I had my second interview this morning with a company that is interested in hiring me – why else would I be interviewing with them, practice? Anyway it reminded me of my past interviews and I thought I would share my worst interview experience. I am not sure it will translate well to print, but I will give it a try.
It started back in July of 1994. I had been working for a company for about 2 years (pretty much my limit back then) when I got a random call from a recruiter working for a wireless company. He informed me that he had found the resume I sent in a year earlier and wanted to let me know about a position in the San Jose office. We talked about it and I agreed to go in and meet the GM and discuss the position. Before the interview, I found out that one of my Navy buddies worked in that office and would be working for me if I got the position. I had known him for a few years and he was a good guy so this was definitely a plus. I went in on a Monday morning and met with the HR manager first…an ex-Raider cheerleader, all I can say is WOW! After her, I met with the GM. He and I hit it off right away. We are very similar people and think and do things in pretty much the same way. We are still friends to this day. Anyway, I met with him for over and hour and he left it by saying, that if they were interested, I would need to meet with the Northwest Regional System Manager. I would dotted line report to him. That would happen next week more than likely. I said OK, just let me know and I went to my office to begin my work day.
About and hour later, the HR manager called and asked if I could meet with the RSM that afternoon at the teleport facility (satellite uplink – for you non technical types). I said sure and took this as a very good sign. I drove to the facility that afternoon and I met with the RSM - MJ. Now MJ seemed nice enough at first glance. We went in to one of the conference rooms and started the interview. The conversation went something like this.
MJ – Well Blue why don’t you tell me about yourself?
Blue – Well I am yadda, yadda, yadda…standard interview answer.
Dead Air – Staring right at me.
Dead Air - No sounds. I was done, but he was not asking the next question. Did he not know how to play the interview game?
Dead Air – Going on 1 minute now of silence and staring. I stare back. Not going to let him make me back down.
MJ – Tell me about your current position?
Blue (thinking) – huh, what the hell was that?
Blue – Well I am the European Sales Engineer and my responsibilities are…yadda, yadda, yadda
Dead Air – More staring
Dead Air – Getting very uncomfortable
Dead Air - The jeopardy theme starts going off in my head…do do do do do do do…
MJ – What about the position you had before this?
Blue – (fighting to regain train of thought) – Well I worked as a yadda, yadda, yadda
Dead Air – More staring
Dead Air – The jeopardy theme is getting very loud in my head now…DO DO DO DO DO DO DO …
Dead Air – I am thinking - Ok, I am done it is your turn to speak.
This went on for an excruciating 45 minutes. Question, answer, staring, silence…question, answer, staring, silence. At the end, he asked me if I would like a tour, I said yes and he showed me around the place. When I got to my car my initial thought was shit, that is the worst interview I have ever been on and there is no way this guy is going to offer me a job.
A week went by and I heard nothing. I was not expecting to hear much anyway after the most uncomfortable interview ever. Eventually my buddy told me they were going to offer me the job and they did a few days later. I took the job. After working there for a few months, I remember telling my GM about my interview with MJ and that I thought there was no way I would get this job. He laughed and said that MJ called him after the interview and said it was the best interview he had ever been part of. WHAT? Man I laughed my ass off.
After working with MJ for a while I realized that the dead air is just part of communicating with him. It was like in his head he was processing what you said, formulating a response, reviewing the response and then it comes out. This happened with every conversation you had with him. You want to talk about annoying. Try having a conference call with a customer and experiencing the uncomfortable dead air…we were constantly like “MJ are you out there?”
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