Inexperienced and Overqualified

Inexperienced and overqualified, the two qualities that I apparently posses according to potential employers. Before I even finished my final semester at Radford, I was applying for jobs. If it sounded like something I would like, I applied for it. Having worked with children and in the human service field I set my sights on jobs that allowed me to show off my skills and knowledge. However, my six years of wiping noses and settling fights at the local Daycare did not give me enough experience to tell others how to handle children, and sadly my college degree for an entry level position meant I was overqualified and would probably leave at the first chance for something better.

The emails kept coming in--yes emails, no one calls anymore--and if one said overqualified the other said inexperienced. I knew I was overqualified for some of those positions but inexperienced. Excuse me, I am anything but inexperienced. Six years of listening to kids whine about how much they hate school, 3 semesters of spending time with underprivileged kids who would rather go to school than go home, and many months of dealing with families whose kids have missed so much school they must take classes in order to prove they are not negligent. I made it through all of that and learned exactly what to do in any situation involving all types of children, but yet I had not learned enough. If there was anything I learned through the four months of searching for jobs it was how different interviews can go.

The questions for each interview are based on the position you are applying for but the employer also wants to know about you and it is with those questions that I freak out. Even though I know myself and am pretty confident with who I am I find it hard to talk about myself as freely as they want in interviews. The questions range from why did you major in sociology and english to what are your hobbies. That's another thing that eats me alive, the word hobby. Whenever I hear that word I immediately think of filling out a Myspace profile with my hobbies that consisted of "shopping, talking on the phone, and hanging out with my friends." That's what I think when I hear hobby but that is not the answer potential employers want to hear. They want to know that when you say you love to read, that you actually read. You can bet 90% of the time when you mention reading the next question is going to be, what was the last book you read? Unfortunately for me my go-to answer is "The Great Gatsby, it's my favorite book I reread it all the time" but in reality the last book I read, How to Talk to A Widower, is a book about a man whose wife recently died and he sluts his way around his neighborhood while trying to raise his step-son. Employers don't want to hear that, and they certainly don't want to hear that you enjoy shopping or hanging with your friends. They say they want to know more about you but the real me is not the girl you are interviewing. It wasn't until I had an interviewer ask me what were my guilty pleasures that I knew I couldn't be myself. The answer that I wanted to give was "I don't feel guilty about my pleasures" but that would not to go over very well, so instead I went with the generic answer of "chocolate" and prayed for the questions to be over. The last question of the interview was the hardest and the one that lost it for me. I should have been prepared but I had lost myself so much in the interview that I felt I had to be honest. When the interviewer asked what my dream job was I sat there and thought for what felt like forever and finally answered "I don't know." As soon as the words left my mouth my subconscious began screaming at me and begging to take back what I said, but it was too late. I had to then say why I didn't know what my dream job was and I chalked it up to being young and having so many years ahead of me to figure it out but that's not what anyone wants to hear. They want to hear this job is your dream job, but in that moment my dream job would be to have a job, no matter what it was. It was once that interview was over that I realized I wasn't ready for a real job, I wanted to go back to school when it was easy and all I had to do was go to class but I didn't want to do the work. It seemed as if I was living in a Catch-22 situation and I knew I had to figure something out. Luckily for me the situation would soon be resolved.

While I was still at Radford, I had wanted to make some extra money and thought about putting my daycare skills to use. I filled out a profile on nanniesforhire.com and figured if someone was interested they would contact me. Two months after graduating I received an email from a family in Charlottesville, telling me that they were in need of a new nanny for their three daughters because there live-in nanny would be leaving in April. I had completely forgotten about the profile but I felt that with me being inexperienced and overqualified, emailing them back couldn't hurt anything. After corresponding with the family and learning more about them I decided to go for a weekend visit. I would be lying if I said it wasn't love at first sight. I loved everything from the home to the family, and being in Charlottesville was an added bonus. It was the first time during an interview that I was able to be myself. I could laugh and joke with the girls and felt that just as comfortable with their family as I was with my own. At the end of my weekend the family offered me the position of being their full-time nanny and I quickly accepted. I knew that this would be the perfect plan for me at this time in my life. It would help me to gain experience in working with children full-time as well as figure out what my dream job was. It was with that plan that I began my life as a nanny.