Are You a ‘Savior’?

This is the second in a series of posts on jobs you should probably avoid. Having labored

through hundreds of job interviews, I aim to impart my knowledge to fellow job seekers in the hopes they don’t fall into these traps.

Last week, I discussed how to spot a jerk in a job interview. This week it’s the “savior” job interview.

The subject line of the email stated “job interview/confidential.” The word confidential was my first clue something was a bit off with this job interview, and I had a feeling what it might be.

Nevertheless, I replied and set up a time for the interview, which was to be held in the restaurant of a hotel in a quiet, old-money part of Manhattan. After I confirmed the day and time, I was told not to tell anyone about the interview. Like, whom would I tell?

On the day of the appointment, I walked past weathered brownstones that have seen better days but still house only the very, very rich and made my way to the hotel. There, I spoke to two nice gentlemen about the job, my background, etc. The interview went well, or so I thought. Then came the kicker: “Thank you for coming,” said one of men. “We’re exploring our options.”

Peeved, I left and thought to myself, “Hey, buddy, I just wasted three hours! I have to dry clean these clothes!”

Yep, I feel for it once again, the “savior” job interview. These guys wanted to make personnel changes and were looking for ready candidates to fill the jobs of employees they most likely wanted to dump. Not bad in theory, but horrible for those employees and their oblivious replacements, AKA, saviors.

So what is a “savior” job interview? It’s when a company or manager has a “difficult” employee they want to replace but doesn’t have the cojones to outright fire. Or, they don’t want to fire them until they have a replacement lined up. Makes sense, right?

But it’s more than that. Since I’ve been on several of these savior job interviews (which I’ll recount presently), I’ve come to recognize there is another dynamic lurking beneath the surface: The workplace is dysfunctional and the manager, unable or unwilling to deal with the situation, hopes to hire someone new who will somehow pacify the rancorous office environment and make everything wonderful. A savior, get it?

My first experience with this savior job interview came during my first unfortunate stint of long-term unemployment back in 2010. I was summoned, again, to a diner. (That is always your first clue something is amiss. Why not hold the interview in the actual office of the hiring company?)

The interviewer then proceeded to tell me, rather obliquely, but clear enough so I understood, that the person currently in the job wasn’t working out. While it’s difficult to gain insight into the mind of a complete stranger, from what I discerned the employee in question was rather passive-aggressively needling his boss to fire him. I actually checked out this guy’s LinkedIn profile. He had authored books, so my hunch is that he believed the job was beneath his talents, which it might have been.

He wanted out, but wanted to be fired (in the hopes of getting unemployment and severance?) instead of being more assertive and proactive and quitting a job he obviously hated. Obviously, a dysfunctional relationship between manager and employee. I can’t be sure, since I never met the guy in person, but that was my take.

Then, as a waitress who wanted us gone from the table so she could get a better tip was rushing us, I was forced to take an editing test. In a noisy diner. While the guy stared at me. Not an ideal setting for a test.

Eventually, I received an email informing me I was not chosen for the job. No surprise. But with nothing to lose, I asked the interviewer why I was rejected. He said there was someone within the company who better fit the profile of what he was looking for in the job. Fair enough. Oh, and I didn’t do very well on the test. Ya think! Sheesh. I resisted the temptation to remind him I had to take the damn test in a noisy Manhattan diner and let it go.

More recently, I went on yet another savior job interview, one of the oddest job interviews I have ever endured. For an hour — an hour! — I sat dumbfounded as an arrogant, condescending bully of a boss (throughout the interview he repeatedly and rather threateningly struck his shoe with a steel letter opener) regaled me with the intimate details of an employee’s home life that he believed was impacting his work performance. Why was I being told this? What impact did it have on the job I was being interviewed for?

Oh, but he didn’t want to fire the guy, he insisted. That would be too hard. He wanted to bring in another staff member to help him.

So, I politely asked, what were the duties of the job? His answer (this is a direct quote): “To make my life easier.” Ah, a savior.

He did tell me of one incident where he had to step in and take over this employee’s duties while he was on a faraway business trip and he become ill because of it. On this point, I agree with him. If this employee didn’t do his job, he had every right to be angry. But I’d also like to know why: Was the employee sick? Was there a family emergency? Did he deliberately shirk his responsibilities? I’d like to know the why before I simply fired the guy or hired another person to be the “savior.”

When I spoke to another employee at this company, he said quite sternly, possibly as a warning, that the boss had a bad temper. This job came with more red flags than an Indy car pileup.

From my reading, all these episodes have several factors in common: a dysfunctional workplace; an underperforming employee; a manager too timid to deal with the situation; and the vain hope a newcomer can make everybody sing Kumbaya. Not gonna happen.

What should happen, in my humble opinion, is the manager and employee first attempt to repair their broken relationship, if possible, with an honest dialogue. HR can be called in to mediate, but in my experience most HR people avoid interfering with bad manager/employee pairings and simply tell the two to work it out on their own. Good luck with that.

Now, let me say here, I don’t put all the blame on the manager. While I believe it’s a manager’s job is to provide fair and specific guidance to employees, it’s up to the employee to be conscientious and capable enough to carry out his or her duties.

If the employee still underperforms, well, then he or she must be fired, and the next in line promoted to replace that person. Sounds pretty simple, doesn’t it?

Except…most managers prefer to do nothing and let the situation fester. Or, they figure they can bring on a new person to be the savior. Stupid management 101.

Is that fair to the new person who is hired as this savior? How are they supposed to learn the job (especially one with unspecified duties), get along with their new co-workers, and correct the dysfunctional morass permeating the office? That would be difficult for any one person to do.

Even boards of major corporations a fall into the savior trap. A company is floundering so they bring in a new highly trumpeted CEO. Months pass, and the company is still sinking. Not even the new CEO could save the ship.

These situations burn me for another reason. Managers will hand-wring for weeks and months over whether to fire an obviously underachieving slacker. Or, they will put the employee under a “performance improvement plan” or PIP, so the employee can either shape up or be shipped out. Either way, the employee is given a chance to save their job or make a conscious decision to leave.

No such luck when it comes to laid-off employees. We are given no such opportunity to save our employment, or even given any insight into why we were selected for the trash heap. That always seems unfair to me.

Perhaps managers hem and haw over firings because it's a tacit admission they hired the wrong person or aren't very good managers. The fault falls on their weaselly shoulders. With a layoff, they can blame the economy and poor revenues.

So, back to the savior job interview. Should you take the interview now that you know the warning signs? Yes, for no other reason than for practice.

Should you take the job? Well, that’s up to you, of course. But I would want to know the exact duties of the job (other than “to make my life easier”) before I agreed to work for that company. Otherwise, you are being set up to fail. Most employment experts agree with me on that point.

You are there to do a job, hopefully one that aids in the profitability of the company. You are not, and will never be, the company’s or a manager's savior.

Next week, I’ll discuss the “unicorn” job ad.

It’s Not 2010 Anymore

…Or is it?

After two solid months of job hunting I can say unequivocally that this time around is much, much different than back in the bad old days of 2010. I mean, this week alone I have three interviews scheduled and two lined up for next week.

One of the interviews is a prized second interview. A real second interview, not one where the snotty HR lady erroneously called me in and then told me it was good thing because “at least it got me out of the house.” Hey, it was her mistake!

I remember I got a call for a job the first day of my search…four hours after I emailed in my résumé and cover letter. Wow! Since then, there’ve been times when I’ve been contacted mere minutes after sending out the résumé. To say I was shocked would be a gross understatement.

Let’s rewind the time machine back to 2010, when it was a full six months – six months! – before I was even called in for an interview and another 10 months after that that I actually got a job.

So I have to say that yes, the job market is much looser now than back then. Yet I’m mystified as to why. The economy is doing better, but no one, except the most optimistic fools, would say it’s going gangbusters. I further doubt the publishing/journalism business is doing all that great. If it were, I wouldn’t have been laid off, right?

So why all this interest in little ole me? I mean, have all the laid-off journalists gone to work in PR or Internet start-ups that package stories like "5 Ways to Make Money from Your Sex Tape." Candidly, I'm not that good.

In the past two years, I’ve gained experience in a new field and learned a whole new skill set in the social media/digital world. But I’ve also gotten four years older (in a profession that values youth…the offices I’ve interviewed at are seemingly populated by no one over the age of 35) and in no way could I call myself a social media expert (whatever that means…I think it’s a buzzy catch phrase meant to make the rest of us feel like dinosaurs). I know more than I did four years ago, but need to learn much, much more. Then there’s the stigma of having been laid off twice in the past four years. Hard to erase that sink hole on my career path.

And for all the interviews I’ve gone on (six so far, two coming up), I know I’ve sent out scores of résumés that have gotten sucked into the black hole of some robo-HR computer system that automatically weeds our undesirables (like laid-off losers).

No job offer as of yet either. In one instance, the company hired an in-house person to fill the position; in another, the firm decided not to fill the job until later this year. In the third instance, I think the company was looking for an entry-level person. Can’t be sure, but that’s the feeling I got. And that’s okay. I'm never angry when I don't get a job. Disappointed, but never angry.

During today’s interview, I’m pretty sure I muffed several answers. So I may have to cross that one off the list (although it would have entailed a hellish daily commute of one hour down the scenic NJ Turnpike).

Still, I’m confused by all this. On one hand, I’m encouraged that I’m at least I’m being considered for the job. But since I’m a bird-in-the-hand kinda gal, I can’t rejoice until I actually get a job.

So why on the days I have a job interview, do I wake up feeling angry and depressed? Perhaps it’s the muscle memory of my long, tedious, rejected-stuffed job search of 2010-11 that prevents me from feeling any ounce of optimism. Even though I keep my salary requirements lower than I should, I know companies would rather pay the lowest rate possible, and that my experience could automatically disqualify me for the job.

I’m also fearful of another job search that stretches past six months (which would put me in the undesirable category of long-term unemployed). I scour the news for any hint Congress will extend unemployment benefits (not bloody likely. Thank you John Boehner.).

It’s for that reason that I’ve tried to expand into new freelance opportunities and one of the jobs I’m being interviewed for next week is for a part-time copy-editing gig. If I don’t get a full-time job, part-time/freelance may be the way to go for me.

Sometimes, I do question whether I want to go back into full-time work. I would dearly love (and need) the steady paycheck and employer-sponsored health care, but at what cost? The trade-off is that your employer can kick you to the curb at any time, for whatever reason. Pack up your desk and leave. There’s always the risk of not being good enough in the new job, too. What happens then? I don’t think I can withstand a third layoff.

I’ve communicated with two former co-workers who have met the same fate, and they express the same emotions: a wish never to be at the mercy of a company’s decision-making machinations again and a lack of trust in any employer.

So you see, when I read how companies are having a hard time filling slots, I think maybe it’s partially their fault they can’t get good workers. They refuse to spend money to train new employees and they have no compunction against terminating hundreds of workers in one fell swoop. It’s understandable that good portion of working age people is turned off by their actions and simply would prefer to be their own boss, if at all possible.

Nevertheless, I will go on every interview I’m called for and pursue any freelance opportunity that comes my way. I’m not giving up, but I’m realistic about my prospects and well aware this could be another long slog of hopeful job seeking and crushing rejection. Months can turn into years so quickly.

Because I remember 2010 very well. Very well.

6 Reasons You Didn’t Get the Job

So you got the call for the interview. Great! So you’re well on your way back to being gainfully employed. Right. Right?

Not so fast there, partner. Hate to pour cold water on your hopes, but simply getting an interview is no guarantee the job is yours. Thinking you have the job after an interview is like believing you won the lottery because you bought a ticket. Then you get the rejection email (or nothing at all), and you are crushed with disappointment. I'm always amused when asked on my weekly unemployment claim if I refused any work. More likely the reverse is true: companies refused to hire me.

Culled from my long and extensive history of job hunting (voluntary and involuntary), here are six reasons you probably didn’t get the job.

You sucked in the interview. You researched the company. You have your job history spiel down pat. You arrive five minutes early. Then, the interview starts and…you crumble in an uncontrollable torrent of nerves. Words tumble out of your mouth in an incoherent babble. Needless to say, it did not go well.

I don’t know of any job hunter who hasn’t endured the dreaded “job interview from hell.” The only thing you can take from such an unfortunate incident is to use it as a learning experience. Was there a question in particular that you stumbled with? Next time, have a better answer ready and waiting. Do better research, and try to stay calm. The more interviews you go on, the better you will be the next time. At the very least, you are gaining valuable rehearsals.

You weren’t a good fit for the job. No matter how much we try to match our skills to the skills outlined in the job ad, sometimes we are not exactly what the employer is looking for, for whatever reason.

Sometimes, the ad is deceptive. A recent example is a job I applied for a month ago. The ad clearly stated “editorial,” but when I went for the interview, it was obvious what they were looking for was an administrative assistant with some digital skills. I didn’t get the job, but the practice is always helpful.

You weren’t the lowest bidder. Yes, you read that correctly. I sometimes think employers are not looking for the best employee for a job, but simply the person they can pay the lowest salary. Why else would companies specify they’d only consider applicants that state their salary requirements?

There are other ways companies leak out their cheapness. Through the wonder that is Google, you can sometimes find out who the company hired instead of you. If they hired someone right out of college whose only experience is an internship or writing album reviews for alternative weeklies, it’s pretty obvious the company wants to pay the bare minimum in salaries.

To an experienced job seeker, I would advise not inflating your wage demands to such a degree that you price yourself out of the marketplace. Yet you are bringing a great deal of skills and experience to the job and should be paid for that. So pick a salary range that is fair and reasonable, but also an amount you can live on. And be real: After I was unemployed for 16 months, I took a job that paid me $17,000 a year less than what I was making before. In this job market, it’s probably unrealistic to expect you’ll net a major raise from your previous job, especially if you were laid off and have been unemployed for a lengthy period.

To employers, I would say this: You get what you pay for.

You weren’t the best candidate. Ouch! That hurt!

In our narcissistic society, nobody wants to hear or believe they are not the greatest thing since sliced bread or dark chocolate salted caramels. But the fact is, sometimes you are nudged out by the better person. Like in sports, sometimes the better team wins.

How do I know this? Again, through the wonder that is Google, I discovered who was hired instead of wonderful me. In some instances, I had to objectively say the person hired had the better skill sets, education and experience for the job than I did.

That doesn’t make you a bad person; it just means you weren’t the right person for that one particular job. There will be others. Also, think about the times you were hired when there were probably scores of other qualified candidates. It all evens out in the end.

You don’t walk on water. Have you read some of the job requirements for certain positions? They want someone with a law or “advanced” degree, a speaker of three languages, a technical wizard and, oh, yeah, about a decade of experience in the same type of job and within the same industry. Not even our Lord could pass muster with these elitist gatekeepers. (Dear Jesus, though your résumé was impressive, we have decided to go with another candidate.)

Frankly, it’s gotten to the point where I don’t even apply for jobs with such ridiculous requirements. I know some career coaches will tell you those requirements are more aspirational and to apply anyway, but I think companies are setting the standards so high so to as weed out mere worker serfs like the rest of. They only want the best of the best, and that typically means at the very minimum, an Ivy League college graduate. Companies are very picky nowadays.

I don’t have a degree from some fancy-schmancy college. I went to a community college for my first two years (a fact I was told by a colleague long ago to leave off on my résumé). I’m just someone who has two decades of hard-fought experience and can do the job without any ego or sense of entitlement. If that isn’t good enough for any employer, well, as my late Italian-American mother would say, They can go scratch.

You came thisclose. There are myriad reasons why you weren’t picked for the job that had nothing to do with your interview performance, experience, educational background or skills. Most of time, you’ll never know those reasons.

Perhaps the company decided to go with an in-house candidate, which makes sense since companies prefer to hire from within. Or the company reviewed staffing needs and for budgetary reasons decided not to fill that job. (Sound familiar?)

Sometimes, I know I’ve come thisclose to getting the job. I remember a rather nice (but ultimately deflating) rejection letter I once received. It was obviously not a standard form rejection missive, but one the lady took the time to personally write.

In it, she explained that I was an attractive candidate, but that they had opted to go with a former colleague. At the time, I remember being miffed. If they were going to hire a former co-worker all along, why string me along for two interviews and a test?

But looking back, I can take heart in knowing that I was qualified for the job, that I did well in the interviews and on the test. Sometimes, that’s the only positive you can take from a lost job interview (rather than thinking you're an unemployable loser). Almost doesn’t cut it when you are looking for a job, but at least it’s better than not even getting the call for an interview.

No one knows better than me how grueling, frustrating and sometimes degrading a job hunt can be. (There is a reason HR people are reviled.) Every time you go on an interview, you are not only putting your career and financial stability on the line, but your entire sense of self-worth. Add to that the anxiety of looking for a job after a devastating layoff and the situation is compounded tenfold.

But giving up is not an option. If you don’t try, you will never work again. And don’t let your ego lead. Don’t think, as some friends of mine have expressed, that you are too good for any job. With that attitude, you will surely never work again. You want a paycheck, right?

Keep trying. Every time you get that rejection email, think to yourself, “Well, that only means there’s a better job out there for me.”

I mean, I hope there is.