These are the many, the loud, the medical assistants. In general, a certain type of personality is drawn to this helping profession. They tend to be extraverts, excruciatingly social, always talking, texting, moving, laughing. They mostly swarm together, like a flock of magpies, or maybe a coven of shiny crows is a better metaphor, yakking back and forth, perched across chairs and tables. And then suddenly, about ten minutes before the end of class, whoosh! They rise up en masse: class is over, we're outta here! I have to wave them back down to the ground, back to their seats.
The mock interviews proceed with many groans, sweaty palms, and fidgety knees. A few students, when placed in the limelight, behave the way I expect them to, ignoring the requirement to dress professionally, belligerently responding to questions with terse and sarcastic answers, obviously despising the process (and me). But sometimes I am delighted at the hidden personalities that emerge when the student is on the spot. Then I realize they don't all fly together. There are a few introverts in this swarm of crows. My people.But just because they are introverts doesn't mean they are shy! Students who have said virtually nothing all term suddenly blossom when asked “Tell me about yourself,” exuding confidence and depths hitherto unseen and unimagined. It makes me love them and their secret lives, which they keep well-hidden and protected in a social setting that can be brutal and ruthless. Did you know crows eat smaller birds? It's true.
One of the students, an extreme extravert, had clearly had experience being interviewed, a lot more experience than her panel of interviewers had interviewing. She played them like the pro she was, tossing their questions back at them with a carefree, breezy style. The panel rallied bravely and dug deeper.
“If you could be a superhero, who would you be?”
“Wonderwoman, of course,” the candidate proclaimed triumphantly.
“What word would you use to describe yourself?”
“Fun-loving!”
“If your life were a book, what would be the title?”
“The quirky and eccentric world of [insert student name here]!”
I could feel myself cringing a little, imagining an employer's response to that declaration of individuality, even as I silently applauded her. She displayed her authentic personality like a banner, clearly proud to be a nut. (And she is a nut, I think—later she told me she has to take some pill before she can go on an interview, else she will be so hyperactive she'll be communicating from another time zone. Sort of a nut, maybe more like a wackjob, technically speaking.)
Every day, after the third interview, we take ten minutes to debrief. The extraverts are so excited, they all talk at once. I have to beg time for the introverts to share their insights. We discuss the potential benefits and pitfalls of telling an interviewer that one is eccentric, quirky, and fun-loving. The consensus is usually this: Why on earth would we want to work for an organization that doesn't appreciate who we are?
Why indeed?
