The job hunt continues today. It is almost noon and I have already received phone calls from two potential employers this morning. One call was definitely more promising than the other and resulted in the scheduling of an interview for tomorrow. This will be my 3rd interview so far and I can't help but think the 3rd time is the charm.
The second phone call of the day ended in a the far less promising "we'll forward your resume on to another department." The job was for a customer service representative in a call centre. The woman was of course asking me about my previous customer service experience. She specifically wanted to know how many calls I handled a day in the previous call centres that I have worked in. I told her on an average day it was probably only around 30. However, there were a few days when the call volume was quite high. She wanted me to put a number on it. This may come to a surprise to some people - but I have not actually kept track of how many phone calls I answered on a busy day committing said fact to memory forever and ever so I can continue to pat myself on the back on my superior ability to answer a phone.
Here is the rub. Call me full of myself - but I think I could be a good worker in a high volume call centre without previous experience of handling 80+ calls a day. So many jobs, list in their requirements must have at least 2 - 5 years experience in blah blah blah. Honestly, from the description of these jobs it doesn't seem like someone really needs a full 2 years of experience doing that exact job to be successful! Look, I am an intelligent woman. I am capable of learning quickly and I am quite confident I would be successful in the jobs I am applying for. Let's face it - it's not rocket science.
To continue the story of the second phone interview. The woman then goes on to ask, "are you a permanent resident or Australian citizen?" Ummm.... did you happen to read my resume (CV)? If you had you would probably have noticed right under my name and before my address the line, "American citizen on working visa (subclass 462) permitted to work for 1 year." So I tell her "no I am not a permanent resident or citizen I am on a work and holiday visa." To which she says, "Oh, because this role is a permanent role... we really need a permanent resident or citizen" This is about the time she said she would forward my information on to another department. I thanked her and we said out goodbyes.
Did she really not read my resume before calling? Or was she just looking for an easy way out when I "proved" to her what would be "my inevitable failure" due to my lack of experience in a high volume call centre? Oh, the joys of looking for work...