How I Socially Engineered a Job

by Oddacon T. Ripper

I'll make this short because it shouldn't be long, boring, and drawn out.

So basically one unemployed morning, I was awoken by my cell phone ringing and bothering me at some ungodly hour (9 a.m.).

I had been using my phone as an alarm clock.  Hey, when you're unemployed, you have to improvise when needed.  "When needed" means "not enough money."  So not being used to being my own secretary, I had answered like a complete fool, or at least almost a complete fool.

When the phone rang, I expected some phone solicitor.  Honestly, I had no idea who it was or what was going on.  "Hello, this is so and so with so and so company.  We would like to talk to you about so and so position" and so on.

Really, I was just confused and becoming irate at this point.  I might have thought it was still a phone solicitor, so I just told them off.  "Cram it up yer wazoo!!" I yelled, sort of.  Basically, I just hung up and went on sleeping.

Later that day (after I had coffee), I realized it was this company I had been trying to get an interview with!  And since I had already gone off and acted like a complete idiot, I thought there was no way I was going to get on the good side of those cats over in HR, ever!  So I began to do what any hacker would do: think of a solution to the problem.

It didn't take long before it hit me.  I would leave a voice message and make it sound like I had not been introduced before - making it seem like I had not been called back by HR.  Like I was a new candidate or someone they had not yet called back.  It was perfect.  I called and left the recording.  I made it real clear in my voice that I had not been "pre-screened" or whatever.

I forget the exact wording I used, but you know how those interview processes work and those dime-a-dozen terms they use for new employees.  I used words like that and tried to make it sound like I was right for the position they were hiring for.

After I felt like I had done a spot-on job with my message, I hung up.  Now I just had to hope that the people in HR would come across my message.  I thought one of two possibilities would play out: they would remember my name, my number, and possibly my rude attitude that I had exhibited over the phone earlier that morning, or hopefully the HR people would simply think they had not yet contacted me, which is what I was shooting for.

Since I already knew I was a shoo-out (Get it?  The opposite of shoo-in), what with the rude words, I just hoped that this message I left sounded like I had not been contacted and would lure HR into a second callback.

Sure enough, it worked!  A few hours went by and sometime that afternoon I got a call back from the same lady in HR!  She wanted to know if I was able to schedule a time for an interview.  It was funny, I don't think she even recognized my voice.  The rest is history.  They hired me, unbeknownst of my rude attitude on the telephone!

Lesson here is don't answer your phone before you've had your coffee!