Patience of Job

My two favorite job interviews — ones where I was the interviewer, not the interviewee — both involved people who didn't get the job. One, in fact, didn't even get the interview.

When I was a creative director at an ad agency once I was in charge of finding a new copywriter, and once we ran a help wanted ad the resumes came pouring in. One of the folks who looked promising had worked at an ad agency where I'd previously worked, though a couple of years after I'd been there. I called and invited her for an interview.

In she came with her portfolio — usually called a "book" in an ad agency — and she was showing her work. It was good, and she had a great attitude.

Everything was proceeding swimmingly until she turned the page to show an ad that I'd seen many times and always liked.

Partly because I'd written it.

Now, every ad in someone's book has a story: what the client's problem was, how the creative team or person came up with the idea, what the results were. I asked her what the story was behind that particular ad.

She told me a great story — much better than the real story — that had nothing to do with how and why that ad had actually been produced.

When she finished, I told her that it had just become an unlucky day for her. "Only one or two people would have known that you didn't write that ad," I told her. "Because I wrote it. At (name of agency). Two years before you worked there."

What could she say? I asked her if any of the other work in her book was someone else's, and she swore up and down that that was the only ad she'd included that wasn't hers.

I told her I was flattered that she'd included my work in her portfolio, but I was afraid she was out of the running for our job opening.

In a way it was kind of amusing, and I felt bad for her. What were the odds that she'd interview at the one agency in town that would have known that ad wasn't written by her?

The second person I remember from that process, coincidentally also a woman, was also someone who looked promising and was invited for an interview. When I called her to set the appointment, the trouble began.

She lived in Baltimore (we were in the suburbs), and she began quizzing me about the closest bus stop, and which buses stopped there. When I didn't know, she told me which buses stopped near her apartment, and asked me if any of them stopped near our office. When I told her I didn't know that, either, she demanded I find out.

Then, when I told her how far the bus stop was from our office (a couple of blocks), she made her second demand: pick her up at the stop, and drive her back to it after the interview.

I told her I wasn't going to do that, and she'd have to find her own way to the office if she wanted to come in for an interview. She insisted that that was a great hardship, and I HAD to drive her.

"If I do that and we hire you," I asked, "how will you get to work every day?"

It turned out that she thought I (or someone in the office, "like one of the secretaries") could drive her two and from the bus stop every day, though she grudgingly admitted she could possibly walk "in nice weather."

The woman we ultimately hired had her own car.