Why did you leave a job?

Matt Murdock

How would you tackle such a question in an interview?
I have had to leave a job due to a pr1ck of a boss. Any interview where I have been asked why I left I have not got the job.

Any advice.

amtc

Genuinely both the parents were not well as and I'm only child.

CINCLANTFLT

Well, while there are both push and pull factors, it us the pull I am focusing on... I feel that I can expand on the excellent oppurtunities I have been given with my current employer by becoming part of the team here...


You get the idea :-)

....... didn't feel it was for me and I had some savings and fancied some time off until a suitable opportunity arose.

matrim

Matt Murdock wrote: »

How would you tackle such a question in an interview?
I have had to leave a job due to a pr1ck of a boss. Any interview where I have been asked why I left I have not got the job.

Any advice.

There are many vague answers that you can give and the main point to remember when answering a question like that is to not bad mouth the previous company.

Typically I would go with something like "I was looking for a new challenge" or "wanted to progress my career and the opportunities weren't available in the old company". Both are part of the reasons I've left companies but they don't give the full truth.

For example, the main driver for me leaving one company was that I didn't get a bonus despite deserving it more that others who did get it, however I wouldn't say that and as I was also a bit bored with the job, saying I was looking for a new challenge is also true.

5rtytry56

critical:

matrim wrote: »

..... not bad mouth the previous company.

The main point of this question is to see how well you can phrase a negative sentiment like "i had a prick of a boss"

Heart Break Kid

"I needed a change"
"A new challange"

Irish_Elect_Eng

It is critical to remember that you new boss will be your ex-boss some day. Nobody will hire a person that will badmouth their last boss EVEN if they now 100% that what you are saying is true. Even if your las boss was a tit, a certain level of loyalty and discretion can demonstrate your character to a new employer.

My last reason was:

" The nature of the business changed and the role that I was successful in no longer was no longer core to the success of the business, as a result there was very limited opportunity for career development. So I regretfully decided to move on after 5 great years with a team of great engineers, many of whom I am still in contact with as I value my extended network as a valuable technical support resource."

livedadream

Matt Murdock wrote: »

How would you tackle such a question in an interview?
I have had to leave a job due to a pr1ck of a boss. Any interview where I have been asked why I left I have not got the job.

Any advice.

it depends, are you interviewing while still working there and wanting to leave,

or did you leave with no back up?

leaving because of your boss being a prick is totally understandable, leaving with no back up can mean that you make rash decisions without thinking though the consequences.

it also depends on the job, if it was a contract role, you can just say your contract ended.

if it was a perm role its tougher.

saying something like, i wanted a challange or a change works but leaving a job without having a job can mean many recruiters can read into it and know something else happened. loads of people leave jobs for a bigger challange but dont quit without a back up.

i like the one about having to care for a parent or child or something is grand because they wont try to dig deeper.

if you can be honest and say there was an issue you just have to hope for an understanding interviewer.

BabyE

Are interviews ever going to get up to date and realize that we are in 20 and ****ing 16 now. Life is not as rigid as it once was, questions like 'why did you leave a job' should be answered as simply as 'just wasn't for me' without the need for playing games.

livedadream

Because your trying to present the best version of yourself... The same way as on a first date you don't tell them about your ****ty ex and why you cheated on them. Leaving a job without a backup can, (only saying can not always is) be seen as being flighty . Hiring and training someone takes time and money you not going to waste that on someone you think will jump ship if they don't love every day.

SoupyNorman

"I've reached a plateau in both knowledge and progression in my current role, from what I have seen about this role and what we have discussed I believe it offers the challenge and progression I am seeking."

seamus

SoupyNorman wrote: »

"I've reached a plateau in both knowledge and progression in my current role, from what I have seen about this role and what we have discussed I believe it offers the challenge and progression I am seeking."

This. You have nowhere to progress in your current company so you're looking for a new challenge.

If you haven't been in your current job long (< 18 months), you can go with the "organisational changes" line such as, "The company has undergone some organisational changes and the role that I am now doing is not the one I was hired for so it no longer challenges me/interests me".

There are many ways of saying why you left, but I'll echo for the nth time in this thread - anything which doesn't badmouth your previous employer should be fine. Changing job is fine, it's perfectly acceptable to want to move on and do something new. Someone changing job is practically always being "pushed" more than they are being "pulled", so it's OK to state why you're being pushed so long as it's clear there's no bad blood between you and the previous employer.

If it's an employment gap, then swinging it as time off to look after a relative, time off to go travelling, or a redundancy, is the way to go. Just make sure you have a short and believable backstory. Don't say you went backpacking across rural Asia unless you actually have.

Bandana boy

BabyE wrote: »

Are interviews ever going to get up to date and realize that we are in 20 and ****ing 16 now. Life is not as rigid as it once was, questions like 'why did you leave a job' should be answered as simply as 'just wasn't for me' without the need for playing games.

With no means of accurately predicting the future we look at past behavior as the best indicator of future behavior. Just wasn't for me , shows at least some weakness from the potential employee . It raises as many questions as it answers
Why did they accept a job that wasn't for them , why did it take so long to figure it out , how did they not have something else lined up , Is this an indication that they are difficult to work with ? We they let me down when we need them.
It is a terrible answer and I suspect universally would disqualify you for anything but the most menial of jobs.

SoupyNorman

BabyE wrote: »

Are interviews ever going to get up to date and realize that we are in 20 and ****ing 16 now. Life is not as rigid as it once was, questions like 'why did you leave a job' should be answered as simply as 'just wasn't for me' without the need for playing games.

Well, you could not be more wrong on this one. Asking why you left your previous job is a legitimate and essential question. Remember, all the risk lies on the side of the employer when hiring an employee (well a permanent one anyway). They have the right and duty to know why you are seeking to leave a job as you might be a 'flighty' type who wont stay for long or you may rub people up the wrong way. If you actually gave the answer 'Just wasnt for me' you'd be torn asunder with follow up questions by any half decent interviewer.

Like it or not there is a strict protocol to be adhered to when interviewing for a company, if you want to rebel against this, be my guest, but you will never get the job.

BabyE

I'm not really trying to rebel, more like be real.

The onus should be on the company to create a work culture which promotes low staff turnover and loyalty. Too many companies are let away with awful environments. Life is short, we live and then we die, far too short to be spending 40 hour weeks in horrible toxic environments.

livedadream

BabyE wrote: »

I'm not really trying to rebel, more like be real.

The onus should be on the company to create a work culture which promotes low staff turnover and loyalty. Too many companies are let away with awful environments. Life is short, we live and then we die, far too short to be spending 40 hour weeks in horrible toxic environments.

but its what you make of it as well, for every employee that says there was a toxic environment theres an employee that was sacked for being toxic.

the law protects employees more than employers on this one.

its so difficult to manage out a poor or toxic employee that you have to be weary when interviewing.

LorMal

BabyE wrote: »

Are interviews ever going to get up to date and realize that we are in 20 and ****ing 16 now. Life is not as rigid as it once was, questions like 'why did you leave a job' should be answered as simply as 'just wasn't for me' without the need for playing games.

Absolutely.

seamus

BabyE wrote: »

The onus should be on the company to create a work culture which promotes low staff turnover and loyalty. Too many companies are let away with awful environments. Life is short, we live and then we die, far too short to be spending 40 hour weeks in horrible toxic environments.

That's not really all that related to the question though.

There is no one-size-fits-all work environment or work culture. Some people are just absolute sh1tcocks who don't get along anywhere. They're often horrifically toxic while they work for you and virtually impossible to satisfy socially, financially or culturally.

Asking someone why they left an employment is a sh1t filter. Like a question on a form asking if you've ever been in jail. It's there to weed out the people who tend to frequently get into workplace conflicts. They're often the same people who are too stupid to hide it from a future employer.

"Just wasn't for me", is also fine for the 90% of people who are normal. If someone has a string of 6-month employments and their response to leaving them all is "just wasn't for me", then I'm going to assume that he's going to leave my company after six months, so his CV is going in the bin.

LorMal

SoupyNorman wrote: »

Well, you could not be more wrong on this one. Asking why you left your previous job is a legitimate and essential question. Remember, all the risk lies on the side of the employer when hiring an employee (well a permanent one anyway). They have the right and duty to know why you are seeking to leave a job as you might be a 'flighty' type who wont stay for long or you may rub people up the wrong way. If you actually gave the answer 'Just wasnt for me' you'd be torn asunder with follow up questions by any half decent interviewer.

Like it or not there is a strict protocol to be adhered to when interviewing for a company, if you want to rebel against this, be my guest, but you will never get the job.

we have ALL had horribles bosses. Some of us have had to leave because of them. I do not think an employer will hold it against the interviewee if they explain what happened in an open and honest way.

SoupyNorman

LorMal wrote: »

we have ALL had horribles bosses. Some of us have had to leave because of them. I do not think an employer will hold it against the interviewee if they explain what happened in an open and honest way.

You really are wrong here.

I'm not trying to be an ass here but I've 10 years experience behind me, changed jobs a few times, interviewed and hired a few times and done quite a lot of interviews myself.

The bottom line is, you can almost never be negative in an interview. I understand your point about honesty and I would certainly respond well to interviewees who are honest but it has to be the right kind of context. There is no place for speaking in a negative tone against any ex colleague (boss, peer, cleaning lady...no one). It immediatly casts you in a poor light, says you dont get on with people even if you did nothing wrong or nasty in your previous role.

Interviews are not normal environments, they are one off events that have you do and say things you might never actually have to do in the job itself. Think of them like stress tests, jumbo jets are designed to fly alot faster then they do but you'd never actually do it.

seamus

LorMal wrote: »

we have ALL had horribles bosses. Some of us have had to leave because of them. I do not think an employer will hold it against the interviewee if they explain what happened in an open and honest way.

It's one side of the story. And you're going to explain it in a way that makes you look like the aggrieved party.

As open and honest as you may aim to be, there will always be a slant in your story, and since an interviewer is in effect looking for reasons not to hire you, a conflict is one.
It's a psychological thing. If you come to an employer telling them that you left because you had a disagreement, they will instantly have a suspicion about how much of that disagreement was down to you, and how much down to the other person.

Think about it on a more personal level - imagine you were hiring someone to clean your house and they told you that they're available because they had an argument with the last person that hired them and walked off the job. Then next you speak to another cleaner who tells you that they're available because the last person sold their house and moved away.

Which one would you choose, everything else being equal?

No good can come of telling the interviewer this information. You might think it says, "I'm an open and honest person", but all that's happened is that your stability and reliability has dropped a little in the interviewer's head.

asuna_cpl

It is all about convincing your future employer that you have a fairly good idea why you are motivated to do your next job. If you give the impression that you are a whimsical worker who will leave a job on a whim, this will be obviously negative. You need to tell a story, whether that story is 100% truthful or not.

I find it helpful just to reflect and think about what makes me feel content in a job. The reflection might also give you direction and help you win better positions too.

Good luck!

shenron

Matt Murdock wrote: »

How would you tackle such a question in an interview?
I have had to leave a job due to a pr1ck of a boss. Any interview where I have been asked why I left I have not got the job.

Any advice.

How were you answering?

Dial Hard

I'd imagine the OP got sorted in the intervening two years...

shenron

Dial Hard wrote: »

I'd imagine the OP got sorted in the intervening two years...

lol, I haven't seen the post was 2016

mloc123

Dial Hard wrote: »

I'd imagine the OP got sorted in the intervening two years...

you would hope anyway

never_mind

I would never say anything negative about my previous job/boss...

Maybe...

I really enjoyed my time in X company where I was able to develop and refine my skills in the role. However, I decided to take a break and to focus on some health matters in my family which are now thankfully resolved.

Murdoc90

Boss was a special kind of lunatic.