workingfortheman.com

This happened years back, when I had just moved to New York and was applying for jobs in the publishing industry... At the bigger publishing houses, you don't just interview with a person in the department in which you are attempting to land a job. There is a process at these larger houses, and this process begins with the human resources department. (I'm sure this is the case with most large companies in industries across the board, but my bitter job seeking experience happened to be confined to the publishing industry.)

Positions are announced through the usual avenues, and all resumes that pour in through the mail and over the fax are directed to the HR department. If these HR gatekeepers like what they see on your resume, then you'll get called in. Lord knows what kind of people can stomach looking at resumes all day long, day after day. Given the kind of lofty language and exaggerated puffery that every single one of us blankets our resumes with, you'd think HR people would start to hate job seekers, no matter how qualified, within a week of being on the job. Come to think of it, I'm sure they do hate job seekers.

Oh look, this guy went to Harvard. I'm going to call and get him an interview for a mail room job. Harvard grads think they're so special.

Oh look, he used this nice, heavy paper with the little speckles. Wow. This is so impressive. We should make this guy the president of the company.

How efficient. This woman sent her resume in via overnight express mail. Why, how has our company survived this long without her. Hire her now, for the sake of the company, hire her now.

So if the HR people feel you might be qualified for an open position, you are called in for an interview. This interview determines if you are worthy enough to be sent upstairs to interview with the head of whatever department you are attempting to land a job. The two interviews I had with HR people at two different publishing houses were the worst interviews I've ever experienced.

Both interviews actually began with "How did you like the University?"

What a stupid fucking question. Surely these were the symptoms of major burn out. These two human resources people were clearly "going through the motions" of their duties.

"And you worked for such and such a company for a year. How was that?"

"And this next company, such and such. How was that?"

Both interviewers simply went down my resume and asked about each item in the most generic of ways. Job interviews can go bad for lots of reasons, but one of the main things that can really kill an interview is a bad interviewer. Hell, if you're looking for a job, there's most likely a whole lot of desperation flowing through your veins. You'll say anything. That can be pretty entertaining. And ugly.

But if the person interviewing you is a total idiot, asking lame questions, it's difficult to build momentum. Unlike a good interview, which can seem more like a conversation between two people sharing a common professional interest, a bad interview can go about as comfortably as a rectal exam, or a typing test, but I'll get to that later.

You want to walk out and just say fuck it. But you can't. You need a job, and you feel an even greater need for some kind of affirmation. Even if you don't want the position, you at least want to feel like you're the one they picked. Sometimes the job is so beneath you that if you don't get called back for the second round of interviews, a wave of self-doubt can smash your ass and toss you around until you're on the phone crying like a baby to your mother, or even worse, an ex-girlfriend.

So if these human resources drones hit the "acceptable" button, you get sent upstairs for an interview with your potential future boss. I remember being momentarily overcome with a cult-follower's delirium as a I rode the elevator upstairs.

Wow. She liked me. She really liked me.

The upstairs interviews went the way most interviews go. The same old bullshit. But instead of leaving, the human resources idiot requires that you come back down to her office to say good-bye. All this means is that you have to wait a little longer and waste more of your precious time so that the human resources drone can ask, "how did it go."

At this point, you're almost willing to tell the truth.

You want to say: "God, you know, it sucked. I really can't see myself working for this company, or that shithead upstairs. I can't believe I wasted my time here today."

But you need a job. So what you actually say is: "It went really well. I'm even more interested in the position now that I know more about it. Thank you very much for interviewing me. I look forward to hearing from you soon." You say the necessary pleasantries, and go past the border on outward enthusiasm, expressing a bubbly interest in the open position, doing your best to keep your own hands from grabbing your own throat and strangling yourself to death. Get out that door. Like an escape hatch on a plane about to crash, you've got to get out that door.

Now for some details on that typing test. These jobs that I was going after were not secretarial. While typing surely would have been a part of the job, my resume clearly states that I know how to type. But before one of my interviews began, I was required to take a typing test. I should have walked out, but such pride is kept in check in order to survive the job seeking ritual. I found myself in a little room with office supplies and file cabinets most likely full of documents one year away from going to the shredder, staring down at a manual typewriter. It was a moment of pure humility. A wave of nausea hit me as the human resources assistant asked if I needed a few moments to "warm up."

"No," I said meekly, defeated. "I'm ready."

And I typed. For five minutes, I typed the text from a page outlining why flex time, offered by the company at which I was applying for a job, was good. "What a bunch of bullshit," I said to myself. I tried to laugh off the typing test, in order to get through the interview, but I knew that I had faced the job hunt abyss, that I had looked into the abyss and seen the truth about jobs, work... the professional life. It wasn't pretty. It wasn't pretty at all.

Back to the archives.

Return to the main page.