David R. Malmborg

Two months ago I was laid off from one of my favorite jobs to date. This wasn’t my first time being laid off, it was my third, yet this time was by far the most surprising. I remember leaving the office with my box of stuff in my hand dreading my least favorite part about being laid off, interviewing.

Interviewing for a job is like dating. It can be full of awkward moments, weird questions, and an ever present need to impress people. When the date is over you are left wondering, “Did I do it right?”

When you think about it, there is the online dating, the blind dates, or you call up the girl that you grew up with because they’re like a security blanket, a safe choice. Interviewing is the same; you start plastering your resume to the interwebs, and hope it will stick. People call you out of the blue to see if you are interested in an obscure position with a company you never heard of. You then go and call all your buddies, old colleagues and everyone you did business with in the past to see if they have something for you. The dates start lining up.

Personally, I don’t mind the actual interview. I don’t struggle with meeting new people, but interviewing isn’t haphazard conversation. Like a first date, everything is calculated, what you say is scrutinized, and with every answer provided you wonder if it was the right answer? Never having met the person before the interview, you decide whether to play it cool, or keep it close to the chest, or let it all hang out, letting them get to know the “true you.” Meanwhile, you question yourself as the person you interviewed with raises one eyebrow, chews on their tongue, or starts to flick their pen around their finger.

Finally when it’s over you leave them, you head to your car, close the door, put your head back on the head rest and sigh relief. The stress is temporarily over, but it doesn’t last long. By the time you get home the only thing you can think of is “will they call me back?”

Personally, I can’t comment on dating too much as I married my high school sweetheart, taking me out of the dating scene for some time now. However, I suppose life is humorous, and decided that I needed to have dating experiences through job interviews. Here’s to hoping that I’m out of the dating scene for a while now.

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Also read about why I’m writing.

I am not a strong writer. I am not concise with my written thought. I am not eloquent with my vocabulary. My punctuation is terrible. Writing is by far my weakest “professional” skill. I know it. I know that others know it. It really hits my ego and confidence when I have to write for someone and it gets ripped apart. I want to get better but when you don’t have confidence in your writing, you feel least inclined to do it when there is not a need. Not to mention, writing is super important to your career and often times your career goals. Grammarly studied 100 Linked In profiles and found that “in the same 10-year period, professionals who received one to four promotions made 45 percent more grammatical errors than did professionals who were promoted six to nine times.” I have seen this with my professional associates as well. It’s true, the good writers are more respected and secure in their job.

Since I know that writing is a weakness of mine, I always felt it was worth practicing, but never bothered to do it… until now. I’m making this blog my public practice platform. I recently found myself at a new company in downtown Salt Lake. One of my favorite aspects about the new gig is I have the chance to take the train to work. My train ride is 35 minutes one-way, giving me plenty of time to write daily on whatever topic hits my mind as I commute. I admit some of the post may be random, but the goal of my posts is not to be overly profound (a common notion people have with writing blogs), but provide me with writing practice.

The life coaches at Griffin Hill told me that “practice does not make perfect, but practice makes permanent.” So in order for my writing practice to REALLY work, I need feedback. If you read this or any of my future posts and find errors, please comment below. Think of it as a form of public shaming! I’m hoping to learn from you, the readers.

Thanks for your help, DRM.

I often marvel at people’s dedication in the pursuit of perfection. I love seeing someone with a true passion, and love for something that they strive to be so perfect at it. Last week, I watched the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi, where an 85 year old man has dedicated his life to perfecting sushi. I happened to have paused the film for a minute right on this quote (being subtitled):

If your sense of taste is lower than that of your customers, how are you going to impress them?

Talk about having a reason to strive for perfection and excellence in your career and business. You strive to increase your skill so that your skill and ability is higher than that of your customers, or else you can’t impress them, and you’ll find yourself slowly without customers. In a subtle sense, the pursuit of perfection is necessary for survival.

-DRM2