The Company Men : Chicago interview?

Chicago interview?

He makes the mistake in thinking it was the upcoming Friday instead of next week's Friday. So what happened to the interview? Did he spend the last few hundred bucks they had on the plane ticket, and couldn't go back the next week or something?

Re: Chicago interview?

I guess so... that's all we could come up with too... but really they wouldn't have done interviews like that... the FIRST interview would have been over the phone....

Re: Chicago interview?

How about this: Bobby was on time, but the Company was playing him.

Just look at his previous "$90K Interview." The HR Guy told him that the job was his, but then (BAM!), won't return his calls as the job is "already filled."

Re: Chicago interview?

I doubt the company was interested after his mix-up. That's how I took it. He knew he blew it.

At first I didn't think it was a big deal, but seeing it from a hiring manager's perspective, it was. You want to hire someone who can handle details. Getting the date of an interview wrong is a pretty rookie mistake to make.

Re: Chicago interview?

I posted this elsewhere. Maybe I missed that part, but I got the idea that the exec just was looking at the wrong Friday on his calendar and the assistant arranged his schedule accordingly. Since there are so many people out there, the point is made, he can't be bothered to fine tune his schedule.

Orrrr...he has to go to Dallas, blows off the interview and leaves the assistant to bluff everything off.

Re: Chicago interview?

Having worked in recruitment for several years I can confidently say it was much more likely that the hiring manager had got the dates wrong and that was certainly my assumption when watching this.

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I also thought that was a weird loose end.

I guess we were supposed to assume that he couldn't afford to come back. That seems awfully strange: the upside of actually getting a job would justify doing whatever necessary to get the few hundred bucks to pay for a plane ticket.

Re: Chicago interview?

The point of the scene is the whole unemployment situation is taking its toll on him. It's one mishaps after another. He can't catch a break.

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Re: Chicago interview?

I agree with many of the suggestions here ... that he was worn down from not having been able to catch a break, etc. I did feel that he must have felt really stupid and almost as if he had had a senior moment to have shown up on the wrong day. The hiring manager playing him would be beyond comprehension.

Plus, working for his brother-in-law might have opened his eyes to what was really important in life, such as spending time and interacting with his family. Of course, he ends up in a professional job but it's serendipitous that he had had that bridge of the construction job so he could be available for Gene's new company, not that he couldn't have jumped hsip to it anyway but Chicago was far from home.

Re: Chicago interview?

I know that it's easy to say this after the fact, but when you're interviewing for jobs where you have to travel a great deal for them, it's not a bad idea to call a few days ahead of time to confirm the appointment. Although, something that was unusual was that usually in that kind of situation, the company would have flown him in and taken care of his accommodations. It was pretty bush league that they made him pay for everything out of pocket.

Re: Chicago interview?

You're absolutely right. I don't know why I didn't think of that. A company would have to have people desperate to work for it for them to expect people to pay to go see them, and if it was that good a company not paying for someone's travel would probably be beneath them.

Re: Chicago interview?

If it's a position high up enough to justify switching cities (you're not going to move to a different time zone to be a fry cook) the company can justify shelling out $1,000 for their travel and lodging.

Re: Chicago interview?

This was one part of the movie that did not like. It was a bit contrived in order to guide the character back to Boston.

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Re: Chicago interview?

This scene really got to me as a similar thing once happened to me. 12 years ago, my first wife and I were divorcing and I was seriously considering relocating and starting anew in another city and I was in New York.

An opportunity came up with a firm in Washington, D.C. I knew someone there who recommended me for a position. The human resources director called me and conducted a phone interview. After that, he asked me to complete an in-person interview in Washington. We worked out a date and he e-mailed me the confirmation.

The interview was to take place on a Friday. Just like in the move, I flew down the night before and stayed overnight. I got to the firm as scheduled. I sat there for half an hour. I figured correctly that there was an issue since I was sitting there for so long.

Finally, someone appeared and it wasn’t the manager I spoke to. It was his assistant who told me that they had me scheduled for the following Tuesday.

It turned out that they needed to change the date as the HR manager needed to be out of town when we were supposed to meet but no one bothered to tell me. This was the responsibility of the assistant that came out. She said that she was supposed to call me but forgot to do so. She even thought it was funny but her grin disappeared when I told her that I had flown in for the interview and also stayed overnight.

She shrugged her shoulders and said that she would have the HR manager call me. No apology or anything! I asked her what I was supposed to do now and all she said is that they would have to reschedule and she quickly walked away.

I didn’t hear back from the HR manager until the following Wednesday despite a call to him that Monday and two e-mail messages. He ignored the mess up and said that he still wanted to me come down. I was pretty annoyed with his firm’s actions and said that his firm would have to pay for a plane ticket as I had incurred nearly $500 of expenses for an interview that never took place.

He was surprised by this and said that it was not his firm’s policy to pay for such things. In response, I declined the interview. It was clear that these guys were clueless and not the kind of place that I would want to work for. I e-mailed him receipts for my flight and hotel expenses and asked for reimbursement due to his failure to timely reschedule the interview. No response…

Because of my experience, I can certainly sympathize with Affleck’s character. You think you have a wonderful opportunity only to be shot down. I took my experience as a sign that I was taking a risk and decided to stay where I was. Smart move as I remain there today…

Re: Chicago interview?

I've worked in government my entire adult life which makes me a leech in the eyes of some. In my younger days I was U.S. Army (Army National Guard and Regular Army 1986-2000) and now local law enforcement since 2000.

I never cease to be amazed at the vast amount of wealth the private sector possess and how freely it will spend it - at times. I know it's popular to make jokes about government employees and there is a lot of waste in government, but the private sector isn't necessarily a model of efficiency either. I liked how this movie shows big corporations spending loads of money on such things as $500 lunches, taking a corporate jet for a weekend in Florida and building an entire floor of an office building for just five executives and their gym. Now I learn that in many cases (though not all) companies will reimburse somebody who comes in for an interview. Wow.

When I was interviewing and testing for police departments I covered hundreds of miles and stayed in motel rooms and ate (cheap) restaurant food. I wasn't reimbursed. Now ,in the interest of fairness, I was able to claim the expenses on my taxes, but I honestly had no idea that some interviewees are reimbursed. Amazing.

At times I feel like I really went the wrong route. However during the worse of the recent recession I kept my job while many in the private sector did not. I did not get a pay raise for a few years and my agency had to make do with a shrunken budget, but I still had a paycheck and our benefits were not cut. Call it a tradeoff.

I thought it was a good movie. Very interesting. I know it was presenting a slanted view point, but still interesting.

Re: Chicago interview?

and, Jefbecco, you have an honorable job. You can sleep well at night!



Love me some Waltons

Re: Chicago interview?

Thank you. Lately it's been pretty popular to beat on police. Nice to know that not everybody considers us murderers and participants in genocide.

Re: Chicago interview?

Ha ha. Well you know what they say, people will hate the cops until they need them!! Take care and "be careful out there."



Love me some Waltons

Re: Chicago interview?

Yeah, that whole thing was poorly done. A company that has a Boston office, (that's where the job was to be), but needs you to come to the Chicago office for your interview would be paying to fly you in and putting you up in a decent hotel. Or as others have said, there might be a phone interview first. So there'd be no confusion or showing up a week early.

But if we just go with the movie, then maybe a job candidate showing up a week early for an interview might indicate a lack of attention to detail, and may disqualify him.

Re: Chicago interview?

I don't think Bob screwed up on this one. He may have been tired, but he probably got the timing right. It should have been made clear in the film (although the director wanted perhaps to convey the feeling of confusion that Bob got until he checked his notes). The exec who promised him the interview was just reckless, and had to be in Dallas that day, too bad for job interview. Happens all the time. Not everybody is a nice, fact checking person, the biggest a...holes are getting the best jobs because of what they are, and that is what their companies need. And a..holes' secretaries are the same, they just behave as the boss does. Of course not all companies are dysfunctional, many are still behaving decently. But the codes of courtesy and decency have completely broken down in recent years. Paying someone to come to an interview ?? No longer done my friend. So many people out there, hungry for any job at any cost, that no one cares if you flew from the other end of he world.
Personnally I did pay once for a plane ticket from France to Canada to get a job (company paid the hotel), on the strength of a phone call. But it was a decent company, recommended by a friend, and I got a four year well paid job out of it (which I quit, I did not get fired).

Re: Chicago interview?

This is yet another major flaw in the film. Putting asside the interview date mix up. A company will pay the expenses related to the interview. In fact, in my case, HR always reserved the airline ticket hotel room if needed. So, there was no chance for such an interview schedule mix up. For a short trip from Boston the Chicago, it would not be unusual to fly the interviewee in and back home the same day.
This film wants to make certain points but fails to make them in a realistic way.
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