Friday, January 21, 2011

Getting better all the time

If nothing else, I think I'm getting better with practice at interviewing.  I am now sadly aware of just how amateurish and unready for prime time I must have seemed in my earlier interviews.  On the plus side, I feel like I rocked the fuck out on my short-list interview.  I was prepared, I anticipated nearly every question they threw at me, I had worthwhile questions to give them, I had thought about research and pedagogical implications of living and working in Distant Place — I was on.  Of course, with a little time to reflect on the interview after the fact, I worry that I might have seemed a little too eager to please in some ways, although I never went into ass-kissing territory or anything.  In any case, even if that worry is justified, I still think I did better than on any previous interview.

It's something of a cold shower to intone to myself now that I probably won't get that job, and I should keep plowing on with other applications.  It's hard to maintain that Zen-like remove when you really, really want to get a job.

I think I'm going to try to work on my sangfroid and inner calm by making a curry.

5 comments:

  1. Nice going on the interview! I know the Zen thing is hard, but it's got to feel better knowing that you did everything right.

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  2. I'm so glad it went well! And that you feel like you're improving. Eventually, you've got to hope it'll have an effect. Sending you many many vibes...

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  3. That's great! I hope it works out...interviews are such hard work and you deserve some awesome results after all your preparation!

    Have to say that I found interviewing to be weirdly validating (in that it was the first time I wasn't a grad student talking about my ideas but a potential colleague, if that makes sense). Like I was sitting at the big kids' table finally...

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  4. One gets better at interviewing with time. And sometimes, whatever happens in an interview is beyond your control (I interviewed at a place where I felt that half the faculty was amazing, and the other half was trying to destroy me. I found out that they didn't hire anybody because the committee couldn't agree on a candidate. It was group A against group B, and they hated each other).

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  5. Thanks, all!

    @Ink: I felt more a sense of liminal crisis moment than anything else — kind of like being seated at the kids' table, and making a formal request to be re-seated with the grown-ups.

    @Spanish Prof: Welcome! I dread the day I encounter one of those interview committees that runs on vitriol and vituperation. I've heard the stories, but I've been lucky enough to dodge them so far.

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