In Which I Don’t Get Hired By Apple
Not long after the Clarendon Apple Store opened, I applied for a job there. At the time I was in there every couple months, either with a display problem in my PowerBook G4 or an overheating problem in my G4 Cube. The process with the Cube had me convinced that I was somehow playing an unplanned game of Stump the Genius. I could get the computer to crash at home, but in several days of them leaving it on in a stress test they couldn’t duplicate the problem (in the end I determined that it was bad RAM that only failed when very hot). At the time I had a decent (but not spectactular) job and the idea of going to work for Apple was intriguing. I never heard anything.
Time passed, and like nearly everyone at my old company I got laid off. I found out through a contact that it was generally better to apply in person at an Apple Store, so I dropped by and spoke to the store manager — who took my resume and a paper application, but who said I should apply online as well. So I did. I still never heard anything.
A couple years later, after yet another layoff at yet another company, I revised my resume and submitted it again. Still nothing.
Keep in mind that all this time I’ve continued to buy and use Apple products, and still had the occasional game of Stump the Genius:
- Why does my iPod sometimes skip the first song on an album?
- Why does the FireWire port on my Mac mini randomly stop working?
- Do I need to worry about how hot my MacBook Pro is running?
The resolutions to those problems are illuminating:
- The iPod seems to punt if the drive doesn’t spin up fast enough. If the iPod is completely idle when you select an album, sometimes the drive responds quickly enough and sometimes it doesn’t. The same thing happens with a friend’s iPod of similar vintage. Once the drive has spun up you can play anything you want, including any track(s) it initially skipped.
- I had bought an external drive that was DOA. I got a replacement for it, but it seemed to have damaged a component in the FireWire port. The replacement drive mostly worked after that, but sometimes the combination of the drive and an iSight camera would cause the port to fail until the computer was turned completely off, unplugged, and plugged back in. Eventually I left the iSight unplugged except when actually using it, after which point the replacement drive continued to work.
- The Genius argued with me and was generally kind of a jerk. Within 48 hours my logic board fried. So yes, I did in fact need to worry about it.
Anyway, the extended recession has made a large dent in my consulting income so I recently passed my resume along to a friend who works at the Clarendon Apple Store, and this time I actually got called in for an “invitation only hiring seminar.” This was a week ago last Sunday, after the store closed. The email inviting me came on Saturday afternoon, so it was clear that Apple doesn’t waste time.
So on Sunday night, along with about 50 other people I stood in the light rain outside the store as employees finished their nightly closing routine and prepped the store for the event. The doors opened a few minutes after 7pm, and employees lined the path to the back of the store, clapping and cheering as all the candidates entered, some even offering high fives. We went to the “family room” area of the store, where stools and chairs had been set out. Each seat had a manila folder and a pen, the folder containing a name tag and a single-page questionnaire (check what jobs you’re interested in, when you’re available to work, when you’re available over the next week to interview, and so on). The senior manager introduced himself, thanked everybody for coming, and gave us a few minutes to fill out name tags and questionnaires. There were about twenty employees there, most in blue t-shirts, and a few in street or business clothes.
The senior manager then started a short video about Apple retail (foot traffic, revenue per square foot, growth rate, etc). After that were employee introductions: name, how long they’d been with Apple, and an interesting fact about themselves. Then we broke up into teams of two, picked Macs, and each team used any available application to create a document with name, interesting fact, and “why I’d be a great fit for Apple” for each team member. We had five minutes for this. Employees helped us print those documents, and then we went through introductions ourselves, with the twist that each team member introduced his or her partner (my partner collected baseball caps).
After the introductions there was another video, consisting of interview segments where employees talked about working at the Apple Store. After that was a Q/A session. The senior manager asked questions (“what was your proudest moment,” “why would somebody buy their first Mac here,” and so on), people raised their hands, and he’d call on individuals for answers. Then he opened up the floor for questions for him or the other employees. At 9:00 he wrapped it up, saying that all the employees had been watching and taking notes, and that they’d all get together and choose candidates for one-on-one interviews.
At this point I was curious what would happen next. Candidates ranged in age from about 20-60, and the range of experience was broad, with students, grad students, lifetime retail employees, tech people, and random assorted professionals. From watching the introductions and the Q/A I had a general idea who I’d call in for interviews if I were in charge, and I also knew the published statistic that the applicant-to-hire ratio is 17-1, meaning that from the room of 50 candidates approximately three would likely be hired. I didn’t know what Apple would be looking for in the room, but I at least had a general idea of the candidate pool.
Two days later (last Tuesday), I got an email from the senior manager inviting me in for a one-on-one interview. The email included a PDF with 22 half-hour time slots over the next week. I emailed back, taking the 7:30 slot that night, with 7:00 as a second choice. The return email said, “See you at 7PM”, so I showed up a few minutes before 7:00 for what turned out to be the 7:30 slot. One of the people I talked to while I was waiting was the store manager, who apologized for the mixup but said she was sure it was the senior manager’s fault (I didn’t mind).
At 7:30 the senior manager returned from the 7:00 interview, and we walked over to the Barnes & Noble for our interview. The café was full, so we conducted the interview on a couple kick stools upstairs. The interview consisted almost entirely of questions in the format, “have you ever been in a situation where X, and then Y happened?” As we wrapped up he said selected candidates would be called in for a second interview with another staff member, but that he’d contact everyone either way. While we walked back to the Apple Store, we started talking again about the process and he mentioned the 17-1 ratio, so I mentioned my observation that that meant only three people would be hired. He said that there’s no requirement they fill only an exact number of positions, and that when they find people who are a good fit they try to get them hired into some position. He said that this time around they could hire as many as five or six people if they were all good fits. He said I’d hear something by the following Tuesday.
So today I got the “Thank you for your interest in Apple Retail” email. I went back to the Apple Jobs web site and clicked the button to apply for the upcoming Georgetown store as well, but I’m assuming that this process will continue not to go anywhere. Whatever it is Apple is looking for, apparently I’m not it. I’d still like the opportunity to try, though. I like the company and the products, and Apple Retail is just about the only retail work I think I’d want to do. I still think of the Apple Store as a happy place, even if I do end up Stumping the Geniuses every few months.
