The Quest for Employment

1.   Applying

The resume run is dead, trust me as soon as you give it to the teenage chick behind the counter to pass on to the manager you have resigned yourself to silent ridicule as you walk out the door. She will probably take it home and laugh at it with her friends; they think your resume sucks.

If you have sun burnt eyes and have typed your email address out 76 times today it is likely you’re applying for jobs online , or subscribing to paid surveys.

Are you perhaps a registered nurse? No? A doctor in engineering... of the heart? Well I doubt your having much luck, mm that call centre looks good, i’ll just go ahead and upload my resume... oh you want me to put in just a few details first?

Name

Surname

Nickname

Dogs name

Several stealth questions about your sexuality

Everything on your resume

Now you can upload the useless SOB.  Wait two weeks for resume to be processed before you get a wonderfully personal response.

We appreciate your interest in the position, as the number of applications for this job are huge we would appreciate it if you just chill out while we do absolutely nothing with your application.

Sincerely (yes a computer can be sincere) Mr. Corporate Douche

2.   Phone interviews

“Hello is Mr.Smith there?”

“Why yes that’s me how can I help?”

“Hi this is Janet from Job That You Applied For Inc, would now be a good time for a brief phone interview?”

“Oh... Sure” of course it’s the worst possible moment for a phone interview, you had a more than generous serving of liquorice curry last night and your stranded on the shitter without a sustainable supply of toilet roll.  You can’t tell them it’s not a good time, if you let them go now it’s back to step one where you have the same chances as the rest of those chumps in the testicle like sperm pool that is unemployment. You’re the lucky one, don’t blow it.  So now you have to convince some human recourses cow that you’re the right person for this job.  Good luck because chances are your shit on the phone, a  recent and unofficial survey by the Rebel Yell research team found that most people speak in a ridiculous high voice on the phone and also act 50% more surprised than in normal situations.

She can hear you pooing by the way.

3.   Group interviews.

This can be fun if you a sick minded freak like Kevin spacey in the movie 7even. This is what employers who think they are hip like to do to for their entertainment, its like putting all of the applicants in the coliseum.  Fight!

Rule 1: Don’t arrive early, it’s like a party not a normal interview, if you’re the first guy there you’re the guy the managers see first. Yes they are scrutinising you the longest. They hate you.

Rule 2. Don’t be the second person there, you will have to talk to the first guy and the managers hate him.

Rule 3: Once you have arrived (be the fourth person,) size up everyone else, look at that douche he is wearing a tie when nobody else is! Don’t be that guy. Check out all the other potentials, be quick to spot the joker, he will be talking to the nearest chick, most likely the frantic teen who finds him hilarious. Don’t sit near him once you are let in, his jokes will turn to sucky shit once the managers are present trust me.

Rule 4: Oh shit they are making you do a role play and you’re teamed up with the 50 year old man who appears to have walked in off the street but its okay because you can knock your partner out of the competition. Make them feel and look wrong footed, do something different to what you organised with the other person. They will stammer and look like a git.

Rule 5: And now it hits you... get out of there! You’re applying for a job with the kind of people that think group interviews are a good idea! Don’t stick around to shake the mangers hand, get out and don’t look back.

4.   The personal interview (Like Blade Runner but faster)

Like the group interview you may see other applicants here, size them up while you’re waiting, they seem to have brought folders for their CVs. What insecure dicks. Don’t carry your resume’s around, because if your interviewer  sees them they will see it the same way your partner would if she was to catch you in town with a bunch of hookers on your arm. If you don’t hang hundreds out of your fly, don’t hang resumes out of a folder. Ok it’s your turn to go in.

Shake hands; awkwardly stand until you think its okay to sit.

“So what qualifies you for this position?”

A: My incredibly generic resume

B: Jesus it’s walking dogs, i do that in my sleep... well half of it anyway

C: Well I think that in my past role as a bullshit artist I learnt that whatever the task given, one can always get through... the task... if you.. Try?

D:  Position? I’ll sue you you sick prick!

Okay so you have somehow managed to stumble through that.

“HR will be in contact with you shortly” says the interviewer, either with a warm smile and eye contact or with deliberate avoidance of eye contact and absent minded flicking of pages. Now you wait for the call if you get one it means you have the job! Hooray! If you don’t it means you didn’t, unless you get a different job, then you will get a call informing you of your success. Convenient.

5.   Induction, Probationary period... you’re the bitch.

You’re the goldfish in the bowl; you have been selected in wild excitement and are set up to dissolution your new owners like ...a goldfish. You’re on minimum wage and enjoy as much permanency as that poo stain on the back of the toilet bowl; you just don’t know how long you will be there.  Your name badge says trainee and your face says “when I serve you, you’re waiting twice as long because the guy next to me will be relayed all of your questions.” You are the middle man, customers laugh at you while you count their change. You’re the one stray olive in a salad bowl full of delicious lettuce (third bowl based reference, thanks guys we made it, I’d like to thank....)

Anyway now that you’re a trainee you can now start to realise that your managers aren’t normal people, if you’re in an office they laugh at Dilbert and find coffee interesting. If you’re in food retail they enjoy commercial radio at an unhealthy level, you will notice this when you know all the words to [insert new black eyed peas song] and start trying to convince yourself that Kings of Leon aren’t really that bad. Yep it’s like squinting at Sarah Jessica Parker, useless. You won’t start to feel human until you get a proper name tag and then it’s humanity at a high cost.

6.   Integration. Revelations.

You went ahead and took the blue pill, you’re in the matrix, you’ve slept with Trinity (you sick bastard,) you have work ‘friends’ who you hate. But you drink at the pub with them because they appear to have eaten your real friends. You’re in a vicious cycle; work took your daylight hours and made you tired in the night time ones. So you look at the losers you work with and realise that your becoming one of them, a loser. You know it’s all over when you go bowling with your manager and he pat’s you on the back in the gayest way possible, work took your sexuality, it gave you colossal goggles that make your ugly co-workers seem sexable. Yep you sexed Trinity and now you have to look at the pile of shit whenever you eat, also ‘she’ had a penis. Good luck with your new job... I hope your happy you miserable sod.