Monday, March 11, 2019

Gratitude Monday: I get by...


In the past couple of weeks, I’ve had two job interviews, one faux-electronic and one with an actual hiring manager. I wrote about the “video interview” a few days ago.

And, BTW, since writing, another objection to this format has arisen in my mind: while it’s true that given every candidate the exact same questions to answer, within the exact same parameters (time to prepare response, time limit for response, number of retries allowed) does give the appearance of an egalitarian approach. But it doesn’t eliminate any inherent bias on the recruiter’s part. Appearance, ethnicity, speech patterns—any number of things can spark a negative—even if unconscious—reaction in the viewer of the video, and your chances go straight to the bin. They haven’t solved any problems of diversity by this approach.

Well, nevermind. It’s Gratitude Monday and I’m not focusing on how pissed off this ploy makes me. I’m grateful that when I prepped for both these interviews, I had friends (who started out as colleagues) I could call on for expertise and encouragement. (The real-human interview was for a marketing job, and I needed some guidance on the vocabulary. Turns out I’d done much of what’s required; I just hadn’t known the official terms for it.)

In both cases, I went into the interview feeling much more confident. In the case of the video interview—meh, it turned out to be only about a 3 on a scale of 1-10 of ghastliness. But my friend’s guidance alleviated a considerable amount of my anxiety and made it easier for me to just crack on with it. In the case of the 60-minute call with the VP of Marketing, I spoke with assuredness and ease, which doesn’t happen all that often, because of getting a crash course from another marketing VP.

So—here’s to friends who come through in the clinch. I hope I’m that kind of friend, too.



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