Sunday, November 06, 2005
I am Iron Man!
I have a key addition to make to the short list of interview advice I posted the other day. One of the things I can’t stand about interviewing is the fact that I have to spend so much time ironing shirts during interview week. I only have a few interview quality shirts and ties (and my second suit is looking a little tired, so only one suit), so I spent a lot of time ironing this past week. Jie and I had an old Black and Decker iron that she picked up in college for pocket change. She had been telling me for a while that we needed a new iron, and an expensive one, but I didn’t really believe it.
Anyway, my average process time for a shirt was 10-15 minutes with our old iron. Someone sent us a coupon for 25% off at Linens and Things, though, so we used that on Friday afternoon to go buy a Rowenta Professional DX-8800. The iron was $75 after the coupon, which is a lot more than I ever thought I would spend on an iron, but good grief was it worth it. Jie offered to break in the new iron to prepare my attire for my final consulting second round interview, and while she finished breakfast I managed to iron a few sleeves just to get a feel for the new purchase. That thing is sweet! It’s like the Porsche of irons, complete with smooth handling, lots of power, and made in Germany. I bet I could iron two shirts in the 15 minutes it used to take me for one!
One final interviewing tidbit: UBS was my hero last year because they did a second round interview in the form of a dinner, which I thought was really cool. No trip to NYC, no stuffy suits, just dinner. This year BCG gets props for holding a second round interview in business casual, though they did schedule me for a Sunday evening at their office in downtown, so I suppose there is a trade-off.
Anyway, my average process time for a shirt was 10-15 minutes with our old iron. Someone sent us a coupon for 25% off at Linens and Things, though, so we used that on Friday afternoon to go buy a Rowenta Professional DX-8800. The iron was $75 after the coupon, which is a lot more than I ever thought I would spend on an iron, but good grief was it worth it. Jie offered to break in the new iron to prepare my attire for my final consulting second round interview, and while she finished breakfast I managed to iron a few sleeves just to get a feel for the new purchase. That thing is sweet! It’s like the Porsche of irons, complete with smooth handling, lots of power, and made in Germany. I bet I could iron two shirts in the 15 minutes it used to take me for one!
One final interviewing tidbit: UBS was my hero last year because they did a second round interview in the form of a dinner, which I thought was really cool. No trip to NYC, no stuffy suits, just dinner. This year BCG gets props for holding a second round interview in business casual, though they did schedule me for a Sunday evening at their office in downtown, so I suppose there is a trade-off.
