Wednesday, November 03, 2004

Getting to know faith

I used to live in West Hampstead and after seven years of riding it twice a day I knew the Jubilee Line like the back of my hand. Every station, how long it took it took between the stops, where to stand on the station to get the best seat. In fact before I moved to NYC I pretty much had the whole of the tube system etched onto my brain.

Then of course, I moved to NYC and had to learn a whole different system, completely different from the one in London. For a start the subway runs all day and night, but there are also express trains, so if you are going from uptown to downtown you can just jump on one train and skip all those annoying stops in-between. Oh and the cars are air conditioned which is great in the summer. The confusing thing with the NYC subway is that all the lines are named with numbers – 1,3, 9, 7, A, C, E. I like that our underground has names.

My job interview was in St John’s Wood, which was unusual because the company is actually off Oxford Street. But I assumed that we were meeting there because Alex and Raoul wanted to take me out for dinner. But it turns out that it was only there because Raoul’s wife is having another baby and he was going to be at the hospital in St John’s Wood prior to my interview.

Because I no longer seem to have the tube map in my head quite as clearly as I used to have I completely misjudged how long it would take me to get there. I left at 5.15pm to meet them at 6pm. It took me fifteen minutes. So for half and hour I was waiting around on a busy high street, freezing my ass off, trying to calm my nerves by listening to soothing classical music on my iPod.

Now usually I don’t get nervous about job interviews. But I REALLY want this job. So bad that I can taste it. Alex turns up at 6pm on the dot and we sit down while we are waiting for Raoul and have a little catch up.

Now on my second interview Alex mentioned a particular brand to me that the agency will have as a client in NYC. And because the world is so bloody small it turns out that the client on that brand is no other than someone I knew very, very well in NYC. When everything happened in March that friend was a pillar of strength. But then very suddenly he turned his back on me. At the time I was very angry with him for this. But now I understand how hard it must have been. And who am I to judge anyway, right.

Nonetheless, the two of us don’t speak to each other anymore and I know he has a strong opinion on my health and where I should be in the world. It’s a point of view that I absolutely don’t subscribe to, but I guess we’re all allowed our opinions. That said, I had to tell Alex that there could be a potential issue there – that if they gave me the job and I ended up having to work with this person, it might be an issue.

Alex went to NYC last week and told me that she was going to speak to this person about me to see what they had to say. And to start with I convinced myself that it was all over. That the person would spill the beans and scupper any chance that I might have of getting this thing. But then I did something I find very hard to do. I let the thought go and put faith in it being ok. To really believe that it would be ok. And if it wasn’t – well I would deal with that if and when it happened.

Then last week they call me and say that they want to see me again. And I was so pleased. So back to Alex and I talking. Alex tells me that she did meet with the old friend, but that I had made such a good impression previously at my other interviews, that she didn’t think that it was appropriate to bring it up. As far as she was concerned she thought I was great, professionally experienced and very clearly up for the job. And the non-professional personal point of view of someone else wasn’t of interest to her. Awesome!

Then Raoul turns up and we go off to some café. Raoul is a tough cookie who really knows his stuff. He throws some very direct, blunt, but important questions to me and I think that I handle and respond to them well.

So in a nutshell, this is the job, should I get it…

Alex and I would essentially be starting up a new business – an arm of the London agency, in New York. Together we would spend the month of December, in London, creating and then fine-tuning a business plan for the new NYC office for 2005 – how we want the agency to look, feel, what the client offer is, what our strategy will be for winning business, what we want the agency turnover to be, who we want to work for.

This would be different to anything I have worked on and would challenge me enormously. But at the same time, without exception, it is the most exciting opportunity that has ever come my way. And I know I can do it. That’s the thing with me – when I put my mind to something I make great things happen. To be part of something that is in it’s embryonic stage, to nurture and watch it grow. And the best bit is that, with Alex, I would be the boss. I could shape it in all the ways that I think it should be shaped. To be part of that is a once in lifetime opportunity.

We end up talking about so many things that I won’t bore you with here, but the crux of it is that at the end of two hours of discussions Raoul laid it on the line. He told me that he thought I had amazing experience, that my knowledge of the NYC market place was really invaluable and that for the most part he thought that I would be a valuable asset. The last step is that I have to meet the finance director of the company, so that I can explain my thoughts, top line, on what needs to be done to make the company a success. Easy - can do that standing on my head.

And then this morning I got an email reiterating that they think I'm great and that providing everything is ok in the meeting next week, they will want me to start in as soon as three weeks time. We have agreed a salary figure (a very nice one!) and we’re talking about a relocation allowance. And I don’t want to jinx it, but (and I’m going to knock on wood again!) Alex and I could be on a plane on the 2nd of January. And NYC would once again be my home.

I know now that I needed to come back to London to make me realise what is important to me. Sometimes you need to come home, physically and spiritually, to remind you of all the things in life that are great and good. It took coming home to make me realise that nothing here is going anywhere. And that my friends will always be here. So with that knowledge safe in my back pocket I want to be back in New York, with all the craziness and laughter and good friends that I know it can give me.

Faith is a hard concept to grasp. And one of the things I find hardest to accept is that there are some things that I am not in control of. At the moment all I can do is put faith in the fact that I can present myself well enough for them to give me this job. And then, if I get it, I work massively hard to make all the other stuff happen.

My single mindedness is my greatest gift. But at the same time it’s my Achilles heel. Because there are still some things that you can’t make happen – matters of the heart for example. And to date one thing that I have never seriously really invested in is my career and I think now is the time to do it. I’m going to be ruthless about it. And I’m going to put faith in the fact that wonderful things are going to happen because of it.

And if this one doesn’t work out. Then I’m going to have faith that there will be other opportunities. Loads and loads of them. Cause you know the worst thing that can happen is that I never get a job I want and my Mum has to teach me to be a hairdresser. And I think I’d make a GREAT hairdresser!

So this year I have learned that it’s good to be single minded and efficiently focussed, but sometimes you need to put things aside and just believe that if things are meant to be, then they are meant to be.

I’m reminded of that billboard I saw a few weeks ago, that I wrote about here. Maybe it was a sign? I don’t know if I believe in signs, but again…watch this space!!!

Life really rocks sometimes, don’t it?

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