Authors: Eleanor Webb
The Job Offer
The Job Offer
By Eleanor Webb
Copyright 2013 as "The Job
Offer of a Lifetime" by Eleanor Webb
Excerpt from Going for the Gold
copyright 2013 by Eleanor Webb
Cover photo from istockphoto.com
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This work is entirely a work of
fiction. All names, characters, and events are works of the author's
imagination. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is
coincidence. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This
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This book is dedicated to my husband,
David, who has been my best friend since we met years ago. Not only has he
always encouraged me to follow my dreams, he had also been a helpmate giving me
the time to follow them.
1
"Thank you
for your interest in Stanford Enterprises, Dr. Conner. Your resume is
excellent, and we have been impressed with what we have seen and heard in your
first two Skype interviews. If you are still interested in Stanford
Enterprises, I would like to, at this time, schedule your next interview with
us. As you know, the next phase of the interview process will be for you to
meet with us in person here at our headquarters for an interview with Mr.
Winfield, Vice President of Engineering, Dr. Rudolph, Vice President of
Research and Development, and Ms. Tomlinson, our Human Resources director. If
we would like to call you back for a final interview, you would meet with them
again. Mr. Stanford will also be there. Stanford Enterprises will cover the
cost of your airfare, of course. Interviews will begin on June tenth. Will
you be able to fly in on the morning of the tenth? I can reserve a seat for
you on American Airlines Flight 691. Dr. Conner?"
"I'm still here, Ms. Iverson. Let
me check my calendar, please. It will be just a moment." Dr. Jane Anne Conner
put the call on hold, waited several seconds, and then pressed the
"Hold" button once again. "Yes. The tenth will be just fine.
What time is the flight scheduled to leave Boston?" Anne asked the Stanford
Enterprises hiring representative using her best professional voice. At least,
she hoped she came across that way. Anne was far too excited about making it
into this next round of interviews, and her voice tended to rise when she was
excited. Looking down at her computer tablet, she pulled up the calendar app
and blocked out the full day for the tenth of next month. She already knew the
day was free; therefore, there was no need to check it. It was nice to finally
be able to put something in it
"Flight 691 is scheduled to leave
Logan International from the main terminal at 6:40 am Eastern time and will
land at Sea-Tac International at 8:35 am Pacific time at Concourse B," Ms.
Iverson informed Anne stoically. "We will have a car waiting to meet you at
the terminal. Your interview is scheduled at 10:00 in Building One here at our
facility. The interview is expected to last until 11:30 and will be followed
by a brief tour of our campus. Then you will have a few hours to have lunch
and have some time to yourself before the car returns you to the airport again.
Your return flight on American flight 1901 will leave at 3:10 and land in
Boston at 11:05 pm. I will email the flight information to you, and your
ticket to Sea-Tac will be held for you at the American Airlines' counter. The
fourth round of interviews will begin on the eighteenth. I will contact you
again if we decide that we would like you to return for the final interviews
with Mr. Stanford. Do you have any further questions that I can answer about
the next interview, Dr. Conner?"
"No, Ms. Iverson. You’ve been very
helpful. Thank you."
"In that case, good luck, Dr.
Conner. I wish you well."
"Thank you, Ms. Iverson."
Anne Conner, known professionally as Dr.
Jane A. Conner, but called Anne by family and friends, pressed the
"talk" button on her phone to disconnect the call and placed the
handset down on the kitchen table where she sat. She could feel a laugh
bubbling up from her gut, and she let it loose and followed it with a loud
cheer. Then she stood up and danced a happy little jig over to the
refrigerator where she pulled out a bottle of water from the interior. She took
a quick swallow then took a couple of deep breaths to calm her racing
heartbeat. Getting the phone call today was an answer to her prayers.
Her latest consulting contract job ended
that Friday just before the Memorial Day weekend, and she did not have another
one lined up. The adjunct courses she taught at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology finished up two weeks ago, and no courses in her field of study were
being taught over the summer break. Thinking about what she had still left in
savings, she estimated that the longest she could go between pay checks was four
months. After that she would need to ask her father for the money, and she was
determined never to do that.
The interview on the tenth of next month
came at a perfect time, giving her a little over two weeks to prepare. She
intended to "wow" the interviewers, to quote her friend Carla, with
her knowledge of marine biochemical and oceanographic research, experience in
lab and field studies, and personality. Anne really wanted this job. She wanted
something permanent to replace the uncertainty of the consulting jobs and the
adjunct work she was doing since she became unemployed when her old company closed
its doors over a year ago. She also wanted the job because it would take her
back to Washington State working for a company that had built a solid
reputation in biochemical research over the last thirty years and in her area
of specialty in the past ten years. As much as she liked the Boston area, she
was ready to go home.
Carla talked to her about coming back to
Seattle to interview for the position with Stanford Enterprises. Carla's
brother-in-law worked for the company as head of their Information Technology
department, and he put in a good recommendation for Anne for the open research
scientist position in their Marine Biochemical Research department. It was
over four months ago when Anne first submitted her résumé to the hiring manager
of the Human Resources department. Just as she did with so many other companies
she sent resumes to over the past year, she gave up hope of a call for an
interview when the months went by without a response. But then out of the
blue, she was called for the first Skype interview two weeks ago.
Thinking of Carla, Anne looked at her
kitchen clock and noted the time. It was a little after six in Boston, and Carla
lived in Seattle. With the time difference, she would not be able to call
Carla with the news that she would be coming out for an interview for at least
another three hours. She could text her, though. Taking her bottle of water
and the salad that she ordered from the deli down the block from the table,
Anne went into the living room of her Cambridge apartment to eat and watch the
evening news. She saw her smart phone sitting on the coffee table next to her
purse, picked it up, and sent Carla a text message to let her know that she
would be calling her later in the evening.
* * * * *
"Oh, that's great, Anne,"
Carla said excitedly from her end of the phone when Anne told her later about
making it to the third round of interviews. "I'll be crossing my fingers
for you."
"I'll be crossing my fingers, too. I
imagine there are a number of applicants they will still need to interview at
this stage of the process. I've been doing my homework on the company, Carla, and
I intend to get this job. I've liked what I learned so far about the company. It
was started thirty-five years ago by Benjamin Stanford, Jr. to research and
manufacture environmentally friendly cleaning agents to be used in the
manufacturing process. Then, when he died, his widow ran it for a number of
years before their son, Benjamin Stanford III, took over twelve years ago.
Since then, the son added the researching of biochemical solutions for sea and
fresh water cleanups. With my background in oceanography and biochemistry, and
with my experience in researching solutions to reduce the effects of chlorine
on sea water, I think that I would be a good fit. I really want this, Carla.
I want it so much I can taste it."
"Yah, you deserve it. You've
worked hard enough over the past seven years at distinguishing yourself. You
work on saving the planet, girl, and I'll work on feeding it," Carla
laughed at her regular joke. How the two of them became friends and stayed
that way since elementary school was a mystery, at times, to Anne. They had
such different personalities. Anne was always the analytical scientist who
approached things logically, and Carla was the free spirit who loved to cook. Carla's
love of cooking eventually led her to her current career as one of the up and
coming in-demand caterers in the Seattle area. Anne thought for the hundredth
time that Carla was a lot like Anne's mother and that was why they got along as
well as they did.
"Are you going to see your mom and
Jim while you are here?" Carla asked as if she had been reading Anne's
mind.
"I planned on calling her to let
her know about the interview, but I'll only be in town for a few hours that day.
Orcas Island is too far from Seattle for me to go up and see them, and with
this being the beginning of their summer season, they will not be able to get
away from the inn to meet me in Seattle."
Anne and Carla grew up on Orcas Island,
part of the San Juan Island chain, in Eastsound Village. Anne's mother and
stepfather, Jim, owned and ran the Eagle's Nest Inn on the north shore of the
island. They bought the fishing lodge and resort when Anne was a toddler and
over the years developed it into one of the premier luxury inns and vacation
resorts in the San Juan Islands. Carla's parents owned the local bakery that
still supplied the inn and the local community with the best in baked goods and
desserts.
"Maybe you should just plan on
staying with them for the week until you find out if you will be called in for the
next round of interviews. Your parents would love to have you up there for the
week. Then, when you get called back again to Seattle, and I know you will,
you can drive down instead of fly. You don't have a consulting job lined up
that you need to get back to Massachusetts, do you?"
"I hadn't thought of that. Mom and
dad would like to see me. She's been bugging me to fly in and spend a week for
the last year, especially since I did not come out last summer." Anne
considered the option and saw the sound reasoning in it. Even if she did not
get called back for a fourth interview, there was nothing to fly back to Boston
for on the tenth, and a week on Orcas would be a nice way to spend her time
instead of worrying about her next paycheck. "I'll call her tonight and
call Ms. Iverson first thing tomorrow morning and see if it is too late to
change my flight plans."
