Living Life the Right Way Round

Mrs T tells me that some research she just heard reported on Radio 4 Today said that if men fidget in an interview it is seen as a good thing but if women do it will jeopardise their possibility of being employed. Hard to work out why that might be and what deep-rooted prejudice that is tapping in to.

I may have been blessed with a genetic tendency to fidget. I also like interviews and interviewing. One to one conversations with an audience are a great way of teasing out truth and entertaining at the same time.

I also had an ability to pass exams at a higher level than I achieved at coursework without ever understanding my subject or caring about it. Lucky me.

I applauded the changes in education over the 1990s and 2000s, anticipating Google almost, that taught people how to learn rather than what to learn. The tendency to revert that Michael Gove is bringing in is disappointing. You learn facts and figures from pub quizzes these days. I know the kings of England from 1603 - 1688 because of A level history in 1973 but cannot hold a long discussion about the significance of those eras.

I have had to learn how to learn and which learning style best suits me since leaving school. School was hopeless at getting me to be enthusiastic about my subjects. I now love maths, physical geography, economics, philosophy, theology, English language and literature and think I would enjoy doing a GCSE or A level (again) in any of those.

You understand your life backwards but have to live it forwards.

Interview Musings

Just a bit more advanced theological reflection on Tuesday's interview. Having sleeplessly replayed most of the things that happened and lots of the questions I was asked I have concluded that the normally reasonably articulate me went walkabout. That is to say I didn't answer questions well or accurately or indeed the questions.

(I also, getting too long an answer off one of the panel to the first of my two questions, asked him to shut up so I could ask the second one and keep the panel within the designated hour. This probably annoyed him and impressed others but it should have been someone else's job to shut him up I'm sure.)

The previous week I had an interview experience that was described back to me as 'astounding.' Same me. Same nerves. Not hugely dissimilar questions. From astounding to appalling in five days.

I read Exodus 3 and 4 this morning. Moses tried to get out of doing a God job by pleading with God, wonderfully, 'I have never been eloquent and haven't become so since you started talking to me.' God tells Moses that he invented words and will use them as he wishes.

One of the questions on Tuesday was what I thought of the ministry of the Spirit and that same Spirit was possibly at work stopping me answering. Fantastic.

I don't think my previously discussed mixed motives lost me the job. I think it was the wrong job and I have found the right one. Amen.

1988

In 1988 my friend John, minister of Broxtowe, noted my decision to avoid a rough council estate in Nottingham in favour of a job in the north-east (slightly less rough in parts) with the words, 'Don't worry Steve; if the Lord wants you, he'll get you.'

Today I've been in the processs of being interviewed for the sort of job John may have had in mind. I'd reached the point of saying that if offered it I'd take it. A sort of Abrahamic, 'Well Lord if you want me to knife my son I will,' moment.

Well there was a ram in the thicket. I don't have the job; someone else does and if it's who I think it is I'm delighted for him and worried for him too. Will pray.

I woke up this morning hoping that, after applying for this job with all my might, I might not get it, then pushing that thought away and treating it as Satan. I wonder if I applied for it with all my might? Who can tell?

The phone call telling me I didn't have the post included the line, 'Thank you for your honesty.' So at least the real me was shown. But would anyone really expect less than honesty of a Christian pastor testing a call to minister in a particular place. I have always found this a conundrum and for one so keen on expressing myself well reckon it may come down to the particular form of words you use when being honest. It starts at a ministry selection conference when you have to balance a sense of calling with a sense of allowing someone else to test that calling. Sort of, 'I think I'm sure.'

Let's leave it at that. If the God who knew about scrambling language in the first place, and puts words into people's mouths, didn't give me the words I needed to express my sense of purpose at the right time then this was not what he wanted. But although what I seemed, in my deep inner self, to want, has happened I feel a little strange about it. Nothing more.

I will be accepting the job I was offered last week, grateful for the opportunity of testing I wasn't avoiding something else in taking it, and looking forward very much to a new challenge. Announcement as soon as all parties agree on timing.

Pick a Number

You're off for an interview and have to do a presentation to the interview panel. Do you phone and ask how many handouts you will need? You probably would because you're that kind of person. I just know that's how.

I didn't. I don't like phoning unless I absolutely have to. I picked a sensible number for an interview panel (4) and doubled it (8). How many were on the panel? 11 (eleven). That's right, eleven. Gave me the opportunity to make light of the fact that I'd got it wrong and this was a bit of a technique of mine to make others look good.

Anyway I've now got less of a stiff neck than I had before the interview through the exercise of trying to maintain eye contact with as many of the eleven as possible (we were in a large lounge in a vicarage) whilst answering questions.

Sample questions:

What is the difference between leadership and management?
How do you go about helping people of a different church tradition to your own?
With which member of the Trinity do you most identify?
Your five closest friends are in the room and they have been allowed one word each to describe you. What will they say?

We have a week to decide whether or not to take the job.