Wednesday, April 27, 2011

The Hunt - A Graduating College Student's Search For A Job

Dan Treadway

I opened my inbox to find yet another email with a generic yet familiar subject line. Its content was predictable:
"Reaching the final stage of interviews is an accomplishment, and as we mentioned, competition is extremely high for a very limited number of positions. While we were very impressed with your qualifications, regretfully, you will not be continuing on in the process."

As far as form letter job rejection emails go, it was surprisingly thorough, containing three whole paragraphs. A separate rejection email I had received a couple of weeks prior was only a couple of sentences long. I can't recall the copy of the email exactly, but in my mind it read, "You didn't get the job. Sucks."

I had made up my mind in September of my senior year that I would try to find a job after I graduated in the hopes of gaining some real world experience before eventually going to graduate school.

Naturally, I understood the economy wasn't begging for another wide-eyed communications major to be unleashed upon it, but I had a fleeting sense of optimism that I'd be a compelling candidate for something at least. I felt like I had done most things right throughout college: I maintained a high GPA, got solid internship experience, and somehow I had managed to never get arrested.

At first my optimism seemed warranted. I got a response from the first large company I applied to and subsequently was in contact with them until January. Following five interviews, I assumed that I was a shoe-in for the position. After all, I had answered and re-answered questions regarding just about everything except my dental history. But alas, one fateful Friday my phone rang and I was given a classic, "We really like you and think you're going to be successful, but we just don't think this was the right fit." Not the right fit after five interviews? That's one complicated puzzle.

I decided to change up my strategy and, in addition to applying to jobs, I attended the glorified meat market known as a career fair on my campus. While I was there I met a woman who thought I was a good candidate for the media organization she represented and I was encouraged to apply for a paid internship there. I kept in touch with her as I applied, and was eventually contacted by the organization and told that several shows were interested in me and that they would call me individually for interviews in the coming weeks. I sat by my phone, and, as phones have a tendency to do whenever one sits by them, it never rang.

From there I continued my search and somehow was selected as a finalist to drive the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile around the country. It started as mostly a joke when I first applied on my colleges career services website, and within a month it became a realistic possibility as I was flown out to Wisconsin to interview with 29 other candidates, of which 12 would be selected. The interview was fun, and everyone at the company was nice, but alas three weeks later I learned that I did not cut the mustard. I was Oscar Mayer humbled.

Now, eight months, dozens of applications, and six final interviews with various companies that resulted in generic rejection phone calls/emails later, I've begun relating to excerpts from the Upton Sinclair novel The Jungle, of all things.

"They were beaten; they had lost the game, they were swept aside. It was not less tragic because it was so sordid, because that it had to do with wages and grocery bills and rents."

Read The Rest Of Dan's Story @ HuffingtonPost

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.