You undersell the glamour a little.
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And above all, you hand it back.
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How about you?
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And when you talk about an achievement, you set the scene first, you say, I was asked to, you give a plain before and after number,
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you say we for the work, you're honest about what wasn't yours, and you finish with, I'm proud of.
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Full credit, zero bragging.
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And underneath all four, the same quiet truth.
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People don't remember your job title.
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They remember whether talking to you was easy.
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Clear, warm, and curious about them, that's what gets you the callback, the introduction, the second conversation.
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So here's your challenge before the next episode.
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Write your own answer to, so what do you do?
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But the good version.
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One line with the human translation using I help or basically I.
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Say it out loud until it feels natural.
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Then write one sentence about something you're proud of at work, starting with, I was asked to.
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Two sentences, your own real work, ready in your pocket.
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Because the next time someone asks what you do, you won't freeze, and you definitely won't say, I talk into a microphone.
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Which, to be fair, is technically true for you.
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It is deeply true, and deeply boring.
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Do as I say, not as I do.
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And tell us in the comments, what do you do?
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Give us your one good line.
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We'd genuinely love to read them, and we'll feature the best ones in a future episode.
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New episodes twice a week.
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If this one helped, send it to the friend who's brilliant at their job
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but goes completely blank the moment someone asks them about it.
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We all know one.
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Maybe we've all been one.
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So this week, write your two sentences and go and use them.
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Take care.
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Thank you.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “Describe Your Work Experience in English. Job Interviews & Networking”. This video has 408 sentences and 3750 words to shadow. The speech runs for 24:11. The speaker talks at a natural 155 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. 85% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| phrase noun | /ˈfɹeɪ̯z/ | A short written or spoken expression. |
| rope noun | /ɹoʊp/ | Thick strings, yarn, monofilaments, metal wires, or strands of other cordage that are twisted together to form a stronger line. |
| plain noun | /pleɪn/ | An expanse of land with relatively low relief and few trees, especially a grassy expanse. |
| designer noun | /dɪˈzaɪnɚ/ | A person who designs something, or who designs things as a profession. |
| relax verb | /ɹɪˈlæks/ | To make something loose. |
| colleague noun | /ˈkɒliːɡ/ | A fellow member of a profession, staff, academic faculty or other organization; an associate, a workmate. |
| deeply adverb | /ˈdi(ː)pli/ | To a deep extent or degree; very greatly. |
| skill noun | /skɪl/ | A capacity to do something well; a technique, an ability, usually acquired or learned, as opposed to abilities that are regarded as innate. |
| dramatic adjective | /dɹəˈmætɪk/ | Of or relating to the drama. |
| translation noun | /tɹænzˈleɪʃən/ | The conversion of text from one language to another. |
| achievement noun | /əˈt͡ʃiːv.mənt/ | The act of achieving or performing; a successful performance; accomplishment. |
| rally noun | /ˈɹæli/ | A public gathering or mass meeting that is not mainly a protest and is organized to inspire enthusiasm for a cause. |
| pretend verb | /pɹəˈtɛnd/ | To speak or behave so as to give a false or simulated appearance. |
| instantly adverb | /ˈɪnstəntli/ | At once; without delay. |
| vulnerable adjective | /ˈvʌln(ə)ɹəbl̩/ | More or most likely to be exposed to the chance of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| start out verb | To emerge suddenly; to jump out. |
| pull together verb | To unite for a common objective. |
| drop off verb | To fall asleep. |
| figure out verb | To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce. |
| show off verb | To exhibit the best attributes of something. |
| head up verb | To lead or take the lead in; to direct; to take charge of. |
| look around verb | To inspect a building or area. |
| reach out verb | To extend one's hand(s) forward; to reach for something. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- What kind of engineering is your background?
- You can say, what's your line of work?
- After she answered, she said, how about you?
- You can say, how about you?
- You ask, what's your line of work?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | I've been leading · I've been managing · I've been working |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have said · I've spent · I've followed |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | being graded · was asked · was brought |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | person who can · someone who earned · someone who owes |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 99 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, I've, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: underneath /ˌʌndɚˈniθ/, smoothly /ˈsmuːðli/, trustworthy /ˈtɹʌst.wɜː.ði/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: translation /tɹænzˈleɪʃən/, profession /pɹəˈfɛʃ.ən/, casual /ˈkæʒ(u)əl/, reception /ɹɪˈsɛp.ʃn̩/, specialize /ˈspɛʃəˌlaɪz/
- Long words — get the stress right: genuinely /ˈd͡ʒɛn.ju.ɪn.li/, psychology /saɪˈkɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/, differently /ˈdɪf.ə.ɹənt.li/, developer /dɪˈvɛləpɚ/, uncomfortable /ʌnˈkʌm.fɚ.tə.bl̩/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like phrase, rope, plain.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.