Sleepless in Florida

#205: Someone get these peach-colored things away from me!

The disappointing thing about Florida is that it doesn't disappoint you when it comes to meeting your stereotypical expectations. We're booked at a hotel that is huge, audacious in design, tacky in concept and stuck in the 80's Miami Vice in terms of color palette. Think of obscene levels of peaches and light blues and pinks and mint greens. Then think of them on the floor, on the walls, on the curtains, on brochures, on the paintings, inside the elevators, outside of them. It should drive you nuts. If it weren't for this overpowering jet lag (thanks to 14 hours Sydney to San Francisco and 5 hours from there to Orlando), I would go officially insane. Which wouldn't be good at this stage.

Dinner however was exceptionally good. They served fennel-almond-blue cheese and pear salad, steak and halibut with soft veggies, then bitter chocolate and raspberry mousse. The rest of the 1,200 or so people are still busy yakking away and networking. During sessions, limelight hogs from big name schools stand up to ask questions that they already know answers to... or that if answered, don't matter much to their future with this company anyway. I think they all just pretend that these questions are of great concern. Some take the pains of saying their name, then saying their school name louder before their life-and-death question. "Hi, I'm Alice Biggins from IMD in Lausanne, Switzerland. "Then collective nods from fellow candidates would follow, along with murmurs of, "That's a really good school."

I am not fazed. If this opportunity is for me, it is mine. If it is not, then no amount of microphone-grabbing and pearly-whites-flashing will give me a shot. The Lord's sovereignty is a wonderfully comforting thing. Not that I am slacking off and chilling in my hotel room while everyone is busy elbow-rubbing and networking with their potential new employers downstairs. I am actually hanging out here and chilling because I need to rest and get ready for the 5 interviews that await me in the next two days. 6 in all. How's that for a relaxing time in Florida? Then it'll be back in the can, in that torture chamber they call "Economy Class" for 20 or so hours living out "Sleepless over Seattle"...Detroit...Hawaii and all the areas we will be flying over on the way back to lovely Sydney. I need a massage.

Some brash "I'm-an-MBA-student-from-one-of-the-flashier-schools" dude was trying to stage his own pissing contest in front of the HR Director of the company's Norweigian group ealier today. He was talking to this guy from INSEAD, Paris: "Imagine how much they're spending on us. (750 candidates + 450 executives/employees/staff) x airfaire x hotel accommodations for 3 days" The INSEAD guy smiles and says, "Ah, a typical McKinsey case" - signifying that he had been interviewed by that consulting firm and that he's familiar with the process. I gave a snort. Or at least I imagined I did. Some MBA grads can just be full of themselves.

So, enough about them. Now let's talk about ME. [wink]