Tough Interview Question: Why did you leave your last job?

People might have to leave their job for various reasons. Living of people determines their nature. Habits firmly establish nature and mostly it is nature of people that makes them smart, moderate or unsuitable for particular jobs.

You must have heard specialists say, “Do what you love. Love what you do.” So you need not to quit your job if you have all your heart in it. But human is slave of circumstances. Don’t blame be of being a kind who leaves everything in future’s hand. But it is not the rule of nature. However, if you want to succeed, you must stay hard in your way. Don’t let circumstances decide new you love, but create the circumstances you need to succeed. Right now I remember George Bernard Shaw. Let me recite him first.

"People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can't find them, make them."
-George Bernard Shaw

But still people quit jobs and look for new ones. In the lack of such mobility, organization becomes idle. No fresh air circulates among the employee. No motivation, no dream. No enthusiasm. Remember then what will happen to world of economy.

So you must assure yourself that you did not commit a crime by quitting your last job. Whatever be the reason, fill you mind with the thoughts of superiority. You had to quit it, and you quit it. No need to explain. Fell as free as the bird in the sky above you head.

Tips: Never feel guilty of quitting a job. Assure yourself that you have good reasons to quit it.

But you must tell the interviewer exactly why you leave your last job. You may wish to know why he is asking you to tell him/her the secret. Here are the reasons:

#1 The interviewer wants to understand your attitude towards your previous workplace, environment, boss, employee and co-workers. This helps the interviewer to map your potential in his/her organization in terms your personality and adaptation capability.

#2 The interviewer wants to knew what is the key point around which your ego revolves or on what your satisfaction resides.

#3 The interviewer wants to evaluate you in terms of your need, expectation and you ability towards grabbing opportunity.

Then what is the best way to tell the reasons for a job quitted recently. Question is important. And this one is more important.

“All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal”.
-George Orwell in The Animal Farm

Here is the step-by-step guide to best answer the question- why did you leave your last job?

#1 Tell the interviewer an exact reason. Do not it in the ‘this and that’ fashion. Being concentrated to the main reason makes your answer clear and believable.

#2 Justify your answer by backing it with some details. Make the backing reasons genuine.

#3 Put yourself in the center of the story. You did not quit your job because one of your relatives had to be hospitalized for a long time. But rather you quit your job to let your employee chose someone else to replace you so that they could smoothly run in you very frequent absence. Alternatively, you quit job because you decided to support your father in his business. You helped him for complete 2 years and now you are back in search of job like this one.

#4 Never ever blame your past co-workers or employers even if you have genuine reasons to do so. It is ok to talk about high risk of job but it is the riskiest to tell any bad words about your past organization and any of its human components. Remember blaming others means you have habit to find reason to do so.

#5 While answering, do not forget that you are just justifying the last job you quit and you are not going to include your experience of vacancy after quitting the job. Rather tell him that you are now freely and hopefully looking for joining an organization that can be fit for you.

Just for your refreshment here are two more statements from George Bernard Shaw.

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him... The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All progress depends on the unreasonable man."

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place"