The best way to explain your job and show what you know is by giving examples.

With any interview question, you can always start by giving a high level response but then, it’s much more credible and powerful if you get down to the concrete level too. The best way to get concrete, is to give concrete examples. So, when the interviewer asks you, can you tell me about the last project you implemented?

High level response: “I am responsible for designing the project methodology, and managing the entire project portfolio of about 3 ongoing software financial applications.”

Then, you can get down to the low level response by saying, “For example, this past year I made detailed project plans, which considered the following criteria: the project purpose, the resources, the risks (and be prepared to detail what they were), the timing and each task for the 10 people participating in the project. The goal of the project was to put into place 3 new applications for the marketing, finance and procurement teams. These applications were used by about 18 key users. I was responsible for initiating the project but also negotiating the project scope with stakeholders, mitigating the risks, setting up the entire scheduling included resources, tasks, dates for deliverables and estimated costs. It was my responsibility to ensure that the quality of the application ultimately met the client requirements.

Even though to you, it may seem obvious that your job is to mitigate risks and make the project plan, you need to communicate those obvious details to your interviewer in a precise and clear way. By having that little reminder, ‘for example’ in the forefront of your mind, you will always be concrete and no longer floating on the high tower.

After all, who wants to work with a flighty ruling aunt who sits on the high tower and looks down on the bunch, busily bustling away.