Monday, February 11, 2013

Job Interview Part 1

I do find it interesting that there are two things about a job that I can either like or hate: the people and the work. So often I may love the work, but I don't get along with the people. Then there are those times when I get along great with the people only to find the work to be unbearable. I am very glad that at my current job I both love the work as well as the people I work with. One wouldn't think so based upon what I went through to get the job.

As a bit of background, I will let you know I was unemployed for nine months before I finally got another job. I was hired through a contractor and was the only person from this contractor working on site for a customer. I got the job because I had experience with the former software that they used. The great thing about working where I did was that it was more of a launch pad for the current job I am at now. I got along great with everybody and learned a lot. I was hired with the understanding that this would be a no end-date contract which gave me time to impress the people I worked for and hoped that they hired me on their staff.

The whole transition from working from one contractor to working for my current employer seemed to occur in stages. My current employer had a large presence there already with the majority of the contractors from that company. I really liked the attitudes and methodology that they possessed and thought to myself that I should consider seeing what it would take to work for them. Of course, working for my current contractor I really had no true benefits. I had no paid time off and had to wait 3 months before I got insurance and 9 months until I could apply for a 401K. So you can see why I admired trying to work for the other company.

I suspected that something was up because projects that I was supposed to be assigned to I was being taken off of, so when they called me in and told me that my contract was up at the end of November, I wasn't too surprised. Of course those dreaded feelings of anxiousness and lack of direction crept back in. I was still familiar with the diligence and routine necessary when you are unemployed and put that energy to work to apply for a new position. I asked the two people nearest to me if they could give me a good word.

Interesting what a difference a week makes. About a week from when I was informed that my contract was up I had three nibbles. The recruiter that one of the people near me worked for, asked to have lunch with me to discuss prospects. That same day, I got a call on my cell phone from a recruiter asking for an impromptu interview that morning. On top of this, I passed my resume to the other person near me to send to the contractor I wanted to work for and got a reply back asking to schedule a phone screening.

That day I walked over to another building to have the impromptu interview. I did get a bit lost because the building had two sections, one of which I went up the wrong elevator and couldn't find the room. I went back down to the lobby and called them to find out where the room was. They almost thought that I had the wrong day for the interview and was glad that I was only lost. After the first interview, I went back to the office and saw the person I was going to have lunch with in the lobby talking to the co-worker who passed along my information. I had lunch with him and found out that he was a recruiter that recruited for the company that I wanted to work for. It seemed great to know that three companies were vying for my attention.

Go forward another week and everything appears to have been put on hold. I couldn't get a hold of anybody to see what the status of everything that occurred the week before. Stay tuned tomorrow for "the rest of the story".

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