I just had to share about something that happened today that is definitely a gift of the AA program!
I'm interviewing for jobs. I'm a transactional lawyer, and I got laid off a few months ago so I do LOTS of interviews (getting pretty good at it, actually!). Anyway, today I had a phone interview. Blah blah blah, we talk about the position, then the interviewer asks me what my salary expectations are.
It's a standard question, but Negotiations 101 is that whoever throws out a number first loses. So I give her my standard answer, which I assume she's heard a hundred times... "Getting the right fit is more important to me than compensation, I've been interviewing for similar positions and my expectations are in line with the market, what range did you have in mind?"
In my experience, her standard response would be something like, "We haven't quite pinned down the numbers yet, what were you making in your last position," etc. But instead she completely flew off the handle! She got emotional and was like, "NO NO NO, that is NOT how it works, I'm not telling you what my range is unless you tell me what you're expecting! I'm the one who will decide what you make and I need to make sure I'm not mis-setting expectations!!!" She went on. It was really weird. I was taken aback -- it was so unprofessional. Further, she's interviewing for a corporate attorney position -- negotiating skills should be the #1 thing she is looking for. If I walked right into it and gave a naive response, she shouldn't want to hire me anyway.
But instead of reacting, I just let her finish and then calmly responded, "Well as I said, I've been interviewing for positions at similarly-sized companies and I generally see salaries falling between X and X" (gave a huge range). She then calmed down and the conversation went back to (mostly) normal.
That kind of take-a-step-back, calm response would have been very difficult for me before I got sober. I am so grateful to be part of a program that helps me deal with life in a much more productive and less stressful way.
Awesome...good for you! I covet those situations when I can pull that off. They are becoming more frequent, but for me it's been a long time coming. I credit the improvement and progress to my finely-tuned medication...made a HUGE difference my ability to "practice the principles" and be less reactive, to be able to step-back and respond calmly.
TwelveSteps, I like this story. THanks for sharing. I am new to this (especially the online thing). I have been struggling lately to keep my cool with some specific people (mainly family) So your story gives me hope. Ill keep practicing. God bless.
