Closed House

After my failed attempt at entering the airline industry I realized that a more stable office environment might be my safest career path. I thought back to my days as an intern in Richmond, VA, and realized that I enjoyed some of the monotony that came with an office job. I liked getting up at the same time each morning, wearing something different every day, and talking to others while we awaited the final drip of the coffee pot.

Yes, an office job, this was perfect. As exciting as flying back and forth to Greece would be, an office job was what I needed at this point in my life. It would allow me to meet some people in whatever city I was in rather than be stuck sleeping alone around the world in foreign hotel rooms.

I began my search in Charlotte, close enough to home, close enough to get to Clemson football games on the weekends, tons of young people, and I’d have a free place to stay until I saved up some money to get a place on my own.

There were a few stipulations when it came to the perfect office. I wanted a casual environment, approachable coworkers, and a challenging position. As I researched more and more companies I realized that a lot of people were looking for this perfect office and unfortunately they weren’t finding it.

Then one evening I found it. I won’t mention any names because I am sure that they have people running RSS feeds and will come stalk me down and never give me a job post reading this blog. Although I won’t name drop, I will highlight the aspects of the company that were appealing to me. (Note: Many of you reading this are only doing it because you are my friends or family and are obligated, so you might remember the company from the two months that I was obsessed with it. Others of you may have been through the same obsession and disappointment; be honest…did we really understand what they did anyways?)

This “perfect” company had a “perfect” website. It caught your eye, was easy to navigate, and was very inviting. There were video clips of success stories and happy employees praising how much they loved “perfect” company. There were Facebook pages displaying pictures of snow days, Friday afternoons on the outdoor patio at the office, and conferences in 5 star tropical hotels. For those of you typing “conferences in 5 star tropical hotels” into your Google search bar, click away from your new tab or window and keep reading, for your own sake, please keep reading. Don’t quit your job yet.

My obsession continued for a few weeks, it even prompted me to create my own twitter account so that I could know what was going on in the office 24/7. I told everyone I knew about this company. I was bound and determined to work for them, play in the snow with them, and drink pina coladas by the 5 star pool with them.

Then one day it happened. They announced that they were having an Open House.

Despite the tough economy they were growing rapidly and had multiple openings they needed to fill.

There was an application you had to fill out in order to be invited to the Open House. This seemed very contradictory to me but nevertheless I sent in my application. A few days later I got my acceptance into the “open” house. I was thrilled; it was like getting into college all over again.

I pulled out my suit from my internship days, dry cleaned it, bought a new white button down shirt, and even coordinated my shoes and handbag to the company’s name. Despite the rain, I walked into that office with my head and umbrella held high.

As I walked into the overcrowded lobby and lowered my umbrella I tried not to let my head fall with it. The 60 people also there for their 30 minute time slot at the open house was quite overwhelming. We were herded into a conference room for a presentation about what the company actually does. After 30 minutes of trying really hard to figure out what the website never fully explained I was still stumped. This wasn’t going very well. After the quick tour we were herded into the break room to await our brief interview.

Although I was still unsure about what they did exactly I figured I would knock them dead in the interview and they would wan to hire me on the spot. I am out going, young, eager, interviews are a piece of cake. I can talk to a dead bug on a brick wall; surely, I can hold my own in an interview.

After the interview was over I wished that I was a dead bug on the wall rather than the too out going, way too young, and apparently not eager enough college student that just sat on the receiving end of the worst interview in history.

I will never know if it was the interviewer, myself, or the combination that led to such a bad performance that rainy day but I do know that after that interview they can’t get any worse. Guess you’ve gotta start from the bottom and work your way up.

Moral of the story is I didn’t get my 5 star tropical conferences but I did research a lot of good interview tips and I am equipped to handle impersonal interviewers and how to handle a dead bug on the wall.

Turbulence

As I sit in the waiting room at a certain car dealership waiting while my car undergoes a “diagnostic test” I find myself thinking…hmm…I could be in car sales. Then I am reminded of the struggling economy and rethink my grand life plans.

I find myself doing this a lot these days. I create a dream job in my head then quickly reconsider due to a number of factors.

In March as I flew home from Aruba – yes, tough life, I know – I realized that I wanted to be a flight attendant. What a perfect job, right? I am in my early 20’s with no commitments, no need to be in one place; why not fly daily, sleep in a different city every night, and get to see the world, or at the least the US of A? While speeding through the clouds at a cruising altitude of 30,000 feet I began to form the perfect cover letter in my head, explaining why I was the perfect flight attendant for the JFK -> Athens flight. Naturally my reasons were that I speak enough Greek to sell cologne and other duty free items, serve meals, and make sure the Greeks on the plane were comfortable. All very practical requirements for a flight attendant, right?

Unfortunately my dreams crashed and burned when I got home and realized that no airlines were hiring flight attendants at the time. Too bad there was no one around to throw out a life raft or assist me with my oxygen mask.

Being the resilient woman that I am I moved on to my next dream career.

Since I couldn’t work for an airline why not work for the magazines that you find in your seat back pocket? Perfect, right? I can still travel (for my “research”), wouldn’t have to worry about annoyed passengers because we ran out of tomato juice, and I would basically have the perks of a flight attendant without jet lag. When I decided I wanted to work for the in-flight magazine world I remembered the phrase “it’s not what you know it’s who you know.”

I remembered an old connection in the publishing world and sent out an email with a resume. Well, maybe that was my first mistake. In my excitement I sent the email asking for advice, resume help, connections, anything really and forgot to attach the resume. I was really helping my chances, huh?

Surprisingly, I never heard back and that was the end of my airline related career dream. I guess I will just stick to flying them instead of working for them.

Under Construction

Please be patient as I get back on the blogging bandwagon. It has been almost a year and a half since my last blog, and I am trying to do the blog world better with my latest attempt. Check back later for the first full "post-grad blog."

Yours truly,

YK