The Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Interview

[JuneSw]

Antisocial_Worker,
I'm a long time reader, but had to join to help. I am a social worker too (bsw and MSW). I interned and then worked for CPS equivalent in my state. I have a few thoughts: this is NOT about you. This is about him. I'm not sure where you are, but in my state you do not have to have a SW degree to work for CPS. If its the same where you live, I will bet that he feels inferior to your degree and training. I spent a lot of time in my job advocating for my clients and describing their motivations and behaviors to non SWers, including my boss and her boss. He feels that you will show him up in this role. I would still follow up,with your placement professor and try to get them to advocate for you. When I did both my internships, the interviews were merely formalities, the professor matched you beforehand.
Please let me know if there's any other info I can help with. It takes a special person to do that job and there are many rewards. I personally became too frustrated with the bureaucracy of my agency and left several years ago, but the lessons I learned are still helpful today.

You will find the right fit. If CPS doesn't work out, look at this as an opportunity to get out of your.comfort zone. That's what happened to me at the MSW level, and I am grateful still.

And advanced standing is only one year

[Moirae]

I know how you feel. I've been feeling the same way for 6 months. I feel like dirt and I feel like just giving up. No words of great wisdom here, just the knowledge that you are not alone and I wish I knew how to help.

[Shyla]

This was NOT a normal interview. The feedback he gave you is creepy and inappropriate. Definitely report this to your professor/advisor/internship supervisor. They need to know what students could run into.

I don't think anyone bothers to study social work without caring about others. You don't go into it for the money.

I don't know which area you should work in but a couple of lesser known options. Dialysis centers use social workers. (Yes it's mostly old people not kids.) Children's hospitals have a group called Child Life. They have various responsibilities and really make a difference.

[Mikkel]

I don't know what was wrong with that interviewer but my impression of you through those many years both here and on Fratching does not match his in any way. In other words he is wrong about you!

[NotMyProblem]

Antisocial_Worker,

I hope you continue to believe in yourself, have faith in yourself.

You have made a huge difference here, just by being you.

The career you are starting will make a huge impact on so many lives. I admire that you are pursuing this. Never once did I get an uh-oh feeling when you first mentioned this career change. Or when you shared stories on your path to get closer.

When fears and doubts start to overwhelm you, please do something unexpected that works for you to shake them off.

Lately, with how things have gotten at work, I often need a smile. So I lift my arms and say "WHEEEEEEE!!!!" while walking back to my cubicle. Doing this continues to put a smile on my face. And on my coworkers faces....

I shall strive to remember to do this also when I'm at home...

[Antisocial_Worker]

An update of sorts...

Last week in class, we had a guest speaker who worked at the same department and at the same level as the interviewer. I figured that as the bridge was already burning after that godawful interview, I might as well blow it up.

So I told her what I thought about the whole situation, what he said, how I took it, and how it especially infuriated me to be told I needed to look for a place with lower standards and to moderate my approach for the women because, as I said to the guest speaker, "apparently you're all quite delicate." I told her I don't deal well with passive aggression or backhanded compliments, but it was only afterward that I realized that if passive aggression and backhanded compliments are never appropriate with your clients, they are not appropriate with your interviewees either. You should at least afford your interviewees the same courtesies you would extend to your clients.

It all became pretty animated, which drew the attention of our substitute teacher for that class that night... who happened to be the head of the program at my university. She confirmed that my approach was "offputting" although in her parlance she meant abrasive. She clarified it by saying that people who do not know me do not see my depth or compassion, but that because she knows me she knows "how awesome you are!" Then she noted that people still talk about my actions at National Association of Social Workers Advocacy Day down in the state capital, when I went after lawmakers and got in their faces with no hesitation whatsoever. At NASW Advocacy Day, I told legislators exactly what I thought about their policies and about the impact those policies were going to have, and I let them have it with both barrels. I advocated so well, in fact, that people were saying I should make it a career.

None of which does me any good now, though. Shortly after all of this, I received an email from my professor in charge of placement and we're going to have a meeting this week to discuss things. I hope I haven't screwed anything up by speaking my mind, but I'm too tired and too old to hold back anymore. Holding back is bullshit and I don't have time for that anymore. The interviewer at DSS couldn't see it, and I couldn't see the dance I'm apparently supposed to do to charm him.

Fuck that. I'm too fat to dance anyway.

[Teysa]

It sounds like you might be being dragged kicking and screaming into another direction. My dad spent years working for the state of Oklahoma as an advocate for the intellectually impaired. That's not the only group that needs advocates. There are plenty of people out there who don't have a voice for whatever reason. Perhaps you've been given the ability to speak for them.

As for the upcoming interview, I wish you luck. Hopefully, it won't be as bad as you seem to think it will be.

[Gizmo]

Honestly? That sounds like more open progress by actually getting the attention of the people involved and them realising that their attitudes are annoying to people like you that work damn hard and get treated like that in an interview. May not get you much mileage of your own but if they treat one person differently in the future because of it then it was worth it.

Hugs. I hope something good comes out of it for you too.

[Seshat]

Anti, dear, I'd hire you as an advocate for my family! Well, I would if I could afford to.

There is a world of need out there, and you have the brains and the compassion to handle that need. You have the strength to stand up to a kid who's on the path to becoming a murderer and direct him to something that suits his individual personality, and the gentleness to sit with someone newly bereaved and offer tissues and a warm shoulder while monitoring them to be sure grief isn't twisting to depression.

It might be that your core skillset is getting in the faces of the people who assign research grants (long-term treatment - ie, finding cures), medical budgets (current treatment), support budgets (eg providing assistive technology, providing carers) and pensions.

It may be that you're better at administering a group of SWs and providing them with resources and support, than at personally going out there and tending to individual clients.

You'll find a place in the field where you fit. When you told us you were going into the field, I was pleased. It's a place with a lot of need; and there's so much need that there will be an Anti-social-worker shaped hole someplace.


Edit to add:

I almost wish this community could afford to pay you. There are enough of us who are struggling for whatever reason to provide you with plenty of genuinely-necessary work!

[Antisocial_Worker]

Thanks for the kind words, especially yours, Seshat.

As it turned out, my meeting with my professor is this week, not last week, although I did get to speak to my placement professor when I went up there on the wrong day. I told her much of what I've said here, and asked if I was going to be pitched out of the program. I was worrying about that because I had been told by email that in addition to my placement professor, my academic adviser and the director of the program would be sitting in as well. Quite intimidating.

However, she said that they're all there to support me and that my next stop on the internship train will be a family justice center, which is a one-stop shopping concept for victims of child and spousal abuse and other similar crimes. Rather than bounce all over town to various agencies such as DSS and the police department, the health department, and everywhere else, you just go to the FJC and that's that. My state is trying to open an FJC in most, if not all counties whereas just a few years ago there were only a handful in the country. The one in the urban county where I live is not up and running yet, but one in a neighboring county is and that's where I'd be going.

So we'll see...