It recently occurred to me that I never told you about the second interview I had with a local marketing company. Internet, that was two weeks ago, why didn't you remind me?
My first challenge with this was that it wasn't really an interview. It was a shadow day where you get to follow one of their people around to see what your day would be like if you started working for them. I needed to be there from 9am to 5pm. Do we recognize the problem yet? That's right, I haven't gotten up that early (much less stayed awake for that long and been away from home the whole time)since January 15! But whatever. I got up, put on my "interview" pants and a nice sweater. I got there on time and fairly alert for the un-Godly hour, and met up with my shadow buddy, Garth.
Let me just take the time to thank Garth for being nice, personable and not at all creepy or serial killer-like. Especially since we spent AN ASS-LONG time in your car together.
We had to drive over an hour to get to his sales territory in Where The Fuck, Illinois. Maybe you've been there? It's between a skanky pool of water along the side of the highway and a Super Walmart.
Anywho. Garth and I ran from one business to another, while I listened as he tried desperately to make some sales. It was depressing. Not just because the idea of sale, Sale, Selling! for a living makes me feel icky and bored, but because he only got two stinky sales. We went to maybe eight places and his daily goal is, get ready...Thirty or Forty!
I also have to say that, were I alone on this particular trip, there are several places I NEVER would have gone into. Like the pawn shop with the very obvious BULLET HOLE in the glass of the front door. And? When I got home I smelled bad. Like BO, old Fritos, wet dog and feet. Everything I was wearing had to be washed and/or aired out. Thank God my interview suit is washable.
Now, I'll admit that I wasn't crazy about the idea of doing business-to-business sales for an office supply company (yeah, it's that boring) going into this. But, I was willing to push through a few months of crap to possibly get to something creative like copywriting or coming up with marketing campaigns. Alas, such a trajectory is not possible with this particular company. They believe in promoting from within, but what's the prize you get for putting up with B2B bullshit? The best thing they could come up with? Learning their accounting practices and running your own branch office. Really, y'all? You mean one day, if I sell really, really hard, I'll get to sit in an office and do math all day? For reals? Gee...Thanks.
Photo above "I'm so unexcited, and I can't hide it."
3 comments:
"When I got home I smelled bad. Like BO, old Fritos, wet dog and feet." Awesome. LOL!
In 1995, I had pretty much the exact same experience. I told my shadow guy that I had to go make a phone call when we were sitting in the parking lot of a public school North of Toronto (after failing to sell any copy paper to them), stood in a phone booth on the corner pretending to talk to someone on the phone and when the dude looked the other way, I darted out of the phone booth and ran out of sight, faster than I ever had in my life.
I had forgotten all about that horrible day. Ack. Job searching sucks, hang in there!
Oh that sounds YUCKY. What a way to spend the day. Hang in there, it is going to happen!! xoxoxo
Thanks you two! Tracey, I can totally see you bolting from a phone booth. They don't have many of those anymore so it wasn't really an option for me. Dammit!
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