I’m learning a lot about the “grass is greener” syndrome and the tendency I have had at times to over-glamorize things. I was talking to a friend today and we were discussing my forays at exploring other companies. The first place I went to that didn’t seem particularly professional is actually a place he is familiar with. He knows the lady who owns the company and we had quite a dialogue. Let me give you a tableau vivant of what my encounter with these people was like:
*We were in a house. Not a real office space, but a house. A dirty house in a rough area that seemed prime for raising pit bulls, dealing crack, and getting robbed.
*The interview took place while the interviewers sat on a dirty “white” pleather couch and I sat in a dirty “white” pleather recliner. I told my friend it reminded me of a bad 80s flashback. Like something maybe associated with Sammy Hagar and he goes, “You interviewed in the Cabo Wabo recliner!” Yes. Yes I did.
*One of the ladies reminded me of Chris Farley’s Gap girl. Or also that new chick on SNL (Aidy Bryant I think is her name). She would bug her eyes out and inflect way high with her voice every time she asked me a question.
*They told me they were not big on motivational speakers or social events and I would basically be left alone to do what I needed.
Sooooo . . . As I am discussing this mess with my friend, he tells me that he actually knows the owner and her husband. Here’s how the dialogue went:
M: The part about not liking motivational speakers or parties is bullshit. She goes to motivational speeches literally all the time. Her husband is huge, I mean, huge on these self-help conferences and they go constantly.
S: Damn. Sounds like I dodged a bullet.
M: And they go to parties all the time, too. There are parties I have literally declined to attend because I saw her name or her husband’s name on the RSVP list.
S: Wow. So basically, it sounds like she just straight up lied.
M: Agreed. The company has the reputation of being a flim-flam operation and I doubt they make much money. Would you have gotten paid?
S: I dunno. Would I? I mean, based on all appearances and on what I’m learning from you, it sounds highly doubtful. I’m so glad we’re having this conversation because it proves my instincts were right!
We don’t always get independent confirmation about our gut instincts or decisions, but it is fantastic when we do. It made me think about other decisions I’ve made and other people, places, and things I’ve walked away from recently. Once I got past the initial shock and strangeness of it all, life has drastically improved since removing the rose-colored glasses. Being able to reframe a situation to “It was not that special” or “There was nothing magical about it” has been wonderful. This weekend, we had a random ice & sleet storm. Everything was covered in a glaze of ice and the highway patrol actually shut down some roads due to collisions. It was a great time to rest and relax. I’ve actually been recovering from strep and a double ear infection, so it was laziness that was needed. (I’m still on UDT though. Even when sick, I pushed through my workouts and didn’t let that fall to the side. I might have been slower than usual, but I kept going.) I somehow got interested in Tower Heist, LOL, and found it was not completely horrible. But I digress. I remember when I was dating a nurse (not Matt, Male Nurse from SNL), in my mind he was automatically the greatest nurse ever. Even though he wasn’t. I think because he was actually a POS, I felt the need to build him up into something way beyond what he actually was. I think that’s a signal to me for the future: if you feel the need to dress it up, it’s probably because it is lacking in some significant way. Think about the typical used car salesman sales pitch: it’s the greatest car ever and the greatest deal and 10,000 other people are lined up to buy it if you don’t. Bullshit. Same thing with my job explorations. The one company was fly-by-night and had me interview on Sammy’s Cabo Wabo chair. The other company was very well-structured and extremely corporate. Too corporate, in fact, for my tastes. Their expectations and quotas sounded pretty ridiculous to me and it sounded like they had the shotgun approach: shoot so many things at the wall that something, somewhere has to stick. That is a stressful type of environment to be in. It’s funny to watch Alec Baldwin chew ass in Glengarry but if you really had to work for someone like that, it would suck. This guy seemed like part used car salesman, part snake oil salesman, and part pervert. He tried to railroad me into a commission-only position in spite of my repeatedly saying, “I’m not interested in anything without a safety net.” Whenever someone completely ignores you like that and tries to keep the dialogue going in a way that suits them, forget it.
My little take-away nugget is this: if it seems too good to be true, it probably is. If you feel compelled to make someone or something more glamorous / enticing / exciting / cool / whatever than it actually is, that should be your sign to either abort mission entirely or take a major step back and reassess. It’s a yellow light at best.
