what was their job

[McNorah]

The short answer is: never trust a job title alone. When someone asks me “what was their job,” I immediately think about the gap between what a title says and what a person actually did. I’ve seen too many “Senior Managers” who handled nothing more than scheduling, and “Coordinators” who ran multi-million-dollar budgets. So my advice is to always probe for specifics — ask about day-to-day responsibilities, the size of the team they led, and the direct outcomes they delivered.

For example, during a recent interview, a candidate claimed to be a “Marketing Director.” I asked what that meant in practice. She explained she managed a team of five, owned a $2M budget, and increased lead generation by 40% in one year. That’s the real job. Without those details, the title is just noise.

To make this easier, I often use a simple comparison table when I’m evaluating candidates:

Job Title on Resume	Actual Responsibilities (from reference)	Key Takeaway
Project Manager	Managed 3 interns, tracked timelines in Excel	Entry-level coordination
Project Manager	Led 12 cross-functional teams, delivered $5M product launch	Senior leadership
Director of Operations	Oversaw vendor contracts, no P&L ownership	Middle management
Director of Operations	Owned $20M department budget, approved hires	Executive role

The pattern is clear: the same title can mean wildly different things across companies and industries. So when I’m screening, I go beyond “what was their job” and focus on impact, scope, and context. That’s where the real insight lives.

[VonKingston]

I’ve been on the other side of that question plenty of times. When an interviewer asks “what was their job,” I know they’re really trying to figure out if I can handle the role they’re hiring for. So I don’t just say my old title. I lead with a concrete example — something like “I was a Customer Success Manager, but my main job was reducing churn by 25% in nine months.” That gives them a story to remember, not just a label. Making it personal and results-focused always works better than reciting a job description.

[StGemma]

Honestly, I don’t care much about the formal title. When I hear “what was their job,” I think about whether the person can explain their work in a clear, logical way. If someone says they were a “Data Analyst” but can’t describe the tools they used or the questions they answered, that’s a red flag. I’m looking for fluency in their own experience — not a memorized bullet list. So I’ll ask follow-up questions like “What was the hardest problem you solved in that job?” That tells me more than any title ever could.

[DelCooper]

I do a lot of reference checks, and “what was their job” is my starting question. But I never stop there. I follow up with behavioral anchors — for example, “Can you describe a time their job required them to handle a conflict?” or “What was the most challenging aspect of their job?” This gets past generic praise and reveals real performance. I also ask for specific numbers or projects, because if the reference can’t give me a concrete example, the job probably wasn’t as significant as it sounds. A good reference makes the job come alive.

[LaJohn]

From my experience helping people articulate their career stories, “what was their job” is often a trap — it makes people focus on duties instead of value. I coach clients to reframe the question by linking their job to business outcomes. For instance, instead of saying “I was an accountant,” say “I managed the month-end close for a $50M company, cutting errors by 30%.” That shift moves the conversation from a static title to a dynamic contribution. Titles are just labels; what matters is the impact you made. So