Waste of 45 mintues

So I had an interview today. The company found my resume on monster.com and called me up. It was to sell life/health insurance to seniors. And that was all I knew. Now, it's not like I was jumping out of my skin for this opportunity, but it never hurts to interview. I was supposed to work today but I found someone to take my shift and I chose to take a personal day.

So I got up this morning, put on my only non-cafe black pants and a nice coordinating top and sweater, I even pulled out the curling iron to calm my frizzy ends. And I was ready, confident, calm and set to wow them with my personality and sales ability.

Man, did I set my expectations high. I found the place just fine, in fact I could ride my bike there easily from my apartment. I walk into the building, the stuffy, boring, unspunky building. I get off the elevator and everything is beige. Beige, beige, boring beige. And suddenly my chest tightens and all that is running through my head is "I don't belong here. I don't belong here." So I walk into the office, there is no one at the front desk and I just stand and wait. Then a big man with a deep yet surprisingly loud voice, a lot of hair product in his very little hair comes around the corner and says something about being here for the meeting. Meeting, not interview. Huh, interesting. Then the door opens and the front desk woman comes in along with two other people who are here for the same meeting that I came for. And this is the start of when my expectations came crashing down.

So we are walked into a room that is beige beige beige, given a pamphlet with a bunch of smiling old people on it, and are offered some coffee in tiny styrofoam cups. And the next 45 minutes was me staring at the big man with little hair talking about how this business will never go under and how we can make so much money doing simple things. What I mostly noticed was how drab the place was, with bad, gross fluorescent lighting and it's sad motivational posters. Even the posters were beige. How are you supposed to inspire people with posters that have no color and flare?

What irked me the most is that he mostly focused on the money, without giving us a base salary. Were we going to be making so much a year plus commission, or was it whatever we sold is a portion of what we brought home? He didn't tell us how we spoke to customers, the process of selling the product. Do we just present it and seal the deal and then someone else does all the dirty work? None of this was answered today in my "interview." And I also chose not to ask. I saw no point in asking the questions knowing I didn't want to work there anyway.

I'm thinking of writing to whomever it was that contacted me and telling them that it's false advertising to say I'll be coming in for an interview and then not to interview me!

I learned two things today.
1. I am not going to work for that company. I don't work well on commission. I can sell things but if you don't buy it, no skin off my back. Seniors and retirees are going to need some sort of life/health insurance but I'm not the one to sell it to them. The job entailed many, many things that I don't want to do.
And 2. Beige is the color of a dying, sold-out soul. That is the ugliest dead color I've ever seen. Now, I ask you, why is it that every office is painted that color?! I know offices want to be neutral in color, but there are neutral colors that aren't beige.

So I'm staying in my job, for now. I'm good at it, I like it (most days), I have a great crew, and my regulars are good people. Today was a waste of 45 minutes. But I do know where I don't want to be. And that is in a beige office working on commission.