Two Interviews

Originally written 7/11/7

Yes, this is a locked post. The title should really be “My First Two Interviews”. This is locked for 2 reasons. 1) In case my perspective employers latch onto this site, I certainly want to cover my ass. And 2) because one of my WEA friends put me on their top friends list. So now, the name “XXX” is readily visible to any ex or current WEA employee who wants to check this out. And ever since they put me on the front page, my hits have far outnumbered my small coterie of friends. So I know I am getting a lot of hits from WEA personnel. And locking this also goes to screw them a little bit. F youze.

This whole finding a job on the internet takes a bit to understand. For example, the jobs offered to those on the State of PA’s website are generally geared to motards. You can put in key words to search for. For example, I put in ‘creative’, ‘marketing’, ‘sales’ and ‘global dictator’. Total jobs for creative=0. Marketing? 0. Sales? 5. 4 of which have been the same job since day 1. And three total of those jobs are for call centers. I went through the site, and they have some name employers. But on the whole, for the gigs I want, it’s pretty damn shitty.

I applied to a job, and within an hour received an email and phone call requesting an interview. Hmmmm, OK, this is good. Or it just means they’re desperate. I call them back and get an interview for the very next day. Quite frankly, this is the ideal situation for me. In my mind, there is less time to get all worked up and nervous. That’s how I got the WEA gig. I was closing my Borders store, so I didn’t get home till almost midnight. There was a message from WEA, telling me that I had an interview time the next day, just call to confirm it. So there was no time to get worked up. I interviewed with 2 really cool people, 1 who was a major inspiration to my WEA job. I wasn’t nervous for the interview. In fact, I told them that this was the only interview I was more anxious about than nervous. And we know how that all turned out. Of course, it also helped that I had made a lot of friends there who could vouch for me.

Now, I am going into there interviews blind; no friends or allies. All good job applicants should do their homework on the company. You can’t go in ignorant. After confirming the interview, I printed out everything I could find about the company. My interview is going to be with the founder of this small marketing company. No problem as I go through the company’s history, their clients, etc. You have to put yourself in the mind of the interviewer. He’s not going to ask me about the retail side of my previous job, he’s going to focus in on the promotion and marketing aspect of it. I go over interview tips and strategies. I’m feeling confident. The only thing left to do is clean up, and figure out what to wear.

Sadly, the nice, bushy goatee I was growing had to go. After the wife frowned on my Paul Sr. from OCC look, I just decided to grow a goatee. Not even trim it, just let it grow. But it didn’t look too professional. And there were too much salt where all the pepper used to be. Those goddamned white hairs. They grow about a third faster and longer than the dark hair. But WTF do I care? I’m already married. So I trimmed the goatee down, and returned to the scruff-with-a-soul-patch look you all know and are envious of.

What to wear? Hmm, board shorts and flip flops just may not cut it here. I don’t own many shirts that even have buttons and collars, so I am at a bit at a loss. One of the great things about WEA was I didn’t have to dress up much. Truth be told, I only have one suit jacket. It’s black, so it works for all major occasions; wedding & funerals. This interview thing will be something I will have to deal with on a somewhat regular basis now, so it’s time to invest in some new threads. I can’t dress myself up to save my life, so it’s time to call in the wife.

She will be in charge of dressing me up properly. We hit a few places, but there’s always a problem. Can’t really get a suit at this point, since it would have to be tailored by tomorrow morning. We’d find a coat, but pants wouldn’t match, etc. This went on for seemingly hours. We’re both getting frustrated now. We’re coming down to crunch time. “How about we go to Men’s Warehouse?” she says. My idea of Men’s Warehouse is too hauty-tauty. Too high falutin. When I need to but sneakers, I go to a place where I can pick out and try on sneakers. I don’t want a ‘guy’ in a referee shirt to add any pressure. Understanding that, I’m not really looking forward to this.

We go. We actually get a cool guy. Slick and all, but he had a personality, so he’s cool. He asks what I want. I say I need a suit for a job interview. He asks when the interview is. “Tomorrow.” I fell I have to preface it by saying that I didn’t wait till the last minute, but it’s just how it happened. I suddenly feel like I’m the loser in one of their TV commercials. The one that needs a suit overnight. I told him I wanted a dark suit. He suggests that I get a gray one for a job interview. OK, so that’s good to know. We start trying out jackets. I try the first one on, and start to button it all the way. “No,” he tells me, “don’t do that for an interview.” Aw geez, not only do I not regularly wear a suit, but now there’s rules for wearing a suit? This is going to be harder than I thought.

We start trying out grey suitcoats. Of course we have another problem here. He tells me some suits will be a tight fit since I have an “athletic” build. Now I don’t know when drinking beer and eating pizza begets an athletic build, but whatever. This further limits us, as only a few suit companies make “athletic build”. I regret eating dinner at Taco Bell. We find a suit that works. Next up is the pants. I am underdressed for this event. I didn’t think we’d end up here, so I’m rocking the flip flops and cargo shorts. I look as out of place as the EMI rep on your ladder. He gives me what, essentially, are stocking to cover my bare feet as I try on the pants. I am a vision in my new suit. Raggedy Tom Petty t-shirt, suitcoat, pants, stockings and flip flops. I make sure Tara’s not snapping pictures with her phone. I stand in front of the mirror. I see a sign that says tailoring jobs dropped of today will be ready in 2 weeks. I need this shit done by tomorrow morning. The sales guy assures me it’s no problem, as he calls for the tailor, Rocky.

At first sight, you can tell Rocco is a grizzled tailor who’s done this his entire life. He’s probably about 80 or so, and still been around for the last hundred years. He doesn’t see my type too often. This guy is like a virtuoso when it comes to tailoring. He grabs here, tucks there, pin here, mark there, and he’s done. The whole process took about a minute and a half. I stress again to the salesman that I need this for an interview tomorrow, and he assures me it will be done. I sigh an OK, pay the bill, then leave. Thoughts of Rocky suddenly having a seizure as he’s doing my pants (yea, I know, that does sound kinda gay, but I can’t think of another way to phrase it without sounding any less gay). It’s just one more thing out of my control, one more thing to worry about.

Next morning, I go back to the store, and true to their commercial, the suit is done. Come home, put it back on-sans the Tom Petty t of course- and head to the interview. Even though their directions are slightly off, I arrive early. One of the things a wise job seeker does-besides get there early, duh-is scope out the office. How does it look? Who works there? Do they look happy or postal? What can you learn from the receptionist? Turns out, this is a brand new office, they’ve only bee there a week. The receptionist is about 23 and listening to Notorious BIG. She hands me a form to fill out. On this form I have to fill out basically my resume. That they already have. And told me to bring a copy of. OK, I get to doing that. And 2 more people show up. The rule of thumb is (first) interviews generally run 20 minutes or so. So either these people are way early, or they’re cramming interviews. There I am, filling out the application. Wearing a long sleeve shirt. Suit jacket. Long pants. Socks. Real shoes. This isn’t the t-shirt & flips I am used to wearing. And I start sweating my ass off. Ugh, not a pretty sight. I am informed that I will not be interviewing with the founder as I was told. I will be interviewing with someone else. This blonde girl comes out of an office. Glasses, tresses of hair about her face, business suit, with…uh…I’ll stop here, but let’s just say we’ve seen this look in numerous Skinemax movies. I am so done.

We go into her office and start the interview. It is unlike any other interview I have been on. She briefly looks at my app. I have horrible writing, so I am sure she doesn’t understand a thing. But she doesn’t even look at my resume. She starts with how did I find this company. This is what is known as the lay-up. I immediately spout out everything that was in their bio; dates, clients, projections, etc. I elaborate that I am already familiar with some of their accounts. This leads her right into explaining what they do. I am not being interviewed. She is telling me what they do. She asks if I think I can do this. Duh, the answer has to be yes. I do make some mistakes. I didn’t talk long enough, gave a few one word answers (def no-no in an interview). She thanks me, tells me she has a bunch of interviews to go through, and they will call the top 5 or so that evening. I thank her, shake her hand, and she asks me what I’m doing for the weekend. I tell her I am going to see a concert. She asks who. “Rush.” “Who?”

A few hours later, we’re in the parking lot. Radios and Rush songs blaring from every third car. My phone rings, and I see it’s her. No way can pick it up and ‘Tom Sawyer’ is blaring. I let it go to message. I check it later, and it’s her asking me to call back. I do, and never hear from them again. And it’s OK. I don’t fell personally rejected or anything. The interview was kind of odd, so I didn’t get the best vibe. I might be better off.

You have to look at every interview as learning about the job. The company wants to find out about you. You also have to find out about the company. The dialogue should go both ways. It’s your responsibility to make sure this is a job you’d actually want. There’s no need to take a job if it’s not The Job. You can’t think the person you’re interviewing with holds the golden key to The Job. It’s OK to go there, ask questions, and decide it’s not your bag. That is far better than just blindly taking the job, only to hate it, and lose the unemployment. So I don’t get keyed up for an interview by thinking “hey, this just might be the gig!” I go in looking to ask questions and learn more about the job and company. You can’t take a rejection personally. Hell, that’s probably the most important thing I learned in high school.

It felt good to get the first interview out of the way. Kinda like when a fighter says they need to get hit once to really get into the fight. And I learned from it, and that is key. I learned that I shouldn’t just be keyed into this one person doing the interview, when it could be someone else. I feel I would have been better prepared if the founder interviewed me, because I knew a lot about him and his company. Instead, I got thrown off when someone else handled it. I also learned I needed to be a bit more forceful in trying to get my accomplishments out and reconciling previous experience with what a new job might entail. I learned my prep was pretty solid. Preparation is key, especially with the Net. If you go into an interview knowing the history of the company, something about the interviewer, clients of the company, where it’s headed, etc. Doing a diligent job researching the company will show them you will be a diligent worker. And it’s more than most interviewees will do, so you’ll be ahead of a lot of other people.

My second interview happened 3 days later. I actually knew about that one before the first interview. Better yet, it was a phoner. It was with a recruiter that worked for the Grammys of all things. Man, to go from a label to the Recording Academy would be pretty cool. I study all I can. Again, I put myself in the mind of the interviewer. She’s not going to focus on my retail stuff. It’s going to focus on the promotions I did, meet & greets I ran, parties I threw etc. I am prepared. I make sure my phone is charged, none of that “can you hear me now?” crap can go on. She calls and we’re off.

This interview went far better. Another ‘rule’ I learned is to try to keep the dialogue 50/50; I talk as much as she talks. Also, generally, my answers should be between 20 seconds and 2 minutes. We just had a flow. She had her shit together, and so did I. It was really a breeze, and I was prepared for all the right questions. Sitting here in front of my PC, I could keep track of the time of the call and the length of my answers. We had a great flow. I did make one key, key mistake right at the top, so I have to learn to better prepare myself. I fucking knew what to say, too, but I blew it. Other than that, it went really well. Sure enough, right after the 20 minute mark, she moved to wrap it up. I made sure to ask her a few questions in closing. All in all, far better than the first one. I might ne 80% of what they’re looking for, and that other 20% might be enough to hold me back. But, like I said, I don’t get caught up in it. The ball’s in their court; if they want me, they will call me. At least I fell a lot better giving a better interview. Of course, wearing shorts and flip flops helped, too. I made sure to send her a thank you email as well. A little good karma might go a long way.

And that’s where it stands. The search goes on every day. (I just got another email while I was writing this). In the meantime, it’s been like a 100 degrees here the last few days. The news interviews everyone who has to work outside. These are real guys; construction, road workers, fireman. And there’s my pansy ass, watching from the couch with the AC on. Yesterday I was driving behind a work truck. It was only like 10 in the morning. And in the back was this guy who looked like he was wasted. Not Natty Light wasted, but more so like black & white Dust Bowl picture wasted. I could never do that shit. I guess there are far worse jobs to actually work.