Properly Prepared

You forget how hard interviews are.

It's been nearly three and a half years since I last had to endure (because that's what you do, endure) interviews. It's an unnatural conversation filled with bigging yourself up, hypothetical rubbish and the odd curve ball that leaves your brain scrabbling around trying to think up something that sounds reasonable.

I have now sent applications out for 29 jobs ranging from Assistant Marketing Manager to Junior Brand Manager to Marketing Executive. 

One of the first jobs I applied for was Junior Brand Manager at a marketing and brand agency in London and it looked perfect. So perfect that I actually told my Mum about it in detail when she asked what I'd applied for. Normally I just brush it off, "Oh you know, the usual."

Anyway, about a week later they sent an email inviting me for a Skype interview rather than making me come down to London for a first interview. This was great! I replied, trying my best not to sound too keen but appreciative nonetheless. I researched the company, signed up to their newsletter-blog-thing, and stalked a few of them on LinkedIn. 

I felt I was ready and as prepared as I could be.

I spent 10 minutes making sure Skype worked and the background behind me was reasonably presentable (no newspaper cuttings of the Reds being mighty, no band posters, etc.) and I was set. A few minutes past twelve and nothing has happened, then my phone rings. Few Skype problems at our end, so we're ringing you!

Wonderful.

Skype interviews are hard, but phone interviews are worse. 

You can't see them, they can't see you. Impossible to gauge any reaction.

Things were going fine until they ventured in to the land of interview speak and ridiculous questions that are never asked in any other form of life.  

"Describe your best day at work..."

"Describe your worst day at work..."

I muddled through as best I could, having been quickly reminded that interview questions are basically algebra and don't exist in normal life.

Then they hit me with a question I should be able to answer, and answer well.

"What is your favourite marketing campaign...?"

Shit.

I have loads. But my mind went blank. I just wasn't prepared to the level I needed to be at. Because I haven't had to answer these kind of questions in a long time.

My mind went in to mild panic mode, I bought myself a few extra seconds by confirming exactly what they meant (visual, print, etc.) and came up with the heavily cliched Nike 'Just Do It' campaign. 

Yadda, yadda, yadda.  

Idiot. 

This is the my favourite marketing campaign. It's incredible. It took three and a half minutes to take me from being not that arsed about getting a Playstation 4 to NEEDING a Playstation 4. I bought one within a month of launch in the UK.

It makes you remember the feeling of opening a Playstation as a ten year old at Christmas and playing Crash Bandicoot for weeks. Playing the 4 minute demo of International Superstar Soccer Pro over and over because it wasn't my birthday or Christmas and I couldn't *just* have it.

The Playstation sound. The sound! The annoyance of a full memory card. God, that was annoying. 

So much has changed since I was ten, but a few things stay the same. Playstation is one of them.

It would be rude, no no, it would be wrong not to have the latest Playstation.

Absolutely genius.

That is my favourite marketing campaign and I will be properly prepared next time someone asks me something like that in an interview. 

So, needless to say, I didn't get a second interview. I kind of expected it, whether I wanted to admit it out loud or not. I thought I was prepared, and I was in terms of knowing about the company and the job... but I wasn't prepared enough to answer interview-y questions.

It's a different mindset. But it is good learning.

In other news, I got in to the Great North Run!

It will be my second half of the year which was what I wanted to do at the start of the year. I'm very pleased that it is something as prestigious as the GNR. I just need to decide if it is worth trying to raise money for something... A year will have past since I raised nigh on £900 at the Nottingham half, so maybe I can pester people again for some added motivation.

I'm running steady 7 and 9 milers a week at the moment with five weeks to go until Reading and approaching 100 miles for the great 600 mile challenge of 2015! I continue to have a sore right knee but it doesn't seem to prevent me from running, but something to manage I guess.

The flights to South Africa in December are starting to pop up on the internet but I'm waiting a little while for all the airlines to publish their prices. I absolutely do not want to have to fly via Istanbul again, even if it is cheaper. The current working idea is to fly on Christmas Day night (we'll be London-way anyway) and come home on Saturday 9th January.

I've read both Book #4 and Book #5 since posting last - Red Rising and Golden Son, two books of a trilogy which is similar to The Hunger Games and Game of Thrones but is set on Mars and beyond following the fight for justice of Darrow au Andromedus. 

It's absolutely fantastic. Universal have just spent a fortune on acquiring the film rights for the series and I imagine it'll be massive when it hits the cinema.

Only a bloody year to wait for the final installment. Mannnn.

That'll do for now. I better get to work shaping up a bank of responses to questions that don't exist in the real world.

Yay.