Fear of being misunderstood
Written on Sunday, February 28, 2010 by Siddharth PV
I am on my way back from Chennai where i had gone for my personal interview for XLRI. As i sit back and think about the interview, i am a little worried the panel might have misunderstood me. I am not so worried about being selected/rejected. Frankly, i am past the stage where i used to think that a degree could make or mar my career. I am sure that mba or no mba, eventually i'll make it good. But being misunderstood surely scares me.
One of the questions where i am afraid i might have been misunderstood is-
Q- So you switched from TCS to irunway.. And your salary jumped by X%.
(he calculated X wrt my current salary.. No wonder X was significantly large)
My Answer- yes sir, but over a period of two years....
Q- So you switched from TCS to irunway.. And your salary jumped by X%.
(he calculated X wrt my current salary.. No wonder X was significantly large)
My Answer- yes sir, but over a period of two years....
And unfortunately this is where i stopped.. Or i guess the topic got changed.. I never explained that my real motivation for moving to iRunway was the profile.. In fact, when i first moved, my salary was nowhere close to my current package. In fact, the cost of staying independently had almost offset the increase in salary and the increment in my monthly take home was hardly anything to write home about.
But the sad part is, i never explained all this. I just said 'it has increased over time'.
Besides, i had also mentioned it amongst my long term objectives that i want to build a strong financial foundation for my family...
Besides, i had also mentioned it amongst my long term objectives that i want to build a strong financial foundation for my family...
Just hope that the panel doesn't (wrongly) put 2 and 2 together and picturize me as a money-crazy guy who's doing his mba to chase a bigger pay package..
This is the problem with short interactions.. You might end up making unfair conclusions about people because you heard only one aspect of the story.. The short interaction did not leave enough time to explore the various layers to the person's answer.
My take away from this episode is-
When you haven't really 'interacted' with someone, you should avoid making any judgements about them. Its important to give people a chance. On the other hand, one must prepare adequately for such interactions. To me, it feels equivalent to faking it (at some level) as you are not being your natural self. But i guess there's no way out..
Posted in
iRunway,
mba,
misunderstanding,
money,
motivation,
passing a judgement,
short interactions,
xlri
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"This is the problem with short interactions.. You might end up making unfair conclusions about people because you heard only one aspect of the story.. The short interaction did not leave enough time to explore the various layers to the person's answer."
May be short interactions are not all that problematic as you think. I personally believe short interactions give you the opportunity to learn what a person true thoughts/opinions.
Given the experience of the interviewer, I'd like to think that he jumped to the right conclusions i.e. he'd have guessed (based on the rest of the interview) that you probably made the switch because the opportunity (inclusive of the $) was very good and that you are still polishing your communication skills :)