Rejection!

It's certainly been a very interesting week for me. First, I was infected with the dreaded Pink Eye early last week, which prompted me to stay indoors from Tuesday to Friday. I finally got completely cured on Sunday night. Too bad it was just in time for Monday morning, which can be dreadful, especially when I had tons of work waiting for me on my desk for the four days I was absent.

However, I didn't mind that much, as I got to make a ton of advances with the task of migrating the company's current inventory system to Ruby On Rails (more on that in a future post). I also took the time to send the ol' resume to some companies (which shall remain nameless for the moment) in the U.S., particularly San Francisco. Surprisingly enough, I received two answers to initiate the interview process with them! For some reason, I wasn't expecting it at all. It's probably the fact that I thought most employers would don't waste their time with local candidates (although I made sure to emphasize the fact that I'm planning to move soon). In any case, that was pretty damn exciting for me, and I'm still psyched because of the quick responses.

So I initialized the interview process with both companies. One company sent some questions, seemingly just to gauge my personality traits. Once I completed it, someone from the company actually took the time to schedule a phone conversation with me and talk about the position. That was a really great touch, and I don't think companies looking to hire great talent do this enough. After the conversation, which got me even more interested in the position, I received a programming test. It was right up my alley, and best of all, as the company is a Ruby On Rails shop, I had a chance to show my up-and-coming Rails skills. It took about a single day to complete (Sunday). I've been waiting for a reply, but I feel really, really good about this opportunity.

The other company sent me a written exam, mostly consisting of questions that challenge your logical way of thinking which I had to complete and return in an hour. These types of exams have been made famous by companies like Google. I thought I did pretty well, although I have to admit the questions were pretty tough. Maybe I was too nervous. In any case, I sent the exam on Friday afternoon and waited.

This morning, I woke up and checked my E-Mail for any response. I saw an E-Mail from the company that sent the written exam (not the Rails program). My heart raced as I clicked the link. Then I saw the following words: "Unfortunately we feel that the company is not the right fit for you at this time." Needless to say, it certainly wasn't the best feeling in the world.

I don't know why I wasn't accepted, although maybe I didn't complete the exam as well as I originally thought. However, I do thank the representative from the company for taking the time to send the test in the first place. I'm guessing that if the company didn't think I was actually qualified by looking at my resume, they wouldn't have taken the time to schedule the test.

After a few minutes of being sort of heart-broken, those feelings were quickly removed. Why? I now know that I can - and need - to do better every time out. And to tell you the truth, the rejection pretty much motivated me to keep on going forward with learning new things. In fact, I took half of my lunch hour just to keep on adding new stuff to the program I'm migrating to Rails. This kind of opened my eyes, and makes me want to be better, the best I can.

I'm not bitter at all with the rejection. As I said, I genuinely thank the company for the opportunity in the first place. In the future, I'll thank them again, when I'm much, much better at what I do.