James Bond Got Me My First Job, and Now I Know Interviews are About Finding the Right Fit (Part I of II)
My every resumé, from the first one I prepared in college to the one I maintain today, ends with the same words: “Fan of James Bond.”
It is those four words that got my career started.
I looked for my first real job during law school. I sent my resumé to every conceivable mid-sized or large law firms in the New York/New Jersey/Boston area, but I only heard back from a handful and the few interview opportunities I did receive ended up being somewhere between unmemorable to disastrous. After one particularly bad interview, the interviewer took pity on me and lectured me on how, going forward, I should answer every question in the exact opposite of how I had answered to him.
The interview with the firm I ended up working for was about the only one that went well, and it was quite different right off the bat.
The interviewer began by asking “So what is it about James Bond that you like”? It was a soft question for sure, but his genuine interest in one of my passions gave an insight into what kind of people worked for the firm. We had a pleasant five, six minute conversation about James Bond before moving onto more substantive matters, and I recall thinking after stepping out of the interview that if I didn’t nail that one, I’m never going to get a job.
I look back on my unsuccessful interviews during law school and understand now what I wasn’t doing right. Back then, I simply wanted a job, any job, and had sent my resumé indiscriminately to any law firm that had a “Contact Us” link on their homepage. I didn’t appreciate that every workplace has a distinctive culture with different focus, and never bothered to look into how those differences may impact my application.
Take, for example, my language skills. Going into interviews, I believed that my greatest asset was my ability to communicate in both English and Japanese. But for a law firm that’s headquartered in New Jersey with offices scattered across the United States but none in Tokyo, Japanese is not much useful. Stripping my resumé of Japanese leaves me as a candidate with decent grades and English skills not quite on par with a native speaker. It’s no wonder I mostly got a pass.
(continued to Part II)
