Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Too Good to Be True

I had a phone interview today that was supposed to last 20 minutes, but ended up taking 3. It was for a career in financial services; I know, not something remotely close to my career goals, but hey, they contacted me for once. The form email should have been a tip-off, but it wasn't any skin off my nose to respond, and like I said: they contacted me. Exciting stuff, world.

Apparently I wasn't cut out for this position because I'm new to the area. Everything on my resume was from out-of-state, but the recruiter I spoke with had been hoping that I grew up in this city, and would therefore have plenty of contacts. So I apparently missed out on a fabulous opportunity to bother my friends and family for commission.

I had a similar experience a few weeks ago, where I had a successful interview for an entry-level management position for a marketing company. They do marketing for non-profits! And it's management! Holy crap! Anyway, they brought me back for a second round of interviewing, which involved spending the whole day with someone doing the position I was interviewing for. That involved standing next to a card table in the lobby of a K-Mart while the people I was shadowing tried to sell children's toys, with 5% of the proceeds going to a non-profit. For comparison: Target puts 5% of their income into a foundation for various community projects. Needless to say, I left of my own accord as soon as I was able to get to my car.

It's surprisingly easy to get suckered into these "too good to be true" situations, even when the language of the ad is so obviously inflated to sound a lot better than it really is. There's a bunch of obvious red flags-- don't send money to a potential employer, don't give out your credit card number-- so I haven't been scammed, per se, but gosh is it easy to get me to interview for a technically legitimate but still pretty goddamn sketchy job. I just give them the benefit of the doubt, because hey, what if this is the Best Opportunity Ever? And besides, it doesn't hurt to send in my resume... or talk to someone on the phone... and then I find myself leaning against a gumball machine in the lobby of a big box discount store, smiling at strangers and hoping that they'll buy a stuffed animal. I like to think that I have integrity, but it's amazing what I'll do for the promise of a $50k salary.

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