Shadowing Practice: Tell Me About Yourself | Best Answer (from former CEO) - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Hey everyone!
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So tell me about yourself.
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The most common job interview question of all time.
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Usually the thing that they ask you first as an icebreaker when you first sit down at your job interview.
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Now there are a million ways to answer this open -ended question
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and there's also about a million YouTube videos out there giving you various ways to answer it.
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But today I'm going to give you the quickest, simplest, best way I've seen to answer this question.
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Okay let's look at this thing from the other side of the fence.
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Let's look at it from the perspective of the recruiter or hiring manager.
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Usually when you post a position, you get a lot of responses and you may well end up with,
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especially these days, with over a hundred candidates applying for the position.
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So for you, this is an elimination game.
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Your job is to go from a hundred applications down to one candidate that you select.
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Now, from the perspective of the job seeker who is being interviewed, you don't know the criteria they use to eliminate people.
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Oh sure, there's posted requirements for the position, but the problem is more than one person may meet all posted requirements.
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So there's often a hidden criteria that they don't tell you of what will get you eliminated or hired.
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For example, something I've seen in the past is a hiring manager who's a fan of a particular sports team
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and if you happen to volunteer that you're a fan of the opposing sports team
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that may be grounds to eliminate you on the fact
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that you might not be a good fit
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and this does happen now we're going to make one assumption here
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and that is that they've actually read your resume
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if you apply for a position and you send in your resume
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and then they later receive it and then call you in for an interview usually
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that means that they've read your resume not always i have seen cases where that hasn't actually occurred.
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But in the vast majority of cases, we can assume this to be true.
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So what does this mean?
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This means that the content on your resume is safe.
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Everything you've written on there did not result in you getting eliminated.
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So it's safe content to use.
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And we're going to be coming back to that.
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Now, when you get asked, tell me about yourself in a job interview, this is what you do.
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Start off by saying, well, as you can see from my resume,
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that's the first thing you say then go down your resume in chronological order starting with the oldest material
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and then getting closer to the present
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and finally talking about your most recent experience
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this should take about 45 seconds no more than a minute then end with the phrase
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and that's what brings me here today and why i'm excited to learn more about this opportunity you
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You see, your purpose in a job interview is to communicate to the person interviewing you how you're the person for the job,
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how you meet all the qualifications.
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That's your purpose in the interview.
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You don't want to waste your time talking about something you did 15 years ago
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that has absolutely nothing to do with this position and is just taking up time.
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That's why you want to summarize your resume in 45 seconds to a minute.
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No more than that, really.
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See, it's a well -known fact that people absorb and retain only a small proportion of what they hear.
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It's like a very small percentage of what you hear that you actually understand and retain and can recall later.
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So that's why you want to mention more than once how you meet all the qualifications.
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You want to make sure it registers.
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So when you get the question, tell me about yourself, all you have to do is say, well, as you can see from my resume,
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and then you summarize your resume in about 45 seconds to a minute.
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Maybe start with your education, start with your oldest experience, and then come up chronologically to the present, where you end with your most recent experience,
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and then you end with the phrase, and that's what brings me here today, and why I'm excited to learn more about this opportunity.
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See, you want to spend as much time as possible talking about this opportunity, not stuff you've done in the past.
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That's why it's very important to try
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and steer the conversation from something you've done years ago to get them to talk about this position
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so you can explain how you meet the requirements.
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So this is actually part of a new YouTube series I'm doing.
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I'm going to go through all the common job interview questions and we're going to talk about the hiring process in general.
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I actually teach this at a postgraduate level
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and I've been on both sides of it hiring and being hired
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so hopefully that'll be useful for you please take a moment now to click the like subscribe
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and bell buttons and also be sure to check out my patreon site for some extra content
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and consider supporting me there too
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so once again i'm bill the company's expert thank you so much for being here and watching my videos you're awesome
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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 “Tell Me About Yourself”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: resume, interview, position, hiring, meet. This video has 26 sentences and 897 words to shadow. The speech runs for 4:57. The speaker talks fast, about 181 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 89% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| resume verb | /ˈɹɛz.ə.meɪ/ | To start (something) again that has been stopped or paused from the point at which it was stopped or paused; continue, carry on. |
| hire verb | /ˈhaɪɹ/ | To obtain the services of in return for fixed payment. |
| eliminate verb | /ɪˈlɪm.ɪ.neɪt/ | To completely remove, get rid of, put an end to. |
| requirement noun | /ɹɪˈkwaɪɹmənt/ | A necessity or prerequisite; something required or obligatory. Its adpositions are generally of in relation to who or what has given it, on in relation to whom… |
| phrase noun | /ˈfɹeɪ̯z/ | A short written or spoken expression. |
| retain verb | /ɹəˈteɪn/ | Often followed by from: to hold back (someone or something); to check, to prevent, to restrain, to stop. |
| qualification noun | /ˌkwɑlɪfɪˈkeɪʃən/ | The act or process of qualifying for a position, achievement etc. |
| vast adjective | /væst/ | Very large or wide (literally or figuratively). |
| percentage noun | /pə(ɹ)ˈsɛntɪd͡ʒ/ | The amount, number or rate of something, regarded as part of a total of 100; a part of a whole. |
| occur verb | /əˈkɜː/ | To happen or take place. |
| select verb | /sɪˈlɛkt/ | To choose one or more elements of a set, especially a set of options. |
| recall verb | /ɹɪˈkɔl/ | To withdraw, retract (one's words etc.); to revoke (an order). |
| volunteer noun | /ˌvɑlənˈtɪɹ/ | One who enters into, or offers themselves for, any service of their own free will, especially when done without pay. |
| fence noun | /fɛns/ | A thin artificial barrier that separates two pieces of land or forms a perimeter enclosing the lands of a house, building, etc. |
| communicate verb | /kəˈmjuːnɪkeɪt/ | To impart or transmit (information or knowledge) to someone; to make known, to tell. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| check out verb | To record the departure or withdrawal of someone or something (such as guests, employees, books, etc.). |
| come up verb | To emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly. |
| go down verb | To descend; to move from a higher place to a lower one. |
| go through verb | To travel from one end of something to the other. |
| start off verb | To begin. |
| take up verb | To pick up. |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | I've seen · they've actually read · they've read |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | being interviewed · being hired |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 28 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, don't, gonna. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: qualification /ˌkwɑlɪfɪˈkeɪʃən/, proportion /pɹəˈpɔɹʃən/, assumption /əˈsʌm(p).ʃ(ə)n/, elimination /ɪlɪmɪˈneɪʃ(ə)n/
- Long words — get the stress right: eliminate /ɪˈlɪm.ɪ.neɪt/, qualification /ˌkwɑlɪfɪˈkeɪʃən/, communicate /kəˈmjuːnɪkeɪt/, elimination /ɪlɪmɪˈneɪʃ(ə)n/, criterion /kɹaɪˈtɪɹ.i.ən/
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 resume, hire, eliminate.
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.