Tuesday, May 08, 2012
Humming my own theme song...
My interview went very well. She was apparently training a new manager for our Big City branch, and she had him sit in for most of the interview. He got called away to handle a scheduled personal issue, so I'm not sure what the point was, other than perhaps just getting him familiar with the interview process. I wasn't phased, though. I've reached a point in my interactions with VP that I'm just not intimidated... she seems more like a peer--and I don't mean that in a derogatory way, just that we're probably close in age, and I've spent some time with her now, chatting about family and shooting the breeze, so I don't get wound up about having to talk to her the way Boss used to back when I first started working here.
We talked about my resume, then we talked about what I'm already doing on the job. Basically I told her, and she seemed to agree that the experience of working in South Branch and then West Side prepared me in a way that simply working at my branch could never have done. When we finally got to the part where she asks if I have any questions for her, I was ready--I hate that part, don't you? You know what my questions are: am I hired, and how much will you pay me? But you can't ask those questions, and you know they're judging you based on how good your question is. So I asked her, "What would you say is the biggest problem you have with your managers--what is it that you most often go home and complain about?" She laughed a little and rolled her eyes (like "Uff, you don't know the HALF of it!") and said, "Do you really want to know??" Turns out, aside from the whole not-meeting-goal thing that a handful don't seem to take seriously, her biggest problem is HR-related issues that managers fail to identify or handle until they become crisis situations. Interesting... we had a brief conversation about the wide range of stuff she wishes she didn't have to deal with--sexual harassment claims that could have been handled better from the start, "my manager doesn't work 40 hours", etc. Pretty good insight for my own benefit.
She also asked me (from the list of pre-printed questions) how I would handle it if I didn't get the job. I was comforted by the fact that this was a pre-selected set of questions, and not her extemporaneously asking me if I planned to go postal when she let Chris promote another buddy ahead of me. Because I couldn't exactly say, "If I don't get a promotion out of this round of applications, I will suffer a psychotic break and either sue this company into the poorhouse or purchase an AK-47 and slaughter everyone involved in the making of this decision." Well, because I wouldn't actually do that. I would fantasize wildly about it, and I would probably become a bad employee as a result of my massive discontent, but I wouldn't actually harm anyone. As much as I'd want to.
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