On being asked please tell about yourself,is it ok to describe the project also?

[Monica Shiralkar]

A common interview question is "Tell me something about yourself". In response to this question, is it okay to also describe the work you have been doing in your project too i.e the project description. What kind of things can be said during the answer to this question ?

Thanks

[Tim Cooke]

When I ask that question in an interview I want to learn a little something about you as a person. What are your hobbies? What do you like to do outside of work? Maybe something interesting about your life journey up to this point? That kind of thing. I would have plenty of other questions to tease out details about your project work so to respond to this question with project talk would not be positive for me.

[Monica Shiralkar]

Tim Cooke wrote:When I ask that question in an interview I want to learn a little something about you as a person. What are your hobbies? What do you like to do outside of work? Maybe something interesting about your life journey up to this point? That kind of thing. I would have plenty of other questions to tease out details about your project work so to respond to this question with project talk would not be positive for me.

Thanks. However , instead of talking about hobbies etc would it not be a better idea to talk something technical to impress the interviewer and try giving him a reason to hire me?

[Liutauras Vilda]

Monica Shiralkar wrote:something technical

That's not what you were asked: "Tell me something about yourself".

If you really want to lean towards your technical proficiency, you could try to divert the chat in some way, i.e.: "During my free time I spend a lot of time working on my personal projects where I had a change to learn some cool technologies..."

But you don't need to rush things as most likely you will be asked anyway to tell more about the things you do in your current work/role, or what you have learned during your studies or so.

[fred rosenberger]

I agree with Tim.  After all, if they said "tell me about a project you worked on", would you talk about your hobbies?  

[Tim Cooke]

That's what the other questions are about. For this question I'm trying to figure out what kind of person you are, which is important because the hardest part of writing software in a team environment is not writing software but the interpersonal skills to work with others. Essentially I'm trying to figure out if the current team could work with you or whether you'd do our heads in.

To answer your question: when I ask this to a candidate I specifically don't want to hear about your technical skills and achievements.

[Tim Cooke]

Unless of course you're using your technical skills for some personal project or agenda, like developing new features for your favourite programming forum for example. But in that case be prepared for follow up questions on why you love that forum so much that you devote your spare time into it.

[Monica Shiralkar]

Thanks