The Slack Album

“Well you was doin’ 55 in a 54…”- Jay-Z
“Congrats, you typed 55 words per minute…”- Computer Screen
I took several technology literacy tests today during an intense job interview for a Temp Agency.
Clearly, my life is less exciting right now than Sean Carter’s. Unless, of course, Jay-Z is currently interviewing for data entry work at a Temp Agency as well. This scenario actually crossed my mind while I was taking a timed quiz about Microsoft Excel. WWJD? What Would Jigga Do? Then I realized he’s retired, and I quickly refocused on the task at hand. Columns, rows, numbers…
Following the technology portion of the test, I was quizzed in Spanish by a woman who was a bit skeptical about the “Spanish Proficiency” line on my resume. She didn’t give me any warning. There was no, “habla español?”. She just broke right into it with some hardcore questions using big vocab words that I probably would not have picked up on even if I had actually paid attention during class.
It vaguely reminded me of a story of a friend of a friend of mine’s. This dude applied for a job with a Russian firm where he would be conducting business in Russian. The interview was to take place via conference call with the firm in Moscow. The friend of a friend felt like his accent was much better when he was slightly drunk and slurred his words in a less forced manner. So he drank all afternoon while waiting for the call. They finally call, and conducted the interview completely in English. Oops.
I’m glad I didn’t drink before my interview. I don’t think I could type safely at 55 words per minute.