After redundancy: how to introduce yourself without explaining your career

Especially after redundancy, stop introducing yourself — start positioning yourself

Losing your job changes more than your employment status. It often distorts how you talk about yourself.

Especially after redundancy, many professionals over-explain: long career histories, defensive justifications, full biographies. Especially when asked the seemingly innocent question:

“So… tell me about yourself.”

Harvard Business Review recently reminded us of something critical:
the interviewer already knows your résumé so here is the HBR-how to introduce yourself.

Repeating it adds no value. What does add value, especially after job loss, is positioning, not storytelling.

The shift: from “who I am” to “why I matter here”

Interviews are not about proving your worth. If you weren’t qualified, you wouldn’t be in the room. They are about your fit against a specific need. That means:

• Understanding what this role truly requires
• Selecting one or two strengths that directly serve that need
• Backing them with a concrete, relevant example

Your introduction should quietly answer one question: “Why am I the safest, smartest bet for this problem?”

Use the same logic in your CV and cover letter

This approach doesn’t start in the interview. It starts on your pages.

CV

• Stop listing responsibilities
• Start showing where you solved the same problem they now have
• Reorder bullets so relevance beats chronology

Cover letter

• Avoid motivation essays
• Open with recognition of their challenge
• Position yourself as someone who has already operated in that context

Think less “career summary”, think more “evidence of relevance”

Check this post for more details on: Practical CV rewriting guidance – salomons.coach

One sentence test

If you had to introduce yourself in one sentence, could you complete this honestly?

“They are looking for someone who can …………, and that is exactly what I have been doing in ………….. situations.”

If not, the work is not in your wording. It’s in your positioning.

Job loss does not reduce your value. But it does require precision.

Those who navigate redundancy best are not the ones who explain themselves better, they are the ones who match themselves better.

I am an experienced coach in this area, do yourself a favor and accelerate your ability to position yourself for the next job!