Essay 1- Polo Job Interview

Polo Job Interview

I feel strange as I look around and see unfamiliar faces looking and doing the same as I am. There’s about four or five of us all having a common goal, to get the job. Some of the people there look nervous for the interview, but I don’t feel nervous. In fact, I feel extremely calm. This isn’t my first interview; it’s actually my 187^th job interview. It does seem like a lot of interviews, but coming from a small town in Texas with little job opportunities, nobody really wanted to hire a 16 year old with no job experience. That was 3 years ago; I’ve had 7 jobs since then. Now that I’ve moved to California, I’ve applied at all the places I could possibly think of. I’m bound to get a job somewhere, which is why I’m standing inside Polo Ralph Lauren for my first interview.

“Hello everybody, you guys are here for the interview? Let’s go into the back”, says a young perky blonde haired man. He leads us through the store into the backroom which is full of colorful clothing. Clothes are everywhere, neatly folded on shelves, on racks, even hung up on rods along the wall and ceiling.  The perky blonde guy leads us into what appears to be the office. It’s full of chairs, just enough for all of us to sit on. The perky blonde sits down and says, “Hello everybody, my name is Dave and I will be in charge of this interview today”. We all say hi and introduce ourselves. Dave begins the interview with telling us a little about the company and about himself. I look at my peers, many of them still look nervous. Dave begins to ask his questions now. He directly asks a dark haired guy from the group a simple question, “Why did you apply at this store?” The guy begins to answer the question, fumbling over his words; everyone can tell how nervous he is. Dave cuts him off and tries to calm him; he instead asks another girl from the group the same question. The girl answers the question as if she had rehearsed it before going in, it was well answered. Dave seems impressed and writes down something in his notes. A slight panic sets in as I witness the questioning of my fellow applicants. In order for me to stand out and be “memorable” in my interview, I realize I must make an unforgettable first impression. This is when I see Dave look at me and I know he’s about to question me. Dave smiles and says, “Ms. Christine, I couldn’t help but notice that you were the only one that submitted a resume, now I see that you’ve had many jobs before, none of which seem to be a retail job.” I look at Dave wondering what he’s about to ask me feeling slightly nervous, he continues to ask, “What can you bring from your previous jobs to this job?” I feel relieved; this is a question I can answer with ease. I look at Dave, smile and say, “Well Dave, I have had many jobs before and though they may not have been retail jobs, I did gain much experience with customer service and I believe that if you can handle customers in the food industry, you can deal with any kind of customer.” Dave looks at me and I can feel the eyes of the others from the group look at me as well. I start to second guess my answer until Dave breaks the ice and starts to laugh saying, “Yes, that’s true I can see why you say that.” He writes something down in his notes and continues on with his questions. We go through several rounds of questions, some of the group answer with ease and others not so much. Dave concludes the interview and tells us that some of us will be called back for a follow up interview.

I get in my car and begin to head home. The minute I reach my house, I get a phone call from an unknown “805” number. I normally don’t answer unknown numbers, but I decide to take this one. I answer the call, “Hello, this is Christine”. The person on the other line says, “Hi Christine, its Dave from Ralph Lauren. I wanted to congratulate you on getting a second interview. Please come back tomorrow around 3 o’clock for your second and final interview.” I thank Dave and hang up. I figured I would do alright on this first interview, but now it’s the second one that I’m nervous about. The next day I head over to the store, this time it’s just two of us for the interview, me and the girl that rehearsed everything from the group interview. I feel especially nervous. This girl is going to do great on the interview, there’s no way I stand a chance. We wait for Dave to come out, but instead another guy comes out. He was tall, had gray hair and was definitely older. He introduces himself as Rusty, the general manager of the store. He takes us to the office again, this time only three chairs, one for the each of us. Rusty congratulates us on the second interview and tells us that only one person will be getting the job. This is nerve wracking. The other girl and I look at each other as competition now. Rusty begins his questions, this time making them more personal instead of general as Dave had made them. He begins with me, saying “I noticed from your application that you’re not from the area, you moved here from Texas correct?” I answer and tell him that I only moved in not even a week ago. He nods his head and then asks, “Now what do you believe the most important thing about a company is?” This is easy, I think to myself. I then answer, “Well I believe the most important part about any company is the customer. Without the customer no company will thrive and so the most important thing to do is make the customer happy.” Rusty seems okay with my answer until he says, “Well here at Ralph Lauren we strive to preserve the cleanliness of a store, preparation is key and here we do strive to maintain our store to therefore make the customer happy.” He asks the other girl a similar question and she gives an answer that Rusty seems to approve of. My hope for the coveted position is slowly diminishing; Rusty seemed to like the other girl more. Rusty concludes the interview. “Thank you”, he says, “if you happen to hear back from us then you got the job. If not, then I am sorry but you were just not what we will need for this company.” He says this looking directly at me. I left knowing I didn’t get the job. I decided to explore the Camarillo area before heading home. I stop at a Starbucks and as I’m going in to get a drink I get a call, this time from the same unknown “805” number as yesterday. I answer quickly, “Hi it’s Christine”. “Hello Christine, it’s Rusty. I wanted to congratulate you on getting the job here at Polo Ralph Lauren.” I’m shocked. I stammer and say, “Um, yeah, sure I’ll take the job, thank you so much! When do you want me to start?” Rusty tells me when to come in and to bring documents so that I can sign paperwork. I thank him again and hang up still feeling shocked, I actually got the job.

What I learned about this experienced is that I should have balanced the confidence in myself. I thought that having a lot of job experience would get me any kind of job without trying, but after the interview I had with Rusty I realize that not everything can be easily obtained. During the course of the interviewing process, I was given insight of being able to realize that overconfidence may not be the key, but rather to take a step back and see all the possibilities of what could happen.