Worst job interview ever... funny.

[MIcrunchyRN]

Ok I had to share this...

So I had just graduated nursing school and got my first job interview at UofM on their oncology floor. I was so excited to have a job at the place I wanted to work for so long (not necessarily oncology but at UofM).

The interview was a 3 part interview and it was long. First a 3 hour job shadow of the floor to see patient ratios, the floor meet some staff etc. Then an interview with 3 or 4 staff members (my mind is still fuzzy) and then another interview with 2 managers.

So if the long day wasn't enough to scare the crap out of me, I had quite a drive ahead of me to be there at 7am. I was also 21 or 22 weeks pregnant with baby number 2. I ate a decent breakfast in the car (McDonalds and I brought a fruit smoothly with me). LOL or so I thought.

I arrived and listened to report and began the job shadow. About 2 hours into the 3 hour shadow I was in a patient's room with the RN and she was doing an assessment (no biggie right?) All of a sudden I got really hot, and felt my heart racing so I decided I'd step in the hallway to cool off, totally oblivious to the what was going on.

One step out the door I began stumbing to find the wall...then it dawned on me the floor is going to hit me really fast and hard if I dont sit down. I sat down on the floor...everything goes blank. LOL yup you guessed it... passed out.

There was no reasoning behind why I passed out. Blood sugar was good, HR was fast but that's normal, all other vitals were great. Nerves? Who knows lol.

After an hour of sitting with the 3 PA's on the floor I was allowed to continue with my interviews. (LOL 2 of the 3 PA's watched me go lights out).

I then did the interview with the nurses... everyone knew except one. The question "How do you handle stress?" was filled with a chuckle in the room about me passing out on the floor. I had the interview with the managers but was so tired and still quite fuzzy that I hardly remember it.

I can only imagine there is a running joke on that unit whenever someone new is doing an interview... "Couldn't be worse than that one girl who passed out :chuckle"

LOL no I didn't get the job... I think I would have been too embarrased to show my face back there. Anyways I had to share... who seriously does that? At least if it had been nurse messing with a bunch of blood or something gorey I would have had an excuse lol... I'm the girl who passes out to the RN listening to the patient's lung sounds. :chuckle

[lamazeteacher]

I told the expectant fathers in my Lamaze classes to do the breathing techniques immediately if they feel dizzy or out of it. I said that L&D nurses still claim that they faint, and I wanted them to make that a myth......

It's lack of oxygen to the brain that can cause syncope, as the body has to render someone unconscious when the CO2 level rises, so they'll breathe. Usually stress precipitates that, and watching something momentous causes breath holding.

I've found the techniques work well during interviews, too.

I messed one up bigtime once, when I went to it while I had the flu, a few decades ago. I explained to the interviewer that I wasn't myself, as I'd been sick - and fell asleep when they talked about their facility interminably. I didn't get that job (can't remember what it was - I was asleep). :smackingf

[Perpetual Student]

I once showed up to a unit to discover that the person I was supposed to meet (he educator) wasn't in. She totally forgot about me. I ended up speaking w/ the manager and that went OK but the job ended up going to someone with more acute care experience

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

i once showed up to a unit to discover that the person i was supposed to meet (he educator) wasn't in. she totally forgot about me. i ended up speaking w/ the manager and that went ok but the job ended up going to someone with more acute care experience

i once showed up for an interview, met with the person on the itinerary that i was sent, and had a lovely interview. when i got home, there was a message waiting for me from the head of the department wondering to know where i was for my interview with her. it seems the secretary who scheduled the interviews had screwed up. i ended up going back serveral times to meet with all the people i was supposed to meet with that first day and didn't because i wasn't informed. and then i didn't get the job.

[lamazeteacher]

i ended up going back serveral times to meet with all the people i was supposed to meet with that first day and didn't, because i wasn't informed. and then i didn't get the job.

ruby, i've experienced several worksites that had similar communication problems from the getgo. i did get those jobs and later wished that i hadn't accepted their offers. i was given a start date when i accepted one offer, and when i showed up that morning, no one had been told that i was to begin work that day, and the person who offered me the job was out of the office for several days. so i went to the other person who had been at the interview, he laughed and said, "well, we told you this would require your own initiative". there was no paper work for a new employee to complete, so i asked people if i could "shadow" them, to get an idea of what they did. most of them kindly let me do that, but not the "initiative" guy.

when the person responsible for hiring me showed uo the last day of the week, he said he hadn't thought that i'd really come that day....... luckily i was able to schedule my own time there, which involved a lot of travel.

so when i eventually left that place, where there was incredible competition for the bosses' attention and approval, i wondered how a future possible employer would look at the reasons for leaving that job (which you're almost always asked on applications).

places like that don't change unless a person is hired to reorganize/manage those offices, which isn't something the people already there, promote.