You don’t deserve to be hired if you don’t have that “thing”

Disclaimer: The ideas expressed in this post are my own personal opinions and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.

I know it’s tough for students and recent grads. Thanks to my job, I know the difficulties my peers face while they make that transition from school to work.

Over the last two years, I never imagined myself being on the flip side of that situation or feeling compelled to comment on Gen Y entitlement. In general, I think it’s been discussed to death and usually consists of much Baby Boomer finger-wagging and head-shaking.

I am not a Baby Boomer. I’m Gen Y. I live and breathe everything Gen Y. I think we’re the most educated, skilled generation to date and, if we get our shit together, we could make the world an amazing place and make money while we’re at it.

But I’m starting to feel frustrated about Gen Y entitlement.

I’ve recently been interviewed by a few young journalists regarding my thoughts on unpaid internships because students are becoming frustrated by them.

To sum up, I don’t think they’re ideal, and in some cases they’re unethical, but they’re the reality of the current job market and to succeed in many industries you have to complete one or more unpaid internships.

I’m a realist. I’ve both completed unpaid internships and hired for unpaid internships as an employer. I try really hard to make TalentEgg’s internships, both paid and unpaid, as meaningful as possible. I don’t think unpaid volunteers should replace full-time paid workers on an ongoing basis, and I don’t think a company should live or die by its unpaid interns.

But this post isn’t about employers. It’s about interns.

Just because you complete a (paid or unpaid) internship with an organization does not mean it is obligated to hire you. This is why:

• If you don’t make yourself so valuable to the organization that it can’t live without you on a full-time, permanent basis, then I don’t think you deserve to be hired.
• If you haven’t demonstrated initiative, autonomy, innovation, vision, passion, and that you can be trusted with responsibilities that are core to the business (at the very least) during your internship, then I don’t think you deserve to be hired.
• If you can’t do your job as good as your manager can (or better!), then I don’t think you deserve to be hired.

Harsh? Maybe. But I would not hire someone who didn’t embody each of those qualities.

So far during my short career as a Gen Y manager and a manager of Gen Y, there has only been one intern who I would have begged my boss to hire; who I could trust with really important projects and tasks; who I knew was making the company bigger and better and stronger; who worked as hard as my colleagues and I, or harder.

We’ve had a lot of great interns. Amazing people. Good workers. I’m not putting them down by any means and I am so, so, SO grateful for all of their hard work.

But did they all have that THING I just couldn’t live without?  I don’t think so.

That THING doesn’t have a name, but I like to think of it as the perfect storm of skills and qualities. Each organization and each manager will have a different recipe for that THING (which is why different people and different kinds of people are successful at different organizations), but we know it when we see it because it is so rare that it hits us over the head and slaps us across the face with its awesomeness.

I did not demonstrate that THING at some of my past internships and I know this because no one asked me to stay. I didn’t demonstrate that THING because I didn’t really want to stay.

But I know I demonstrated it at TalentEgg because I went from intern to senior management very quickly, and I’ve maintained my position while I’ve watched many others come and go without making any significant contribution to the company’s culture, growth or bottom line.

A lot of students and recent grads ask my colleagues and I how to find an awesome job. We usually try to offer some actionable tips, but I think the truth is that you just have be remarkable.

Everyone has a degree or diploma, or two or three. Everyone has a resumé. Everyone has connections. Everyone has access to personal branding tools and social media. These things might help you find a job or internship, but they won’t help you keep it. Your behaviour and your work will.

Thoughts?

How do you know when your high expectations are too high?

I find hiring people really challenging. I’m not going to lie. I was trained as a journalist, not as a manager; and as such a small company run by mostly young people, we learn as we go. And that’s awesome!

But I find the whole process awkward, kind of like dating or interacting with babies or old people (yes, I’m one of those people).

I’m never quite sure how to act. If I play good cop, I feel like I’m being too nice and basically begging them to work for me even though I’m not entirely sure I want them to work for me. If I play bad cop, it’s even more awkward because I’m waiting for the moment when they say, “This is bullshit!” and walk out of the interview.

I’ve made the mistake of hiring someone who turned out to be completely different than they came across in their interview in the past, so this time around, I feel like I can’t trust my own good judgment. I’ve asked a few people for advice IRL and I’ve gotten some good feedback which I’m eager to employ as I start interviewing candidates this week or next, but I’m still a bit worried.

Because I’m really, really picky. If things aren’t done right, I go all OCD and have to fix them on my own time. After a few times of someone not picking up on the fact that they’re not meeting my standards, I tend to assume they’re incompetent. If they can’t spell or form a sentence that makes sense: incompetent. If they run into a problem and assume it can’t be done instead of figuring it out by, oh…I don’t know, Googling it: incompetent.

I discussed all this with some family and friends over the weekend, and many of them told me my expectations are too high; that not being grammatically correct is the way the world works now; that hiring young people means they’ll need a bit of hand-holding; that I’m setting myself up for failure because I’m never going to find that one perfect candidate.

But why would I hire someone onto my team who isn’t exactly what I’m looking for? Maybe large corporations can get by with slackers and illiterates, but fast-paced “small businesses” (my boss hates it when we’re referred to as a “small business,” but I can’t think of what else to call us) can fall apart within a very short period of time if one person isn’t carrying their weight. Businesses like ours thrive on superstar-ness, and I think everyone on the team right now is just that.

If you’re not a superstar, I don’t want you. Is that discrimination?

I know, I know…not the best “manager” here. But I’m working on it. Maybe. The truth is I want to be one of those terrifying editors who make people cry and realize their own incompetence by way of my overwhelming meanness.

OK. For real. How do you detect superstar-ness? I know a lot of you out there are superstars, so maybe you know the secret that I just haven’t been able to figure out yet?

P.S. I know this is my first blog post in ages, but I’m now trying the whole “write about anything and see what happens” strategy.

Photo credit: Shooting Stars by stefanvds

Why I still don’t have Internet access at home four months later

It’s been four months since I moved back to Toronto for work after a four-month stint living at my dad’s after graduating university and breaking up with a boyfriend.

Until four months ago, I’d had Internet access wherever I was living nearly continuously for over 10 years, maybe more. I feel like I’ve had the Internet for my entire life (or at least the half that I actually remember) and it’s been an important tool throughout my life.

If I hadn’t been so involved online over the last 10 years, I highly doubt I would be capable enough to do my current job.

But over the last year, I noticed the Internet becoming an addiction and a crutch.

I love consuming information and I could probably spend every waking hour of my life reading blogs, watching videos, listening to podcasts, checking out photos, etc. I know this is a good thing, but it’s also a dangerous thing if anyone actually does it because then you stop participating in all the other really great things about life.

And as my last year of university came to a close, and simultaneously so did my last relationship, I found comfort in focusing my attention on the computer because it meant I didn’t have to think about all the crappy stuff going on in my life at the time. It was a distraction and it became an instant wall between my ex-boyfriend and I when we lived together.

I didn’t want to talk, fight, clean up after him, open the mail, cook or do anything else that was an extension of our relationship. I wanted to ignore it all, so I did.

When I arrived at my dad’s last April, I didn’t really like anything about my life there either – I had grown distant from my family after four years away from school, my dad’s girlfriend had moved in, there was nothing to do in that town and none of my friends were there anymore – so, once again, I ignored all that in favour of the Internet. I sometimes worked all day and night. I read dozens of blog articles every day. I watched hours of TV online. Sure, I got out now and then, but not enough.

So, I finally realized that I had left one unhealthy situation for another and I needed to get out. Financially, I probably wasn’t ready, but I knew I could get by, so I moved to Toronto Sept. 1.

Four months later, I still don’t have Internet access at my apartment. I’ve found many reasons to justify it – Canadian telecom providers suck, I’m on the Internet at work anyway, I don’t want to be stuck on a computer all night after I’ve been sitting at one all day, etc. – but it’s starting to creep up on me. Sure, I have email and Internet access on my BlackBerry, but it’s not the same.

Sometimes I don’t leave work until 7 or 8 p.m. because there are things I still want to do. I’ve marked as read countless undoubtedly interesting blog articles in my Google Reader because I can’t spend my workdays catching up. I mostly forget about Twitter and Facebook in the evenings and on weekends. Until recently when I finally got a TV again, I’d mostly replaced TV shows and movies with podcasts I download at work and listen to at home.

The truth is, this extreme hasn’t felt right either, so now I’m itching to connect again, but I’m kind of scared at the same time. What if there is only one extreme or the other for me? Only being connected all the time or not being connected?

How do you balance staying involved online with staying involved in the rest of life?

P.S. Any testimonials for an excellent Internet service provider in Toronto that isn’t Bell or Rogers?

Oh no, I feel a quarter-life crisis coming on. Crap!

Despite appearing to be really good at patting myself on the back for a job well done, I seem to be going through one of those pesky quarter-life crises.

I assumed I would avoid it altogether because I nabbed an awesome job straight out of school, but the truth is now that I’m all settled in I’m starting to think, “Now what?”

Not so much in terms of my job – I have more than enough to do and the company has a The Sky’s the Limit mentality – but in terms of my life. Until about three months ago, I was working toward some very important milestones in my life. I had full control. I knew if I did A and B I would eventually get to C.

OK. So I got to C. But now I’m panicking a little bit because there are no prescribed steps to take to get to another place in life. I could potentially do anything, so I’m left feeling a bit paralyzed and I do nothing instead.

Except when I’ve had a few drinks and the paralysis melts away and I feel like I can actually do anything, so I do, but I don’t think about the consequences first. And when that feeling finally returns I find myself even more “stuck” because I’m embarassed for losing control, for being irresponsible, for appearing unprofessional. Sometimes I don’t even need a few drinks; I just feel a bit sassy and try to get away with things I never even would have thought about doing, say, a year ago.

Where there used to be clear paths to follow and distinct lines drawn in the sand never to cross, there seems to now be only greyness and uncertainty. Not to be over-dramatic, but in certain situations I find myself having a hard time telling the difference between right and wrong. I often ask friends and family for advice, but none of them seem to know the answers either.

So, here I am, a little confused, mucking things up … putting some things away which have been bothering me for a while and digging up new ones.

I known I need to set goals for myself and work toward them, but I have no idea what those goals should be. I know I want to move back to Toronto, but I have no idea when the right time should be or how much of my debt I should pay off before devoting nearly half of my income to rent. I know I want to meet new people and maybe even date some of them casually, but I have no idea where these people are or how to meet them.

This all sounds very vague, I know. But it’s kind of how I feel right now. Vague. Bleh.

Mission accomplished

I promised myself I would blog more often once I finished school because I wouldn’t be working the equivalent of two full-time jobs (just one), but I’ve still managed to keep myself surprisingly busy.

The only huge news I have is that my face was on the “front page” of GlobeandMail.com on Friday! And not for some random reason, but because I wrote something that The Globe and Mail published on their GlobeCampus site. That’s huge, right?

TalentEgg recently partnered with GlobeCampus for a blog/column called From Class to Career. Lauren’s article went up early last week and mine, “It’s been two months since graduating … now what?”

Needless to say, it’s a very exciting (or eggciting as Lauren would say) time for TalentEgg and for me personally/professionally. Already this year I’ve been published in the National Post multiple times and now something I wrote was featured on the Globe and Mail’s homepage. Two national newspapers in the span of a few months. Not bad!

You don’t have to be hired by a media giant to be published by one!