The actual title was inspired from an interview I saw a little while ago with
Kevin Hart where he said something like "All you see is the million yes's
that I get but no one sees the million no's I had until I got someone to say
yes" and that always resonated with me because it really describes the
marching through the snow era I had when I was 18 and going for my first role.
One thing that was a very challenging obstacle for me was my age, as the
response I got was that an 18 year old wasn't serious enough for the role which
I was applying for as oppose to someone who was older that had more
responsibilities than an 18 year old would, as well as the gap in experience
and knowledge to fill the role.
It's interesting to think about those times as when I look at an 18 year old
these days and I actually see how young they really are, how young I was when I
was travelling damn near across the whole of London for interviews and people
could not believe I was there interviewing for a full time role they assumed work
experience or some other reason.
I was so hungry back then I was doing literally 2-3 interviews in one day just
so I could land my first role. Did I hear a Million No's? Absolutely! But at
that time, I actually didn't care. I had almost become immune to it after a certain
amount. It can be discouraging to always hear “no” especially when you really
give a great interview but someone else was just that much better....you have
to keep pushing. The moment you quit looking, stop looking, start caring about
being told No or understanding your competition, goal or objective....that is
when you are really telling yourself No!
The below sections and benefits of my experience aren't about how to perform an
interview but more on controlling your persistence. Your self-motivation should
want to keep your eye on the prize...that Number One objective which is landing
that role! These were the points and experience that helped me when I was first
going through this obstacle.
Travelling
I didn't care where the role was or how unrealistic the travel was because
where I may have not gained the role, I gained experience. Anything you go
through yourself on no matter the outcome is still experience gained.
Me travelling further distances made me learn
routes & get familiar with different places to get to certain areas which
were handy if any roles came back around that side. I gained experience from
knowing the organization, researching what the company was about and how my
role would contribute towards the business as well as experience of the
interview meeting new people understanding their requirements and them
understanding what you can bring to the table and how you will be a perfect
fit. Each of these experiences contribute to your resilience and hope towards
securing your role. Even more advantage these days as when I did this I had to
use the A-Z or print out a map and work out the route before Google maps was
able to locate you 😀
Deal
with Million No's
This will more than likely happen. Typically takes the first No you receive for
you to start on your mission of resilience to it. When I say the “No's” don't
mean anything to me I don't mean just accept it and ignore feedback as such but
more that a “No” means not right now. As stated before every interview is an
experience you go through
When I was doing multiple interviews in one day it's even more impactful when
you hear multiple No's for each role. If this mission was easy everybody would
do it but it's also a test to see how serious you are about this and what your
dedication is to what you are looking to do. I remember another quote from a
rapper name Derez DeShon who said something like "When you get to the
point where you're like I don't want to do this no more, and then you push on
that's when you start to succeed with it" which was very true for me which
I will come back to later on.
Feedback
and No Feedback
Now I find when you are starting out some feedback
is no feedback at all where it doesn't actually help you and overall makes your
task even more frustrating because you don't know either where you went wrong
or why you didn't get the job.
Whether feedback is either vague or dismissive, it’s
the perfect time to build thicker skin when it comes to hearing bad news such
as this. I felt at the time the worst ones are ones which were either false
hope or adding salt to the wound where someone says "It was extremely
close between you and another candidate" or "We wanted to take you
both on" or "Please keep in touch with us as we are still interested
in him/her in the future" which to someone who is young or looking for
their first role is kind of a wind up as for all the million times I heard this
I'm afraid to say that nobody actually kept their word to none of them. The
positive thing I can say is feedback like that means you are getting really
close. But in actuality it's never what we want to hear not at those times. I
was told "Eventually someone is going to say Yes. Every time you hear you
came second or close someone will say Yes and the other person would have come
close"
Sharpen
Your Sword
Your technical knowledge is your sword, your
discipline your technique (talking martial arts hear now 😀)
Starting out you will get technical questions to
see how strong you are, generally questions which you should know, some which
they wouldn't expect and a couple which they know you wouldn't get and this is
where you want to aim!
I wanted to cover every and any base and some of
the stuff I knew no one could even believe I got right especially at 18/19 with
little experience. Your hunger is really displayed at this point but that's not
the only part of it, your sword has to be sharpened on two sides. One side is
technical knowledge whilst the other is your experience of all of the one
billion interviews you already had. A lot of people use words or phrases like I
have the passion, drive, focus etc but these are all emotionally driven. In my
opinion these are verbs not adjectives. The million No's, knowledge build your
sharpen sword and this alone shows you have all of those as you wouldn't be
sitting there in that interview for the millionth time if you weren’t!
Something is keeping your persistent!
Remember
it's Two Ways
This is something I also need to tell myself! This was something I had to eventually
understand as my eagerness would have put me in positions I may have not wanted
to do but I wanted the experience at almost any cost.
For example, I had an interview for a role in which
the requirement was to work a night shift something like 8pm until 8am and I
was totally fine with this (well actually I didn't care and was like ok) and I
actually had this role in the bag, then he said I was going to meet his boss
because he was happy with me taking the role. The boss saw me for a few minutes
that was it. Next day I heard I didn't get the role and I went ballistic! The
reason I wasn't given the role was because I was too young! Funny thing was that
I was actually too young to understand why I didn't get the job because of that
lol the point is don't let your eagerness set you up for anything just because
you want that first role so badly as you could get taken advantage of., and in that
situation in hindsight they really saved me from myself.
How
this all helped me
To go back to the point of the quote where you have to feel like you don't want
to do this anymore, I did!
I had an interview at (won't say where unless people really really ask) and I
destroyed the interview, technically and all the competency based questions and
I was ready for everything they had and there was some stiff competition.
A couple of days later I heard the dreaded "Unfortunately it's a No on
this occasion but you were so close they wanted both of you and wanted to
create a position for you and they still are trying to". Now I knew this
wasn't true, but I thought I would give them the benefit of the doubt and chase
them on this.... until they no longer responded...
This was the point where I was at a breaking point and I was feeling like I
didn't want to keep doing this anymore. But the energy you develop when you are
at this point is tremendous, it's like you build a euphoric state of I don't
give a damn-ness! It's tough to push on after...but that's what separates the
people that are successful and the people that are not.
So...I had a string of interviews don't remember specifically the order but I
had to attend mass meetings where everyone took a technical test, multiple
telephone and face to face interviews etc I did approximately 5 in a week. And
that's another point...see if you are being invited to so many interviews there
is definitely a demand and interest in you! But again, still not what you want
to hear and may most likely never look at it that way until later on.
So it went for about a week or two where I heard absolutely nothing...at this
time I was advised (forced by my mum 😊) to perhaps
take a little break just to review my CV, active job boards and then the
unexpected came....I had received the ultimate "Yes"!
The feeling of that moment……priceless!
Finally, I had done it. Then shortly after that I
had feedback from another place for a second interview! Whilst I completed that
after a tough interview but since I had another offer I had a lot more
confidence, like scoring a goal in football then think I can play for
Manchester United!
I was asked when I wanted a decision and it
literally jumped out of me to say today! Funny thing was I was chased by the
agency for this role for a few days to take the interview but I reached a point
where I wanted to take a break from it after multiple No's. Then whilst that
happened the many many interviews I did in the past had started coming as
offers, and another one and another one......I had 5 offers in total to choose
from!!!
For once I was the guy who was just slightly better or 1st place for a change.
Even felt guilty when I had to let roles down.
And this was my experience of turning a Million No's into a yes. What would be the
next logical step after this? Perhaps maintaining a Million Yes’s 😊
