Here's a memorable story from a few years ago. I was looking for a part time job to supplement the other part time job I had. I found an ad for a part time front desk position at a yoga studio. You didn't have to have any knowledge of yoga, but be willing to learn (I was. I had recently completed a pilates class and I next wanted to take a yoga class). The other requirements were to have had prior office and front desk experience, answering phones and being a first point of contact (which I had), to be computer savvy (which I am), and to be willing to do cleaning duties (which I am). I applied, and several days later I got a call to come in for an interview. It's always amazing when you hear back from any job. The number of applicants keeps rising, and HR (or whoever)'s patience to sift through the massive number of applications keeps dwindling. Communication and courtesy is also continuously on the decline, in this -as we all know it to be- increasingly virtual world, in terms of communication and interaction. Anyway, all of that is a post (actually, a book I should maybe write) in and of itself. It's something that will inevitably be woven all throughout the posts I write.
So anyway, I went in for my interview and the manager of the yoga studio, a woman probably in her late twenties, a couple of years older than me at the time, met with me in her office. She asked me about my experience, my skills, why I thought I would make a good front desk person at the studio, typical questions. She was pleasant, a little standoffish, but whatever. Then at one point she asked me "If [I] would be comfortable answering the phones and talking to people on the phones all day." I said absolutely, that I had previously worked as the front desk manager at a small tutoring center and that I had spoken to people on the phone all day at that job and at other jobs as well, such as when I worked at the IT help desk at a college. She then said to me (paraphrased), "Well because I can hear you have an accent, and ya know, they tell you that if you're going to apply for jobs doing phone work that you should really work on accent elimination. I did it too, because I'm from Long Island. I went to acting school and they taught us to listen to newscasters because those people need to speak without any accent, and you can practice and you can learn how to speak without an accent."
UHHHHHHHH... Okay, now, two things were going through my head. Well, three. Okay, one: The thing with my accent. This is going to be a bit of a tangent, but bear with me...Okay, there's some kind of phenomenon that follows me around in my life. Some people perceive me as having a MAJOR accent, which they usually define as a New York accent, but not any specific borough for the most part. Some people perceive me as having a definite accent and they have wondered if it is: British? Australian? Israeli? and a whole slew of others. Some people hear a little bit of an accent, but nothing really noteworthy. Some people don't perceive any real accent at all and just think I sound like a normal non particular tri state resident, or a New Yorker, but not one with a strong accent. Others recognize it as a light impediment. The truth of it is that I have a slight New York accent (which comes out sometimes more than others) and I also have a slight impediment, which makes my "r"'s difficult to pronounce. Some people notice it A LOT and others don't notice it at all, it runs the whole gamut. That's why I call it a "phenomenon", because it's bizarre for me to have people occasionally reacting HUGELY to how I speak, and other times people don't notice it at all. And particularly in interviews, being very conscious of this, I speak as articulately as possible. So for someone in an interview to point it out as if it's a major accent is quite an unprecedented reaction (although not, because these weird things happen to me all the time). So anyway, what was going through my head. One: that it was weird that she perceived it as such a major accent.
Two: That she pointed it out was really rather rude and unnecessary, and it probably violated equal employment rights. If she didn't feel I would do okay on the phones, she could have just decided that on her own in private and just not hired me, without ever saying anything to me about it. When she asked me if I felt comfortable doing phone work, she knew my answer would be yes. (First of all, I have phone work all over my resume. Secondly, I had already said in my cover letter (which she responded to by calling me in for the interview) that I was comfortable and experienced with phone work.) But she wasn't asking me in order to find out my answer, she wasn't asking me if I was comfortable with phone work. What she was doing was giving herself an opportunity/platform to tell me that basically SHE did not feel comfortable with me doing phone work. This is like saying, "Look, I wouldn't hire you and I'm not going to hire you, because I think you have an accent and I don't want you answering my phones. But I'm going to keep you in this office for the remainder of this interview anyway. And I suggest you practice speaking by watching newscasters like acting students do before applying to any more jobs with phone work." THANKS. Was she trying to be an older sister type, giving me job pointers? Did she think she was being nice and helpful? Or was she just a stupid b!t@#? Either way, it was unprofessional and rude. Not to mention, I'm pretty sure it violates some kind of equal employment rights law. I think I said something like "Okay, thanks" and then got out of there as quickly as possible, since I obviously wasn't going to get the job, right? I could have responded to her by saying all of these things I'm now telling you here, but I was still sort of desperate for another part time job, so I didn't say anything to kill my chances, by responding like an actual feeling, thinking human being. I remained "professional". But I'm sure I couldn't have killed my chances any more than I had apparently already done just by opening my mouth and saying a word with the letter "r" in it. :-p
And the third thing I was thinking: In acting school they told this girl that she needed to work on accent elimination in order to get a job, and perhaps it's true that some jobs won't hire you if you have a strong accent and they don't feel comfortable with you working on the phones in the office, but one: that's not something you TELL the applicant, because it's technically illegal. And two: perhaps if you have a major accent and it makes people unable to understand you on the phone then it is at least understandable why you wouldn't want that person doing phone work. But if it's a perfectly understandable accent, then it just comes down to an issue of taste - the employer doesn't CARE FOR your accent and doesn't want it as part of his/her business image. Fine, having an opinion isn't illegal in and of itself, but it IS discrimination and it IS unlawful if that's the reason you don't hire someone who is totally qualified. So for pete's sake, at the very least, employers, don't be so arrogant and stupid as to TELL your applicant that you don't care for their accent, an accent that other employers had no problem with (I held previous phone heavy jobs), and an accent that does not distract from being able to understand me (my prior employers certainly didn't think so). Because most people don't notice much of an accent from me, I have had to conclude that people who say they can't understand me are either: extremely poor listeners (what I'll call having a listening impediment), drunk, or have a hearing impediment.
As expected, I didn't get called back for the job.
No comments:
Post a Comment