Interviews are funny business, human beings sitting in a room, that asses each other’s strengths and weaknesses through survey questions. You are given a very small window to summarize who you are and if you fit the role, you win their game. Early in my career I would be intimidated meeting the “Boss”, my hands would get sweaty and I would have to deploy strategies to stay calm. Over the years as I gained experience, confidence and a better understanding of myself, and therefore the world, it allowed me to be more like me and less like ideal “candidate.” My approach and focus changed and so did my experiences. I gained an immense work ethic from my personal ventures, career changes and transferring to other departments, this allowed me to meet people that either supported me or quickly filtered the ones that did not understand me. Those that did not understand my ways or views on life, came around eventually by having respect for my work ethic, the desire to continually learn and add value. Maybe not all will come around and get you, but the ones that do, those are the ones that add value in your life.
These day’s I rarely interview, because I have a long term play and it requires me to continue learning and adding some more technical skills, but when I do its to get feedback on where I stand and what else I need to work on. You will be surprised how much you can learn about yourself through the interview process, it can tell you how people view you. Some feedback might be painful and you might say, no way that applies to me, but you know what, I bet there is a lesson hidden somewhere. If you are doing things for the right reasons and want to increase value, keep doing you; it will allow the right people to see you and bring more of that good into your life, because whether you do this or not, people will come and go, might as well be ourselves and attract those that can truly help us better ourselves. I am not saying that everything I did with my unorthodox approach is always right, in many cases it create ripples, rather than saying the robotic answers they wanted to hear, but my theory is that it leads to a more enriched experience in life.
A wise man I met the other day, because I was being me, said, “don’t ever become a robot” and after getting to know me, he was ready to recruit me into his department, but once he knew my goals, he gave me a great strategy, which resembled the one I was putting into effect. Had I not been myself, I would never had that interaction and met this really amazing person, who was hidden by layers of his own protective barriers. Please don’t become a “robot”, no matter how tempting it might seem, just act this way to get the things you want now; that’s the short term gain. Only you know your needs, so do what you have to do, but please focus on building that vision of how you want your life to be; each step either takes you a step closer or further away. Don’t be afraid to take these steps, if you take one in the wrong direction, it’s okay, learn from it and get back on the path. Keep fighting the good fight brothers and sisters.
…Oh and by the way, if your interested to find out how the interviews went, let me know by commenting and I will do a post on that.
JOURNEY OF A MADMAN 