As I've worked as a IT Infrstructure Consultant for over 10 years, I've interviwed with literally hundreds of companies to experience from the best to the worst experience in dealing with people.

Among those, only once in a while, I ran into a special case which turned out to be unexpected from the beginning of the process.

It was in 2002 when I interviwed for 6-month long contract position as a data center tech support for this mid-sized company in Santa Clara. The configuration of their system was exactly like the one I had a couple of projects back.

And I fit into what they were looking for except for the compensation rate, which I was willing to lower it as the project itself is interesting and that project leaves me enough secured free time for me to work on other projects.

As it was the time of the collapsing of internet bubble, when companies were laying off thousands of employees in Silicon Valley, the competition for each open slot was fierce.

The two interviews I had with them were great although I felt a bit of sourness on their side.

Anyway I didn't get that position, and they explained me that they hired other candidate as he lived 3 minute drive away from the data center compared to my 10-minute driving, not because he asked for half the rate I asked for. Although they really like me with my skills set and interpersonal skills, they told me they had to consider the quick response time to their data center.

I found it ludicrous for saying that as they could have rejected me for whatever the other reasons were. In case of system failures, 5 or 10 minutes won't make a difference unless it's 30 minutes or so.

For a couple of years, it stayed as one of bad experiences in companies I've dealt with.

Last year, about two years after I interviewed with them, they contacted me for their new project which required me to manage their systems remotely without being resided in Silicon Valley at all.

At first I was surprised that they contacted me again for the job interview which occurred two year before, and that they remembered me clearly on my skills set. As I was on the project at the time and was about to start the new one soon, I told them kindly that I could not take that offer. I explained in details from my heart that how much I appreciated their consideration and what would happen to me later on for new projects.

That was the period when I spent 2 months in Asia and one month in Los Angeles to execute projects and I had to be on a regular basis, which made me difficult to commit long term project.

That interview became one of the best job interviews I've had although I was not able to take the project.

They contacted me again about a month ago, for a new position as they expanded. As I've decided to have multiple short-term projects rather than one long term project, I decided not to consider that opportunity at all, although the nature of it was what I was looking for.

They told me if I was not interested in it, they would advertise to collect resumes and I told them I would refer my ex-colleagues if they were interested in it.

At first, I thought I made a bad impression on interviewers assuming that's why I didn't get that job. And they were quite impressed with me during the interview, and contacted me for their new openings in similar role in the company over the years.

You don't know what's gonna happen later on between you and a person you just ran into. Life is a lief-long marathon where you have to be good all the time.

(June 14, 2005)

Copyright© 2005 Daniel SW Kim