Weathered MMM

Dear cousin,
Your experience sounds very miserable, and I am amazed to realise that even some shitty weather can affect work life!

I had myself a bad experience last week, I crossed London at lunchtime to endure an interview with some small guy in south west london.
Weather was great in the morning and helped me decide on my interview strategy for the day : hiring manager is a dude, sun is shinning, let's go for seduction. Sleeze sales!

Unfortunately heavy showers struck as I came out of the tube station and since I was already late I had no choice but to dive in - with no umbrella.

By the time I arrived I was a total freaking mess, and I made a dramatic entrance. I soon realised that the fucker standing by the door was the hiring manager looking for a first impression of me.

He got it, he also got a very fishy handshake, and I am now expecting a fishy rejection.

Eurotrash

Fragile eyes look away.

So yesterday I had a second interview with a company considered super trendy in the industry: a small boutique pestilence agency, nice job title to get : Dickhead of Pest Planning. I took the whole day of work to prepare, finished work as early as possible, then run to the place.

The hiring manager could not see me after 6:30 so I had to run like Forest to reach their glossy office of central London in time.

Unfortunately, when I had reached the headquarters, the receptionistas had already left, so I had to stuck my sweaty body to their glass door, and waved for the late workers to let me in.

I was probably dishevelled, because the young guy who saw me and opened the door bared a very wary face. He asked me who I was and why I was here. I said I was Miserable Middle Manager, here for an interview with Cynthia Bladder.

He asked me if I knew what she looked like.

I found it weird, but although I had already seen her Angela Bower face on Linkedin, I said : no I don’t know, I have never seen her, I come for an interview.

I don’t know what I said that, I guess I got worried that the child had found out I was in fact a stalker.

Eventually someone else came, someone very blond told me to sit down and brought me a glass of water.

So I sat down.

And waited

And waited

Yesterday the sun was shining and since I had run, I was sweaty.

I became angry at Bladder and I did something weird : I swiped my armpits with my right hand.

and waited again.

20 minutes later she was here, all fresh and bubbly – an American woman. She apologized, she was on the phone. Okay.

I usually like American people, they are very friendly and not too hypo.

So we sat down and started to chat. She had old fashioned questions, I was ready, confident, excited, technical, whatever. I felt the interview was going well.

Until she told me that she liked my technical profile (which I am running away from) and that she was starting to realise that I would be better for another role. That she would be thinking about other roles more suited to my profile.

...

She asked me if I had other questions. I had one more, some bullshit question about the size and personality of the team – but who cared about the idiots since I just learnt I wouldn’t manage them.

She put an end to the interview, thanked me very much, told me she would be in touch with the agent and held her hand...

...which I happily shaked with my right hand...

...for the second time.

Pass time

When you have nothing to do in an office and you can’t really spend your day watching soft porn, cute puppies videos on Youtube, or even redoing your CV, you start doing things that you would never do in real life.

Indeed, open desk office space has always been bad news for miserable middle managers. Get found by a staff on youtube suffer 50% of team sickness as a result!

So when you are bored, not only your brain looks for pathetic highlights - such as the fact that it is Thursday : one day before Friday and 2 days before the weekend...or pathetic low lights – such as being told off for being late for a very non important meeting... but it also looks for stuff to check out on the internet (that don’t bear flashy images). 

First you look for stuff that are relevant to your job/industry. Do some self training, learn about the industry, check the industry news, waste some time on Linkedin. You can do that at least one hour per day, if you have enough energy. Or if you are like me, you develop obsessive habits linked to paranoia such as checking  who’s been on your Linkedin profile 20 times per hour. Yeah just in case a top recruiter at your dream company had checked you out.

Linkedin is amazing, you can waste so much time on it....and not feel bad about it. Join stupid forums, check people’s CV, try to understand why less experienced and younger fuckers are senior managers and not you.

There are other stuff to do : check out blogs! Blogs of pathetic people like me, celebrity blogs....but these have a lot of flashy pictures. You can also make friends on forums. Forums of expats, forums of people that share the same miserable passion as you, such as riding children scooters, or blow drying. I have a passion for blow dries, didn’t you know that? Learn so many techniques that don’t work, I have the dullest hair ever.

But the best stuff are the stuff that you can share! Don’t share them on Monday morning...actually don’t share them until Friday because it may cost you some credibility. But on Friday, nobody works. I mean in most companies anyway. Friday is the day of Krispy Kreams, email jokes and funny forwards.

Here is an example, it is a test.

No it is not the purity test where everyone score 10/200 because it is cool to be dirty and pretend to have had threeways with men. It is a random test that you can actually do at work without being caught and called a lazy ass.

Here it is : http://www.guardian.co.uk/​science/quiz/2012/mar/13/quiz-​are-you-an-introvert?INTCMP=​ILCNETTXT3487

Here is my score :

You scored 11 out of a possible 20

You have a tendency towards being introvert. The higher your score, the more introvert you probably are. The nearer to 10 your score is, the nearer to being an ambivert you are (yes, there really is such a word). But even if you answered every single question as an introvert or extrovert, that doesn’t mean that your behaviour is predictable across all circumstances. We can’t say that every introvert is a bookworm or every extrovert wears lampshades at parties any more than we can say that every woman is a natural consensus-builder and every man loves contact sports. As Jung felicitously put it, “There is no such thing as a pure extrovert or a pure introvert. Such a man would be in the lunatic asylum.

So what? I have a tendency to be an introvert but nearer to be an ambivert? Who is the psycho who wrote this shit?

Anyway, the highlight of my day is that I had lunch with myself today, and myself and I had an amazing salad. Unfortunately it was so stressful for me to chose the ingredients that I don’t think I will have one ever again.

No picture today, I am blogging from work!!

Highlight of the day

Thought that photoshop bitch represents both topics of this post : boring with highlights.

Anyway, blonds always attract more readers.

SO.

Since I am working hard and I am too tired to blog after work, I thought I would start talking about the highlights of my days.

Oops, I meant : since I don't have much to do at work but I am too lazy and tired to blog after work, I thought I would start talking quickly about the highlights of my days.

Because I am bored.

Miserable is bored bored bored.

Again!

Don't take me wrong, the contract job is cool and the people are nice. Even my team is nice, I am even lucky that they know more than me. So my job is about sitting, pretending, and earning the cash.

And waiting.

I am not sure what I am waiting for, the end of the contract maybe? One may think that I must have stuff to do, even occasionnaly. Yes occasionnally I do. I receive about 10 emails per day, so I send ten emails back.

And I do what I am paid for : I take care of the job of the woman I replace.

It is all about pretending that you have something to do in the end. We are deep in the fucking crisis and people hang on to their jobs like mussells on the shore. And like mussells they have nothing to do.

So I what do I do? Well I take time to think about my career, and I occasionally look for a job.

Let's face it, looking for a job is more fun than actually working. When you look for a job, you are always hopeful. You expect an outcome, you dream about a better situation for yourself. Grass is always green on the other side of the fence.

Last week went to two more interviews. One liked me and may see me again, another rejected me : I went for a job in digital pestilence and got rejected because I only ever worked in digital pestilence. Worst, the recruitment agent got offended when I told him that the hiring manager was a time waster.

fucker.

but I digress.

That was not a highlight of a day (maybe the lowlight of the week).

The highlight of an office worker's day - especially in middle management - is something small that happened during the day in the office, that brought joy.

Or at least that didn't bring stress, frustration, or irritation.

Don't you ever wonder what made your day at work? What is it that makes you think it is all worth it and justify you sitting around being either too busy - or like me, doing nothing/waiting?

Leave the money aside for one minute, what did you enjoy today??

A highlight can be : not falling asleep during a webex conference, eating an M&S brownie, or having your colleague bringing donuts Krispy Kreme and NOT feeling like vomitting on him thereafter.

Damn I can't think of any highlight today...

Contracting

Ok, the picture has nothing to do with this post, but Jean, I had to tell you publicly : you are the best, je t'aime et vive la France!

But let’s talk about contracting shall we? It is much more fun than cinema - much more miserable too!

So if I was very miserable suffering politics in a big company full of moronistic wannabees, I am less miserable as a middle manager contractor – but there are still many things to be miserable about.

Indeed, being a contractor is interesting.

What is the difference between contracting and temping? On a daily base, there is none, the job is the same. But as a contractor you are often paid on a daily rate, so basically you make more dosh. Why? Because you are supposed to be a supplier to the ‘master’ company who hires you. So when you are a contractor, you have to have your own company, so you become your own CEO/COO. Alas you have to have an accountant, but since you make more dosh it doesn’t really matter.

Why do companies hire contractors? Here are the most common reasons:

- When an stupid middle manager hasn’t managed to secure an extra headcount for his team

- When someone ‘un replaceable’ gets pregger and fucks off for a year – this person is clever, she has managed to convince her boss that she is too busy not to be replaced.

- When a company is really huge and has extra dosh to spend ahead of a recessionary economy – in times of crisis the company will not fire but will not renew contracts

-When a company needs people who are already trained and ready to work hard from day one

What sort of job can be done by contractors?

Any really.  But what is key is that the contractor must have balls and be ready and trained.

So middle management is a job that can be done by contractors. And senior managers love it because they don’t feel threatened by contractors. They even like to remind them that there is a difference between you and them – they are part of the family and you are not.

The company : a family – *feeling like puking now*

I guess it is a family for some people. Last night I watched a program on people who had worked for TFL (the London tube network) for 40 years...Their whole work life! I have never worked for a company for more than two year so 40 years for me is about 20 lives. But by the end of the program you could really feel a sense of family, all those people living a happy life together, serving (badly) passengers, ripping them off in harmony.

Ha. Maybe I should send my CV to TFL. Maybe I already have actually.

Ho well.

So when you are part of the family you get all the benefits. First benefit is.........the office pass!

As a contractor, the thing is often red. Permanent employees usually have a white pass – which leads to racial discrimination between permanent employees and ‘temporary employees’. So contractor, temp, whatever, it is branded on your waist, you are different!

Second benefit is the gym. Haaa the gym. So important for everyone, especially when it is free for the whiteys and not for the redoes.

Usually, as a contractor you can’t access the gym for free. You need to borrow the pass of someone. Basically you need to suffer the shame of begging a family member to loan it to you.

For the anecdote, at P&G, every day we receive a newsletter from HR, talking about some shit that happened in the company during the day. Mainly to cheer us up, since the company is actually restructuring.

Well today the newsletter mentioned that the staff was blessed by a huge amount of food leftover from meeting rooms (some probably couldn’t swallow the exit interview croissants). The writer said: ‘Thanks reception for telling everyone, however the sense of urgency in your email made us think that you were already stuffing your mouth eating it all, instead of controlling that temp staff don’t fraud on gym cards and making sure that calls get answered. We hope this is not the case.’

Wow.

This is what I thought : ‘what’s the matter with you HR twat? Are you jealous? At least I don’t have my ass on the firing line.... do you know that with my day salary I can buy myself at least 2 yearly subscriptions to your posh gyms EVERY DAY...

Well, he is HR so he must know.

Ok what else is not on our benefit list – pension and health care. Pension is a problem indeed, but private funds may have all gone burst in 30 years so I am not keen on investing anyway. Health care – well I don’t think private health care cures stress related diseases better than the NHS. At least with the NHS you get miserable staff, easier to relate to.

The company Christmas party is also source of frustration, when you can only be invited by a permanent employee and the permanent employee can only invite a couple of people ‘like you’....

Others issues are around motivation, the fact that you are not up for promotions (ever), or long term career development or invited to company meetings, or up for trainings...

But it is OK, payback is that you only do your hours, no need to find extra projects when there is nothing to do, no need to lick people’s ass, no need to sleep with anyone to get anywhere, not that I have tried that, probably why I am still a low life Miserable Middle Manager.

It happened!

After about :
-500 CVs sent
-15 interviews
-300 double rejections (when you are rejected from a job you don't want)
-185 single rejections (when you are rejected from jobs you think you might want)
-5 'unknowns' (you have been to the interview but never heard back from the recruiter ever again)
-1 quickie (super fast interview)
-about 13 hypocriticals (when the hiring manager wants to make love to your face but later f*** you in the back)

eventually...

I have...

...found a job!



HA!!!

Ok, it is not the job of my dreams, it is a 6 months contract, but...IN YOUR FACE XANAX!

No more Philipe Focker, Gabino Ducon, Moobs - goooooooooooodbye!

New adventures are about to start : I will be managing a new team and prostituting myself for a company called : Pest&Gamble.

Stay tuned!

And just to finish my job search on a negative note (although it is not totally finished as I am still trying to find something better), here is what a rejection from Facebook looks like :

Hi Miserable,

Thanks for your interest in the Operations Middle Manager opportunity at Facebook.

Unfortunately, we won't be moving forward with your application at this time. However, as Facebook continues to grow, we encourage you to keep on the lookout for new opportunities posted to our careers site. We really appreciate your interest and look forward to connecting with you in the future.

Thanks!

Facebook Recruiting

 

 

I like the exclamation mark after the 'Thanks', like they are so enthusiastic in everything they do, even rejection. Thanks Facebook!

 

 

btw, check these out, hilarious :
http://iamtheclient.blogspot.com/
http://www.webagencyfail.com/

The quickie

I had another fabulous job search encounter last Friday that I had never experienced before so I thought I would share it.

There are a couple of recruitment agencies that I trust and work with regularly....I mean there are a couple of mofos that are less bad that others....I call them the special agents - any other agent being a moronistic scumbag.

So last thrusday, a senior special agent calls me :

Him : Miserable, I have found Ze job for you, the job of your best and wildest dreams. I have no job spec but I think you are the perfect match for it, and the MD of the company, MediaPestus, is my best friend. I am having dinner with him in about 15 minutes, shall I mention your name?

Me : it sounds great but a bit junior, are you sure that the level will match my expectations?

Him : off course it is super senior honey bunny, and you will get the dosh you want, trust me

Me : ok, if the dosh are in, I am in


Comes Friday, special agent PA calls me, texts me : CALL ME NOW! So I call back :

Her : the MD of Mediapestus has heard about you, he said you have excellent references, he is super excited about you and he wants to meet you asap-before-eop i.e. 2PM, what do you think? And sorry to rush you, and don't worry if you can't prepare, he is aware of it, it will be very informal.

Me: hmpf - informal informal...in the end he will still make a call on the chat!

Her: don't worry babe, he had a boner as soon as he heard your name.

Me: Okay then, go on


Comes 2PM I am ready :

Super black mascara special long eyelashes effect : check
Short deep V cleavage dress : check
High heels : check
Red nail varnish : check
Gloss super glossy : check
Brains : not sure but check

MD guy comes, pretty cute, pretty young, pretty excited :

Him : Hello Mis, how you doing, I am soooooooooooooo happy to meet you, I hope you don't mind the rush and the mess, as soon as I heard of you I wanted to see you.
I want you, I want to make love to your CV and experience, I think we are a match from heaven, I am going to haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaave you right now on the taaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaable!!!!!!!!!!

Me : ok ok, that's great, when shall I start then?

Him : so, tell me about the market, the competitors, our technology, what clients do you think we should target, what strategy do you think we should adopt blaaaaaaaaaaah...........

Me : you perv

Him : I hope you don't mind, I have lined up 2 more interviews for you, our head of hisarse and our VP of hercunt. They are really nice, as soon as I hear their feedback I will get in touch with special agent.

Me : sure, I love threesome interviews, give me more


....


So, what was an informal chat became a full unpaid consultancy session. It is Tuesday now and I still haven't heard of them : quickie but long rejection!


Where is the job search police?!!