Acing the interview - a certain perspective

I can’t decide if I am unemployed or just not earning any money. Since unemployment benefit dried up after 26 weeks, the state has no mechanism for me to register weekly as unemployed. In theory then, I guess I dropped out of the system and off the non payroll of the largest band of brothers and sisters in the country. You’d think we could organize a union of non workers to look after our interests. “The National Union of Unemployed” has a nice ring to it. But, is an author unemployed if he or she is writing, but not selling their work yet? At what point is an author considered to be employed? These are difficult questions, but there are other difficult questions, the sort that are asked at interviews.

Because I can’t decide if I am unemployed technology worker or an unpaid author, I have been on interviews for ‘real jobs’, in cubicle world, making the top three candidates, if 2nd interviews are used as the criteria for that metric.

That’s how I found myself at the Career Place, which,

“since 1997, has served over 46,000 individuals and more than 3,000 local employers. Chartered by the Metro North Regional Employment Board, and managed by Middlesex Community College, The Career Place helps individuals to find current job openings, assess their skill levels and interests, and enter education and training programs.”

I clearly don’t have the skills to make it to #1, so I signed up for “Acing the Interview.” In fact this is such a popular course, that I waited a couple of months for a slot and so arrived early to ensure a seat in the small conference room used for training. This course normally costs $59, but you don’t have to be unemployed to take it or any of the courses offered. In a perverse way it helps to be unemployed and out of benefits, because then courses are free.

To my surprise and disappointment there were only three other people interested in “acing the interview”, all were female and our tutor, also female. I could feel the estrogen levels rising in the room as we went round the table, delivering our 30 or 60 second elevator introductions and practicing interview answers.

G, a paralegal with 2 masters’ degrees and 5 years experience, that appeared to consist of solving filing problems and butting heads with people unwilling to prioritize their work to suit her needs, I had met before. My heart sank; I knew G. wore her issues openly. At our last meeting during “behavioral interviewing” I suggested that she stop answering interview questions during our practice sessions with a 10 minute life story, which included why it was not fair. It is impossible to give meaningful, short answers in an interview, if you spend your practice time outside of them hashing and rehashing bad experiences. On several occasions I gently stopped her after 5 minutes or so and suggested a more positive positioning of her answer, until she began stopping herself, to do the same.

K. is a senior admin and is unlike the rest of us, currently employed. She works for a non profit organization and has no time to research companies as the instructor suggested, is unaware that libraries open in the evening (when she has to do the washing and cleaning), but has been on many fruitless interviews, where starting salary was below her current mid level salary. I suggest she look for the most inefficient non profit charity available, since they will be the ones spending most on administration. Later I show her how to find a prepaid cell phone (suce a Virgin or T-Mobile) for emergency use, such notifying the company if she running late for an interview (she relies on public transport) or to phone up the company she is interested in and ask about the salary range.

D. worked at a school, supporting teenaged children. I don’t recognize the job title, but it sounds like a school welfare worker and she has a degree in it. When asked the practice question, “what is your greatest accomplishment at work?” she is hesitant and needs prompting to think of one. Eventually D. tells us in a disorganized manner, of an occasion when she talked a troubled girl out of committing suicide on the school grounds. I am staggered and have to tell her that her greatest accomplishment is that “she saved a life”. Not many people could match that answer at a job interview. She brightens, smiles briefly and thanks me.

These people don’t need help acing the interview, to be told to arrive early, wear clean shoes, and send thank you notes or any of the other process steps required. They need help to get rid of anger, to organize their thoughts and deliver them in a coherent and high impact manner and yes, to be shown how to manage their time and to buy a pre paid cell phone.

Me? I learned that my delivery of interview answers was too quiet, that it showed a lack of confidence (when it really showed disinterest). But today I was employed, at least for 4 hours as I listened to 3 people and helped them see themselves in a better way, in a way they really were. Of course, I didn’t get paid, but I wouldn’t have if I sat at home writing, not yet anyway.