House of Pain

The Doubletree close to the HBS campus has literally been turned into a house of pain.  HBS has taken over pretty much the entire hotel for Hell Week, renting out rooms to be used for interviews.  Sound kind of weird?  It is.  Please see Exhibit A (below) for photographic evidence of this strange phenomenon:

Exhibit A

It’s such a surreal experience, and it goes something like this:

You have an interview.  You’re nervous and holding on to your faux leather portfolio for dear life.  You hop on the HBS shuttle and head over to the Doubletree, awkwardly riding in silence while other freaked out interviewees sweat nervously beside you.  Chatting with people only increases your chances of the whole, ‘”What are you interviewing for?’ ‘Company X.  You?’ ‘Me, too.’ ‘Cool.’ ‘Cool.’  <insert awkward silence>” scenario.

You get to the hotel.  Perhaps you swing by the student lounge that’s been set up by HBS to grab a drink and a snack before heading to your assigned room.  Perhaps you don’t, preferring to skip 1) the possibility of spillage and 2) the stressful experience of catching snippets of conversation as you put cream cheese on your bagel (…”How did yours go?  Mine was awful…did you get that crazy pricing case?  I got that crazy pricing case and blew it!).

You get in the glass elevator and head to your appointed interview room.  Outside of the door there is a chair.  A very small, uncomfortable chair.  You sit down and shuffle some papers around while you wait, observing the scene in front of you.  On every floor of the open atrium hotel, business suit – clad Hell Weekers mill around like ants in a corporate ant hill.

The door opens, and the sound of end-of-interview niceities floats out into the hall.  This is it.  The previous interviewee darts out of the room and runs like hell for the elevator, and now it’s your turn.  You enter the room and realize that yes, in fact, it is just as weird to interview in the sitting room of a hotel room as you thought it would be.  As you walk your interviewer through your resume and outline your three biggest strengths (with colorful yet succinct examples!), you try not to get distracted by the fact that he / she slept in this very hotel room the night before.  Did he/ she chill on this exact couch last night in his / her underwear watching TV after getting in from the airport?  No…can’t go down that road.  Way too distracting.  Focus!  Must talk intelligently about key industry trends now!

When it’s over, you are both physically and emotionally exhausted.  Walking out of the hotel room, it strikes you as incredibly poor planning on HBS’s part to hold these interviews in an open atrium hotel.  What if someone decides to jump?!  You yourself fight this very impulse as you slink back to the elevator, get on the shuttle, and finally get back to the sanctuary of your apartment.  One interview down, so many more to go…

It’s like the Eagles said:  You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave….