Priorities
I just got back from an excellent and productive meeting with my search client that has me champing at the bit to get started on the search—but priorities, priorities. So after I write up the meeting for my final paper (best to do that quickly, so I don’t forget anything), I shall turn my attention to the networking presentation and the next search-class problem set.
If I get through all that, it’ll be time to send out some more résumés. Brief phone interview this afternoon, granted, but there’s nothing like getting shot down to inspire one to new heights of frantic paper-pushing.
I will cop to certain superstitions surrounding important competitive milestones like job interviews. One such is that I beat long odds but never short ones. So it’s no wonder I lost out on the Ruritania position, being one of only two candidates; I expect I’ve a better shot at Rohan, seeing as how they’ve got four or five.
Another is that when I do get shot down on a job I really want, the job I eventually take turns out to be a blessing (if sometimes disguised at first). I had to apply twice to get the job at Impressions that set my entire working life on a new and rosier path. I got shot down on running the Puerto Rico Census Project, so I swallowed my pride and accepted a data-entry position—one that ended up introducing me to database programming and paying for nearly all of library school.
So I’m hoping that the pattern holds this time.