The Job-Hunting Update

Well, as I've not really posted for a little while I felt that an update was warranted, this week I've been predominantly focused on job hunting, that most exciting and dramatic of hunts, in pursuit of the most quick-footed and stealthy of prey. Chasing over hedgerows and through open fields, with the quarry always in sight yet never quite within shot.

Anyway, having extended that metaphor for far too long, back to the point. Yesterday I was up in London as I had my first interview per se - it was technically an assessment day, but it was still close enough to an interview to have the general point. The company it was with was TNS, a market research company.

This was actually surprisingly fun. I know that's not the typical word associated with interviews and the like, but it wasn't too bad. There were seven people on the assessment day including myself, and the overall structure was very good and helped everyone relax, feel comfortable and it was a nice atmosphere - one which you'd think that you'd be very happy to work in.

The day included three individual assessments, as well as a group exercise. These were all preceded by an overall presentation providing a summary of what the graduate role was in the company. The first of these assessments was an interview in the more traditional sense, which I did not find went too badly, and was fairly standard - although in hindsight those things never do seem to go well when you look at them, but I was okay with it.

The second exercise was a data analysis one, where you were given data tables and had to interpret the data according to the brief and make recommendations in a brief presentation. This was quite engaging and I found this very interesting as well. It wasn't too bad.

We then had a break for lunch, where we got to talk to current employees who'd entered the company as graduates, and a group exercise before we got back to the final individual assessment. The group exercise was awesome - you had to build a six foot tall tower out of paper, with no other material involved. You were also restricted by time limits in that you had only 30 minutes total, and 6 minutes for the entire building phase. I was one of those in charge of the actual building and it was slightly panicky and took more time than we thought, but in the end we managed to complete the task and our tower made solely of paper stood tall and strong for five minutes and would've stood for longer if we hadn't knocked it down.

The final exercise was a numeracy test, which I found rather comfortable even if having to use a 5,000 year old calculator rather tedious and tiresome. This was one I didn't have any issues with.

Overall I felt I did competently, although whether that is enough to hear back I'm not sure. But I was fairly happy with my performance overall, especially for a first interview.