The J-O-B

I met with Veronica my new boss today. She’s super cool and I can’t wait to start my new job next week. We met in her office and I was really nervous because I wanted to make a great first impression. Her office is GORGEOUS. It has a beautiful window with a beautiful view and a beautiful cherry wood desk and a beautiful gray office chair….okay….anyway I knocked on her door and after coming down from my immense feelings of office envy I was able to greet her like a professional. She was in a black fitted suit with white heels. Veronica has blonde ruffley hair and pretty brown eyes that she enhances with extremely subtle eye make-up which took me awhile to notice. The woman, she’s good at making it look like she’s not wearing anything, that’s a true artist. Veronica is not just the editor for the paper, she’s a very busy woman! She signs off on what the station chooses as stories every day, coaches the anchors, and keeps a hawk-like eye over the backstage goings-on. I honestly don’t know how she finds the time to do all of it but in any case, she’s a very direct person and cuts to the chase, which I really like. I know it can come off as intimidating but I just see it as a way to make time more efficient.

I sat down and took out a note pad.

“You wanna get out of here?”

I was caught off guard, “What?”

“Let’s go get brunch. There’s a place in the lobby that has the most amazing quiche you’ve ever had….unless you’re a vegetarian, you’re not a vegetarian, are you?”

“No,” I said giggling.

“Good, I like that, vegetarians are pretentious, you’ll see that when you meet Steve.”

“Uh….who’s Steve?” I asked as Veronica handed me a heavy bag.

“You’re assistant.” She said walking out of her office to the elevators.

“I have an assistant?” I followed her trying to make it look like I wasn’t struggling to move with the bag (it was THAT heavy).

Within a few minutes we were seated at one of the nicest restaurants I’ve ever been in. The tables were made in the bistro style with under-laid glass mosaics in flowery designs and the glasses were all crystal. Veronica nodded her head to the hostess and we were seated in a booth near the back. I slid in awkwardly with the bag she had given me and was handed a menu by one of the most beautiful men I’d ever seen.

After looking over the menu, I started to panic.

“Honey, calm down, this is a business lunch. Don’t even bother looking at the prices, brunch is on the news station.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I already cleared it with the big guys, they’re the ones who suggested it.”

Relieved, I decided on a potato skillet with breakfast sausage, cheese, and buttered toast while Veronica ordered a mushroom, cheese, and ham quiche for both of us, an order of French toast with strawberries and coffee pot.

“So, in that bag are all of the writing applications we’ve received.”

I was confused. “When I interviewed they said the job wouldn’t be posted until you and I talked.”

“The job hasn’t been posted yet,” I gave Veronica an even more confused look, “This is the news business, Faith, people don’t need to see a job posting to hear about writing jobs for a newspaper. If everything works out we might not even need to post an advertisement.”

“How did all of these writers hear about it, then?”

“Different sources, some are staffed by the news station while others heard from word of mouth. This project is very exciting to people so it would make sense that there would be chatter about it.”

“Okay, do you want me to still post an advertisement?”

“No, let’s get through these first and if we’re still looking then post the advertisement.”

So my assignment for the week is to weed through hundreds of applications and writing samples which were in the bag Veronica handed me. I won’t be judging the writing samples, that’s Veronica’s role, but I will be skimming them for grammatical errors, spelling, and other mistakes that might make them ineligible for review. I also will be responsible for putting their applications into a database for future reference. We’re looking for about 20 people all together and I have more than 200 applications to look through.

After brunch we headed upstairs to talk about our working styles. After about an hour of getting to know each other I gathered my things to leave.

“I look forward to working with you, Faith, we found a real gem in you.”

“Thank you, I appreciate it very much.”

“I almost forgot, would you like to see your office?”

“Absolutely.”

I followed Veronica around a square pit, “What’s the huge pit for?”

“That’s where all the writers will work, we’ll start having furniture delivered next week.”

On the opposite side of the pit Veronica lead me down a shallow hallway,

“This is where Steve will work, he’ll be like your personal secretary but he’s also trained to help you with HR related things you may need done.”

Across from the shallow alcove that Steve would inhabit was a glass wall and a frosted glass door. There was a conference room with a whiteboard at the back and a giant cherry wood table flanked by black office chairs in the center of the room. “This is one of two conference rooms, there’s going to be a few televisions installed in it as well as some other smart media that we’ll use to monitor other news stations, stories, or have meetings. The other one, across from my office, looks just like it.”
Veronica stopped at a dead end a few feet farther down the hallway, “And this is your office.”

She opened the door and the first thing I noticed was a huge window and glittery sunlight. I had a window at my old job but it looked out onto a brick tenement building and barely let in any sun. I could see the lake from my window and a pretty skyline of surrounding buildings. There wasn’t any furniture in my huge office, which I assumed would be delivered with the rest of it.

“So here’s a form for you to fill out, you can choose which furniture you want to order for your office, basically anything in this catalog,” she said handing me a furniture booklet, “you can order. Take that home with you tonight and bring it back when you have a chance. Do you want to go meet our station staff?”

I snapped out of my fantasy and nodded. I was a little sad to have to leave my office but followed her down to the station’s floor. They were shooting a few taped segments for the night news and I met several anchors, cameramen, and journalists. They all seem really nice and I’m looking forward to working with EVERYONE on this project.

“Okay, so if you could get the winning applications over to me by Friday next week, we can start doing interviews the week after that, so you don’t actually need to come in until we start interviews, other than to drop off those applications.”

We said our goodbyes and I waited for the elevator to close before I started dancing and clapping, I scored the ultimate treasure by getting this job!