Friday, March 18, 2005

Open Forum

I have an appointment Monday to speak with HR at the current temp job to explore the possibility of going permanent. I welcome your advice.
Posted by at

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello Andy,

Well, I am not exactly sure what your temp job entails, but I would certainly suggest to you to emphasize to HR that you're committed to excellence in your work. That while it may seem as though you may not have lots of experience in an office setting before, your previous training has taught you how to cope with stress and how to tackle projects and challenges on a daily basis.

Most likely you'll get the full-time position, and all I can say is approach it with self-confidence. Not cocky, but self-confident.

I remember I read an article on how to ace a job interview and not sure if this helps, but it certainly gives you some good pointers...

http://www.soyouwanna.com/site/syws/aceinterview/aceinterview.html

And on a last note :) an Internet romance would be very fun :) Unfortunately I am not near New York right now nor do I foresee travelling there soon (I might be in Washington DC sometime soon though). But we should certainly keep in touch. I really enjoy your blog. At some point I probably should start mine. And we could correspond via email too. I am a bit shy in initiating this type of contact sometimes but certainly we could do that.

Hope you ace the interview. I will keep my fingers crossed.

Richie

1:32 AM
Andy said...

Aw, Richie, that's so sweet! There's no way you could have known this, but you've misdiagnosed my problem. You see, I don't want the job. I'd rather lick bus tires. I barely know the guy I'd be working for, but over the past two weeks I've gotten an earful from the other admins. I've heard more than I need to know that this job would not be a lot of fun. Furthermore, it's in investment banking, which is basically my least favorite of all possible work environments. Not just that, it's managing the monies of pharmaceutical companies. So basically I'd find myself a cog in part of the giant corporate complex that is, to my way of thinking, principally what's wrong with America. (I'm not anti-corporate, I'm anti-greed, but unfortunately they're practically synonymous.)

My dilemma, though, is that I need the money and I need the insurance, and for all the resumes I've sent out so far, none of the places where I'd LIKE to work have responded.

My friends point out that, as a temp, I'm showing up and doing this work anyway, so why not get paid for it and continue to look for something I'd rather do?

I see their point. I am not interested in the job, at all, but I have my price in mind. I'll see what they want to offer on Monday and decide from there, I guess, if there's anything further to negotiate.

The reason I need advice, though, is because I'm a terrible liar (meaning, I'm bad at it). I'm not sure I can "sell myself" to HR for a position I'm only taking out of desperation.

I guess basically what I'm looking for is a chorus of supportive people to say, "No, don't take this job! Don't fold! Keep your eye on the prize, don't settle!" Unfortunately sometimes practicality trumps ideology, and I fear I've now reached that point.

7:45 AM
Jess said...

If you're a terrible liar, then stick with the truth... just don't tell the whole truth. There's nothing to be gained by telling the HR person that the job sucks. Instead, if they ask if you like the job, you can say something like, "Well, if I could get a job where they pay me to go on vacation, that would be better, but this will do until that happens or I win the lottery!" Say it with a smile and let the conversation move on.

You might as well stick with this for the practical reasons until something else comes along.

9:36 AM
Anonymous said...

Well, since they've already had four people in two years in this position, you wouldn't be breaking the pattern if you took it for awhile... But I would only take it if you know it won't drive you crazy. Why did the other four people leave? Why is the current person leaving? What will you tell the next employer about why you wanted to leave this job?
-- Former personnel manager extraordinaire - JF

12:02 PM
Anonymous said...

Andy,

Both Jess and JF have offered very insightful comments. JF pointed out something very important: why is it that people leave this job? Does this company know why? Good questions, JF...

Jess also provides you with a great way out of having to say "your company sucks and you morons are just greedy people trying to make even more money out of other people's misfortunes" (much as you'd probably want to say this).

I would just add to the discussion what you mentioned before. You need the money. If that's the case, then you need to take the job. Furthermore, I don't know you very well but from what I read in your blog, you used to be in a completely different area (the arts). I would think that if you stick to this job for a few months (maybe a year), save some money and build-up some office experience, then you'd be in a better position to send out dozens of resumes that include a little line saying "I contributed to the daily operations of an investment banking organization dealing with pharmaceutical business".

On a side note, 10 years ago I was an undergraduate who wanted to be a world-class and famous researcher by the time I was 21. I have to say that I still think that overnight success still takes from 10 to 15 years.

Just my two cents. Hope these comments help.

1:03 PM
Andy said...

The current person left because she has an 18 month old daughter and is "tired of working 10-12 hour days." I don't know why the other assistants left, but when I mentioned to another admin that the boss was kind of hard to read, she said, quote, "You'll never know how he feels about you until he fires you."

Basically the job consists of him having you contact various people around the country and set up meetings and after you've made all the travel arrangements and confirmed everything, he changes his mind and just as you've rebooked everything it either goes back to plan A or suddenly there's a plan C. And apparently "gratitude" is in short supply.

Once he had a Monday morning meeting in Boston and made plans to go up Sunday night and stay in a hotel. On Saturday he changed his mind and EMAILED his assistant to tell her to cancel the reservation. Um, she doesn't work weekends. So the reservation got billed as a no-show and it's been my job to argue with the accountants that they should pay for it anyway because the former assistant "forgot." I know that's a lie, but I figured it was his lie, not mine.

As far as the "next" job goes, the plan would be to just stay here until I get something else lined up. I just intend to be honest and say investment banking is not my thing, but it was an emergency stopgap measure and I'm looking to bail as soon as I can. How's that?

12:54 AM
Anonymous said...

Well, Andy ... Good luck and keep me posted :-)

11:56 AM
Anonymous said...

Do not take this job.
JF

12:20 PM
SailRacer said...

Make sure your breath is fresh.

6:56 PM
Matthew said...

Definitely doesn't seem like a good job. Under normal circumstances I would unquestionably give it a thumbs down. However, I guess it boils down to whether or not your desperation for the money and insurance outweighs the negatives on the position.

1:26 AM

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