On the Hunt
I’ve been on the job hunt for a while now. After years of scratching together a living in the entertainment industry and putting my heart and soul into scripts that nobody reads, I’m ready to sit at a desk, send 2 emails, attend 4 pointless meetings, and call it a day (just kidding, I’m very excited to work super hard for anybody out there who has a job for little old me). I’m not sure how many of you have looked for a job recently but let me tell you, it is WEIRD out there.
It’s been a while since I’ve looked for a traditional job. In the writing game, it’s a lot of sending emails to people, setting up meetings, and watching those meetings get delayed and delayed and delayed and eventually canceled. Occasionally it’s a pitch meeting that goes well and you still never hear from them again, or one that goes so well you have to do it three more times in front of one extra person each time.
Looking for regular jobs though, is so much more annoying. I’ve spent the last few months jumping between LinkedIn, Indeed, ZipRecruiter, and throwing resumes in bottles into the Silver Lake reservoir in the hopes of finding a job. To cut to the chase, it hasn’t gone great so far.
I’m by no means a perfect candidate for the types of jobs I’m applying for: I have non-traditional work experience, haven’t spent any time “leveraging CRM tools and data analytics to track sales performance” and I certainly don’t have 3-5 years’ experience needed to get an entry-level job…which seems like a big ask. But I do have a college degree, a wealth of experience and a winning attitude, which I thought would at least get me some interviews…well, it certainly got me an essay topic.
Last week I got tabbed for an “AI Interview” for a talent pool organization. After doing some online research, it seemed like they probably weren’t a scam which is all it takes to clear my low bar these days. What followed was one of the strangest business experiences of my life. I showed up to the virtual meeting and was greeted by an AI voice that did a good job of not trying to sound too human. I was told that I would be asked a series of questions about my skills and experiences and that I shouldn’t take long pauses in my answers or the AI would think I was finished answering.
So, I’m staring at a video window with nothing but my camera feed when the first question asks me about the creative process of the latest movie I wrote. I was honestly shocked by how good of a question it was. Shocked to the point that I guess I didn’t answer quickly enough because the AI simply moved on to the next question… oh-for-one, Will. The second question was about some of the strategies we incorporated into a rewrite of a Hallmark movie we did a few years back, again a really good question. This time I was ready though. I answered as best as I could and when the next question came, it incorporated what I had said and asked a good follow-up question. I was taken aback. I’ve done plenty of interviews and most of the time, the questions are generic and clearly taken from a list but this AI seemed to listen and ask questions based on my answers in a way that would leave me complimenting a human as an A+ interviewer.
When the interview was over I just kind of sat there, trying to figure out what happened. I guess my answers were sufficient in some way because I did get added to the talent pool…whether that gets me a job at any point? Well, that’s a whole other story!
Tell me about your strangest job interview! I want to know!
Damn, but it is a strange strange world out there, and kudos to you, intrepid explorer, for using your mental machete to hack through it all and report back to those of us still trapped in the amber of 20th Century practices. The strangest job interview I can come up with would probably be my application to drive part time for Town Taxi, one of the main cab companies in Boston when I was in college back in the days before Lyft, Uber, GPS on your phone, and driverless cars, although there were plenty of cars driving around Boston that seemed like no one had their hands on the wheel. For those who don’t know Boston, the streets of much of the central part of town basically follow old cow paths or the stumbling, staggering steps of pre-Revolutionary War drunkards who wandered out of taverns looking for pizza or pasta to sober up, not realizing it would be a good 125-50 years before one of those joints opened up. Which is why so many streets meander aimlessly only to end back where they started or dead ending (appropriately) at a cemetery loaded with headstones for people named Hezekiah, Ebenezer, Quill, Lavinia and Sophronia. Anyhoo, one Saturday I went in nervously expecting to be handed a map of the city and told to come back when I’d memorized major thoroughfares and landmarks, knew how to get to at least five major sections of town and four suburbs and which graveyard Paul Revere was buried in. You know, like one-eighth of what London cabbies are required to know. Instead, the guy interviewing me seemed more interested in the Dunkin Donut he was dipping in a lukewarm cup of Dunkin coffee. With a mouthful of dough he asked if I had a criminal record. I said no. He then asked to see my arms, and when he couldn’t detect any track marks he asked if I wanted to start that day. I did, and for the first two months the first thing I said to people was, “If you don’t know how to get to where you’re going, you should take another cab.” Only survived those early days because as a part-timer I got the crappiest cars in the garage. Dings, dents, doors that wouldn’t open or wouldn’t stay closed. Other drivers saw I had nothing to lose, which gave me a strategic advantage in the bumper car world of central Boston. Learned a lot, never got robbed, and only got lost once or twice each day I drove. Terrifying then, fun to look back on now.
These comments are amazing!
One of my early jobs was as a “hot walker” at Hollywood Park Racetrack. This is the absolute lowest job a person can get at any track (or in the world?). The horses are “worked” very early in the morning before the heat of the day. Even so the thoroughbred still returns sweaty and he/she would be handed off to me or one of the others (all men) and we would work in circles for 20 minutes until the horse was cool and calm.
The real cherry on the top was to learn a special whistle that brought on urination when you put them in their stall. No colic allowed.
Honestly I loved it. People were lovely, horses everywhere, one of my favorite jobs. Horses…