You've got the job!

Not five minutes after I’d hung up with my east coast interviewer did my phone ring again. It was the January interview. “You’ve been successful! Congratulations!” came a voice. At the time I was so shocked and excited that I didn’t realise for weeks who the voice on the other end of the phone was that day, but now I’ve realised it was J – I knew she was my goodluck charm! The paperwork would be sent out soon she said, and in the meantime I should get my police clearance organised.
I was over the moon. I’d made it! I couldn’t quite believe it. But I was so excited and spent the next three weeks checking the mail everyday to see if my contract was sitting in the letterbox, just waiting for me to sign it. But it took forever to arrive and when, in early March, I got an invitation to a recruitment day at my dream airline – the one I had grown up admiring – I was torn as to whether I should go. I talked it over with my family and friends and they encouraged me to go, if for nothing else than to get my name into the system at that airline for the future. Working at that airline was still my ultimate goal. And maybe it would come sooner than expected?

Somehow I was less nervous in March than I was in January, even though this interview was by far the biggest and most serious one I’d been to. And all the other candidates were of the highest standard. They were mostly all older than me, all with previous experience, and all looking down their noses at me. I thought I cut an all right figure amongst them though, and this was confirmed when I made it to the panel interview that day as well. I couldn’t have been more stoked with myself and had a hard time trying not to let my mind run away with me and picture myself wearing that lovely dress already.

As I waited in the inner city hotel foyer for my interview, I bumped into a girl from my January interview. She’d also been offered the job there and I asked her what she’d do if she was successful today with this much bigger airline. She was quick to answer: “Oh I’d be here in a second! I’d pull out of ground school with J and L…I don’t care.” I guess some people only want to go to the big time. Nothing wrong with that – heck, I had been incredibly naïve as well and wanted to only work for the big airlines at one stage, but now that I had an offer I was happy to take it. I honestly didn’t know what I would decide if I got offered a job at two different places.

I was interviewed by a big burly bloke who could’ve been the CEO of this airline for all I knew. He was very business like but so wonderfully pleasant that I felt at ease sitting across from him and even had the guts to tell my awkward story about having to dob in a colleague who was coming to work under the influence of drugs. It was a good example of my work ethic and my integrity and I knew it. And I know it impressed him. And when we got to talking about my barista skills I thought I was in with a chance – he seemed so interested and so enthusiastic about my experience, whilst I was nothing but honest and polite to him.

I went home that day feeling as good as I had about my interview in January. But I didn’t know what to expect. Salaries and allowances and pretty uniforms and discounted travel and Hilton hotels were all swirling around in my head.