She didn’t make it past the first round of interviews.  

She had the right education, ample experience outside the organization and a deep understanding of the inner workings of the organization.  She thought her experience working with the executive team would at least get her past the initial screening.

She wanted the role. Badly.  

What happened?  What story is the organization telling themselves about her? What story is the organization telling themselves about what the role needs? What story is she telling herself?  What’s the truth?  

The facts are irrelevant; there was no objective disqualifier. The job is not one of those where you must be left handed or speak French, so her experience as a right-handed midwesterner seemed irrelevant.  There must have been something else; some story not known to her.   

I wonder how she responds.  How does her story inform her next move?  

I wonder how the organization dis-served her by not telling her their story?  

Then I wondered what it would matter.  Say that we were able to get the ‘for reals’ truth from everyone and put it on the table.  She still wouldn’t have gotten the job.  

There’s always another story. There’s always a story that a recruiter tells on behalf of the organization, but really the hiring manager felt threatened.  That’s the truth, but that can’t be stated.  It can’t be stated because that’s not in the recruiter’s dropdown box for ‘reasons for rejection.’  It also can’t be stated because the hiring manager doesn’t know it.  He knows that ‘his gut’ said she wasn’t a good candidate.  But this is the way of it — there’s always another story.  There are always competing stories at play.  

The work of my friend is to tell a productive story to herself.  Believing falsehoods (“I’m not good enough”) doesn’t serve her. As much as she may want, she’ll never get the ’truth’ from the organization and even if she did, it won’t help her.  Rather, her energies should be spent on articulating her learning’s and preparing herself.  

And her resume.