What I had forgotten about job searching is how low the lows can be, and how high the highs. In November and December -- usually a quiet time when it comes to job interviewing, or so I thought -- I went from having three potential jobs back to my homemaker/unemployed academic administrator mode.
Before I explain my two-month journey, let me briefly recap what brought me to this point. In my first column, I mentioned how I had quit a job as director of a campus career center to follow my husband to a college presidency he had been offered. I've been looking for the right position in campus public relations ever since.
Last fall, I decided to investigate and embrace any and every opportunity that came along. Give it a try, test it out, and if it doesn't fit, then cross it off my list. I even dusted off my copy of What Color Is Your Parachute? to remind myself to process through each one of the things that is important to me as I am testing out various career paths.
In doing that, I rediscovered that I have two distinctly different sets of skills. The first set is in marketing, communications, and public relations. I have been able to make that work for me in my last three positions. I enjoy marketing. I enjoy writing. I enjoy creating.
However, a certain part of this work I also find boring. Spending too much time isolated in an office behind a computer sucks the life out of me. So, while I enjoy the work, I just don't enjoy too much of it. I need human interaction. As the Myers-Briggs folks would say, I get energy from working with people. I am an ESFJ (Extraverted Sensing Feeling Judging).
That's why I enjoy advising. I like the one-on-one contact with students. I enjoy the thrill of meeting someone, finding out what makes them tick, and putting the puzzle pieces together to form a career plan. The best job I ever had was as a career adviser.
All of that soul searching led me to apply for some very different types of jobs and to try out some very different types of consulting opportunities.
I arranged an informational interview with the head of a small publishing company and wound up editing my first book. It was OK. In truth, the book (basically a dictionary) was kind of boring. The author, however, was a delight to work with.
In the middle of the editing process, the publisher called to ask if I might be interested in talking about doing some marketing work for him. Over a delightful lunch, he and his vice president picked my brains. We exchanged ideas about marketing books and talked about the future of the company. Apparently a bottom-line man, the publisher asked what it might cost him to hire me. When I told him my asking price, however, it became readily apparent that he was looking for someone to do full-time work for less than a full-time salary. The idea was less than appealing; I have gotten too used to cushy benefits in higher education -- four weeks of vacation, Fridays off in the summer, and all major and minor holidays off.
After we both took some time to think about his "offer," he invited me back for coffee and asked if I'd be willing to show my "indispensability" to his vice president by doing some work gratis for a while. Apparently, she had been burned by "marketing types" in the past and was not willing to invest in another unknown quantity. I told him I would have to think about it, but I knew I wouldn't be thinking too hard. After all, other opportunities had begun to present themselves.
I had applied for three academic jobs -- again, all vastly different -- and was overwhelmed to find myself called to interview for two of them.
The first job was to serve as a lead adviser for a marketing team at a small community college. It was a very attractive institution, and I liked the staff members I had met.
The trouble was, I was not sure about the commute. As I mentioned in my first column, I had quit my last position partly because I couldn't stand the long commute, 45 minutes one way. So before interviewing at the community college, I did a test drive at 7:30 a.m. Although the college was 20 miles closer than my last employer, it was 20 miles in the wrong direction because the commute was even worse. I withdrew my name from consideration. It may sound silly, but no matter how good the job was, I knew that within a month, I would hate the drive all over again.
That left me with one other interview, for a position as director of a consortium working with several local colleges and school districts in the county where I live. The job passed my commute test and it had variety. I would do career counseling with students, marketing, and grant writing. I would have plenty of face time with people and not too much time sitting in front of a computer. My hours would be flexible, and the boss was a heck of a nice guy.
Getting the application packet together was grueling. Whatever happened to just sending in a cover letter and a résumé? I had to submit a position paper about my leadership style and respond to several issues that the consortium was tackling. Apparently, I passed the smell test and was called for the first interview.
I found out quickly (the day after the interview, in fact) that I had moved ahead to the final stage. I was one of two candidates who would be interviewed after the Thanksgiving break. I was asked to deliver a 30-minute presentation to an eight-member committee. My topic: to pretend that the people on the committee were prospective members of the consortium and convince them to join. Piece of cake, I thought. I worked diligently on the presentation and walked confidently into the room feeling that the job was mine.
I felt myself wobble a bit during the presentation but generally thought that I did well. At the end of the talk, when I opened the floor up for questions, a member of the committee threw me a curveball. In his guise as a prospective member of the consortium, he indicated that he still wasn't convinced that he -- a member of a labor organization -- should be willing to shell out his hard-earned dollars to join the group. How could I convince him? I tried but I could not answer his question to his satisfaction. I talked about accountability, giving back to the community, gaining a more highly skilled work force, and so forth. I gave it my best shot, but I could tell he did not like my response.
And, in fact, the next day I found out that the job was not mine. The committee member who called me, however, praised my experience. He encouraged me to apply for another position on his campus -- an assistant deanship -- that would be opening in six months. I politely thanked him, told him that I would certainly consider that, even though I felt like saying, "Thanks but no thanks!"
So, two weeks before Christmas, I was again a cookie-baking homemaker/unemployed academic administrator facing the New Year with no job opportunity in sight. While part of me just wants to say "Bah, humbug!" and crawl back under the covers, the glass-is-half-full part of me knows that it's time to pull up my bootstraps and start all over again.
