Humouring the Intern
Posted on January 12, 2010 with 7 Comments
It is finally time for the long-promised story of one of the three interviews I had during the brief one-week period where I knew I’d been laid off but hadn’t yet secured a new position.
That week was quite a whirlwind of resume-posting activity for me. This layoff, I had the added pressure of paying rent and other assorted bills that weren’t part of my measly fixed expenses the previous time I was laid off. So I got on the job applications with a fervour that I couldn’t quite muster last time around, and it paid off. Within days of being given my notice, I had three interviews lined up.
The one I was most excited about was for a Communications Manager position at a local college. This is basically my dream job for this level in my career and while I apply for lots of jobs at that level, I am mostly passed over because in this less-than-stellar economy, there are plenty of more qualified candidates to choose from. Still, I try anyway. I was thrilled to score an interview for this position and prepared carefully for it; I researched the college, had a couple of communications tactics up my sleeve that I could offer up as small ideas that could make a big difference to their communications program, I printed out my references, and prepared several questions for the interviewer. I had a good feeling about this one and was determined to knock their socks off.
Admittedly, I had been surprised when I spoke to the HR person on the phone who called me for a preliminary screening to determine if I was worth bringing in for an interview. She sounded, honestly, about 12 years old. I didn’t think too much of it though, because I assumed she was just the youthful assistant to the Communications Director and was just arranging the meeting on her behalf.
Nope! I arrived for my interview and was taken aback to have a young girl (who couldn’t have been a day over 18 years old) greet me dressed in a long tshirt and leggings-as-pants. She brought me to her “office” for the interview. I’m still thinking she’s the assistant of the real interviewer until she closes the door and begins asking me questions.
A little unsettled, I did my best answering her, which mainly consisted of her reading off a job duty and then asking me if I thought I could do that. In total, she asked me seven real questions, two of which were yes/no. I asked her several of my questions, to which she gave uninformative, short answers. She let slip during one of them that she’s actually a student intern! After a whopping 13 minutes had flown by, she thanked me for coming in, told me she’d make a final decision by the end of the week and showed me the door.
SERIOUSLY? A college of good reputation in the community allows a poorly prepared, ill-informed, inexperienced intern who is actually a student at the college make the final hiring decision for a managerial candidate several ranks above them who will run the school’s communications program. Needless to say, I never heard from her again. I’m thinking they were bringing in real candidates for a fake position so the HR interns could get practice interviewing.
What’s the weirdest job interview you’ve ever been to?
Category: Uncategorized
All my job interviews are usually freaking weird
Like they didn’t grill me like I expected, or they grilled me, but with stupid crap like being a woman
Did you notice the two doors? maybe the surveyed you before you even got into the interview to determine which one you’d go in to the practice run for the intern or the real one for the humble candidates who know that no one is beneath them. I recommend you lose the attitude because it probably shone through at your interview and don’t judge people on first appearance – she could’ve been your next boss for all you know!
Wouldn’t it be rather unethical to post a fake position to give students experience in interviewing? A total waste of candidates time in preparing their resume/for the interview and your references’ time in writing references. I’m dying to know which college this is (though I don’t blame you for not saying!) I applied for a sessional instructor position at a local college that required 3 reference letters from each of the 80 candidates (!) and then told us all that an internel person “changed their mind” and took the position!
Frizz – I was afraid this might come off a bit that way. Here’s the thing. I have truly done a bit of a self-inventory on this, and I don’t think I came across as judgmental at the interview. I think I answered her questions honestly and well, and I did a good job. However, if you take what you perceived as my attitude problem out of the equation here, and put yourself in the shoes of a Marketing Director at a college, don’t you think I have a point? Would you delegate the screening of a Communications Manager candidate to a school student doing an HR internship for one semester out of her school program, who hadn’t even graduated yet? That is putting a lot of power into the hands of someone who is not experienced enough for that level of responsibility, and who has no invested interest in making a good candidate choice. This was evidenced in the type of questions she asked me. No interviewer could make an informed hiring decision for a Communications Manager based on the information she asked me. This wasn’t a real interview. And I’d say that she had already written me off before she started asking me questions, but I saw her list of prepared questions and she asked me every single thing she’d written down. She just didn’t prepare well. It was an utter waste of my time.
Beth – I think so too! I was tempted to call them up and give them a piece of my mind, but then I got a job offer and decided I had bigger fish to fry.
Did you ever think that maybe the job was a hoax and simply a project for the “intern” to get her feet wet in the interviewing porcess?
Dad – that’s exactly what I think!
hahaha. Oh, man. I would be livid. I forgot where, but some chain does the hokey pokey at their group interviews. At least she didn’t have you dancing!