Ah, job expectations vs. reality. Once upon a naïve time, a few years ago, I thought finding a job with a good degree would be relatively easy. That’s what I had been told anyway. Fast-forward a few years: nope, it’s not. By now applying for jobs has become my main job experience (too bad it isn’t seen as a great asset on your cv).
Here are a few of the fun things I have encountered so far…
Step 1: vacancies
They should put a trigger warning at the heading of every vacancy: “WARNING: reading this can cause severe anxiety (it’s not you, it’s them)”. Reading vacancies and what is expected from the poor souls applying for jobs is why yoga was invented in the first place.
This is what an average vacancy generally looks like:
Step 2: the interview
If somehow you managed to overcome your anxiety about not being fit for any job whatsoever and you apply for one, the real fun begins. You get to start the “Waiting To See If You Are Invited For The Interview”.
Well actually the days of interviews are long gone. The process is a lot more enjoyable now thanks to personality tests, knowledge tests, logic tests and about 15 other tests designed to hire the absolute worst candidate for the job. Oops sorry, I mean best candidate.
Before an actual interview, there is the complete check of your mental health and willingness to sacrifice everything for a mind-numbing job, based on questions such as: “Do you prefer working or going on holidays?” and “Are you willing to rat out a colleague who arrived five minutes late yesterday?”
And then – o joy! – comes The Interview. There’s you facing a tribunal of at least three people in an overly lit meeting room, with them penning down remarks (what, dear God, what are they writing?) while you are busy explaining why they should please please please pretty please hire you. Without sounding desperate of course.
To make the process even more enjoyable, they ask you wonderfully relevant questions such as: “Where do you see yourself in five years?” (That’s easy, doing your job, sir) and “Wouldn’t you rather be somewhere in the African bush?” (Well of course but you’re not willing to pay me to do so, are you?!). Sometimes you get a “Well, your experience is a bit all over the place isn’t it?” (Always nice to talk to someone who thinks jobs are being thrown at people nowadays) or, based on the same experience: “Your experience has been mainly in one area, why are you applying for this job?” And if you’re real lucky, you get one of the people doing the interview shamelessly checking his phone while you’re talking, or even taking calls while you’re explaining how lovely you think it would be to work here.
How magical would it be, if the whole looking-for-a-job-process would be made to feel less like you’re an inferior being who should be happy with whatever they throw at you, and felt more like what it is: a process involving equal human beings, all trying to find a fulfilling activity that pays the bills and doesn’t make us want to shoot ourselves.
Maybe we can start by smiling a bit more, not taking it all so seriously, maybe even make a silly joke, and acknowledging that none of us really have a clue what we are doing.
Ruth Van de steene 