We Will Call You
Ep 3: Soft Skills
Fact-based job-seeking-opera for geeks
“This solution may improve the effectiveness of your planned investments.” Domnall caught the businessman’s satisfied look, then turned his attention to the database specialist. “It will require the integration of three different systems, which, as I understand it, may pose a certain difficulty…”
“If there is a good reason to integrate them,” the woman shrugged, “we will integrate them.”
“When could we expect the first results?”, fretted the businessman. “Competition has recently started to steal our clients.”
Domnall closed his eyes and recalled the schematics he had received from the IT department. It wasn’t much, but it might be enough for a reasonable estimate.
“Do you lose more clients in the area of long or short-term projects?”, he asked.
The businessman needed a moment to find the right table and display it on the screen. He looked at the numbers and replied, “Short-term.”
Domnall opened his eyes, reached for one of the notepads lying around and began to sketch.
“So here we have your customer data… financial flows here… a connection to the third-party data here…” He glanced at the database specialist who, not wanting to miss any detail of the reasoning, leaned towards the drawing so hard that she was practically lying on the counter. “Which of these data lakes will be the easiest to connect?”
“These two.” The woman pointed to the sketch without hesitation. “We could make it production-ready in about half a year.”
Domnall smiled to himself. He drew a few lines and crossed out several others. He looked at the woman again. She blinked in surprise, but a second later she nodded approvingly.
“In this configuration, we could do it in a quarter.” She threw her business colleague an asking glance. “Provided that we could temporarily suspend the development of the new reporting system.”
The businessman froze staring at the drawing.
“If I understand it correctly, within half a year we may either get a tool allowing us to identify the highest risk projects or in three months a churn predictor?” When the interlocutors nodded, he finished slightly disappointed, “But the latter is at the expense of reporting, right?”
“That’s the way I see it,” confirmed Domnall. “But I need to warn you that I base my assumptions on partial data I received with your technical test. At this moment I cannot promise the solution will work, and even if it will, what level of precision we will be able to achieve.”
The troubled businessman massaged his temples. The database specialist mentally drifted away to her tables probably already forging an action plan for the upcoming weeks.
Domnall felt a pang of enthusiasm. The company, although small, had a well-thought-out strategy and was well managed. While the interaction with the managerial and technical staff to date proved to him that employees not only showed a high level of competence, but also respected common sense; and that Domnall valued the most.
“Very well, very well,” a young representative of the human resources department interrupted the conversation unexpectedly.
Until now Domnall did not pay any attention to her, because she was silent as the grave, entirely absorbed with some cosmetic detail of her absurdly long hybrid nail. Now she folded her hands on her chest giving the applicant a broad smile, both charming and insincere. “I think that’s enough for today.”
Domnall felt a shiver crawling down his back. Her last sentence was pronounced in a pleasant tone, but neither that nor the mask of delight on the girl’s face was able to hide the resentment lurking underneath.
“Very well?” Domnall frowned. “I don’t think so. I don’t know why, but I feel that you think I shouldn’t get this job.” The Girl’s apparent confusion confirmed his supposition. “May I ask why?”
“I have the right to veto all and any candidates,” she chirped sweetly as soon as she regained her composure. “My role is to assess their soft skills and I think that you simply lack empathy.”
“Empathy?!” Domnall’s eyes widened in surprise. “Like in the ability to empathize? To harmonize with the interlocutor’s emotions? Absence of which is called psychopathy? I just showed that I can sense your emotions towards me, despite your wide smile and kind words!”
“But your inept communication has clearly discomforted my people; me too.” She sent him an offended glance, then added harshly, “Such behavior is unacceptable. I won’t even mention, that when a difficult topic came up, you closed your eyes clearly avoiding eye contact.”
“I was just thinking about a solution to the presented problem.” Domnall looked at the other participants in disbelief, seeking support. The businessman and the database specialist scrupulously studied cosmetic details of their own nails. He murmured hopelessly: “Like they are now.”
“Very well! As all is clear now, thank you very much,” the HR girl announced in triumph. “We will call you.”
We Will Call You Series:
Episode 1: Data Democratization
Episode 2: Stimulating Work Environment
Episode 3: Soft Skills (current)
Domnall is a brilliant guy. However, job-seeking is long-term entertainment, and will probably take him a while. Especially that job interviews don’t happen every day. In the meantime, you may consider reading about other (equally brilliant) characters in our #Pharmacon sociological thriller.
