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28 September 2008 : Dazzlingly Apropos
Tonight I took a personality assessment (and an excruciating basic math skills assessment, and also some analogies and basically, I took the GRE again) for a job that I'm very excited about. It wasn't one of those MMPI type tests where they ask if you sometimes like to kill people or if Jesus has ever sent you a birthday card, no. It was the kind of test where 150 questions are actually 15 questions, each reworded ten times.
Apparently in order to get a job these days, you don't have to have a college degree or any experience, so long as you're consistent.
The second section consisted of a series of two juxtaposed activities, and you had to choose which activity you'd prefer to involve yourself in, with a scale of four allowing you to indicate the veracity of that preference.
About halfway down the list, after hemming and hawing, because honestly I feel pretty good about most of the activities they had listed (though I cast my vote firmly in favor of building a deck rather than balancing my checkbook), I see these two options: Studying Geology or Writing a story, poetry, or screenplay.
Are you freaking kidding me? This test, it tried to kill me. I believe I spent at least half of my allotted hour gaping slack jawed at the screen, trying to decide how on earth I was supposed to choose between two so clearly awesome activities, both of which I have participated in and enjoyed in great drafty measures at various times in my life.
Now I'm at a loss. I'm not entirely certain I want this job anymore. I'm not entirely certain that there should not be a special place reserved in hell for the kind of people who would ask a girl to choose between Studying Geology and writing a story. Especially for a job in finance. The ambivalence, the indecision, it abounds. I am being suffocated by an atmosphere filled with swirling metaphor.
I'm no psychologist, but I'm pretty sure that this is just a bunch of tomfoolery, and mostly the creators of said test have been peeking in my windows at night, trying to figure out how to finally break me.
What have I done to deserve this? I just want a job, not another existential dilemma. Clearly we're all stocked up on those over here.
posted by lindsay at 23:02 ::
Tonight I took a personality assessment (and an excruciating basic math skills assessment, and also some analogies and basically, I took the GRE again) for a job that I'm very excited about. It wasn't one of those MMPI type tests where they ask if you sometimes like to kill people or if Jesus has ever sent you a birthday card, no. It was the kind of test where 150 questions are actually 15 questions, each reworded ten times.
Apparently in order to get a job these days, you don't have to have a college degree or any experience, so long as you're consistent.
The second section consisted of a series of two juxtaposed activities, and you had to choose which activity you'd prefer to involve yourself in, with a scale of four allowing you to indicate the veracity of that preference.
About halfway down the list, after hemming and hawing, because honestly I feel pretty good about most of the activities they had listed (though I cast my vote firmly in favor of building a deck rather than balancing my checkbook), I see these two options: Studying Geology or Writing a story, poetry, or screenplay.
Are you freaking kidding me? This test, it tried to kill me. I believe I spent at least half of my allotted hour gaping slack jawed at the screen, trying to decide how on earth I was supposed to choose between two so clearly awesome activities, both of which I have participated in and enjoyed in great drafty measures at various times in my life.
Now I'm at a loss. I'm not entirely certain I want this job anymore. I'm not entirely certain that there should not be a special place reserved in hell for the kind of people who would ask a girl to choose between Studying Geology and writing a story. Especially for a job in finance. The ambivalence, the indecision, it abounds. I am being suffocated by an atmosphere filled with swirling metaphor.
I'm no psychologist, but I'm pretty sure that this is just a bunch of tomfoolery, and mostly the creators of said test have been peeking in my windows at night, trying to figure out how to finally break me.
What have I done to deserve this? I just want a job, not another existential dilemma. Clearly we're all stocked up on those over here.
posted by lindsay at 23:02 ::