What-do-you-wanna-be is a question I have been asked so often that I no longer know how to answer it. It’s hard to figure out when you have friends like Buddy who spent four years of our youth loitering and drinking without aim or aspiration.
“Fuck it, let’s have a pint!” he would say regularly, whether he was happy or sad or on a fine morning at the breakfast table.
It was October when we received an email announcing the placement schedule. While everyone got busy putting together elaborate CVs – achievements, grades, certificates, and whatnot, Buddy and I stared at the blank Word document and wondered if our ability to sleep with eyes wide open would qualify as a skill.
“Fuckin’ hell, did we do nothing in four years? Shall we add that hot professor’s finance course from last semester? Might help us stand out!” Buddy suggested.
“We both scored a D, and that too, I suspect, because the professor wanted you out,” I said.
“Fuck it, let’s have a pint!” Buddy growled.
A few weeks later, during a placement seminar, the class topper showed up with a three-page CV. Watching Buddy watch him flaunt his CV was an unforgettable sight. The trainer advised us all to shrink it down to one page.
“No HR will give more than ten seconds to your CV. The shorter the better!” he said.
Buddy, sitting next to me, pulled out a crumpled page from his pocket and said – “That’s fuckin’ great advice. I now have only half a page left to fill.” And we laughed our guts out.
We somehow managed to put together a CV and included the hot-professor course, but the page still looked painfully empty. I came up with a brilliant idea of increasing the font and line spacing to stretch the text across one full page that asked the same haunting question: What-do-you-wanna-be?
Placements started. The top-tier-hot-shot companies ran their own written exams to filter the cream before even glancing at CVs. Students like Buddy and me, with stretched line spacing in our CVs, attended every test. Also, Buddy didn’t want to miss the free pizzas handed out after the tests. They went well with beer.
One company shortlisted a bunch of us for the interview round. Buddy didn’t make it. I have no idea how I got shortlisted myself given I copied from the guy who had flunked three courses last semester or maybe they jumbled up the roll numbers.
The night before the interview, Buddy and I tried to understand the company’s business and failed completely. Their website had videos of suited douchebags boasting about the company. “Their mission is to fuck the world and their vision is to make a shitload of money.” Buddy summarized it.
I waited in the lobby with other aspiring explorers of the great What-do-you-wanna-be question. Everyone was either reading, mumbling to themselves, or going through their CV. They had folders, certificates, polished shoes, and faces that said “topper.” I had a borrowed jacket and a CV printed on a thin sheet of paper with a crease running right down the middle.
There was no sight of Buddy until I saw him running towards me, unable to contain his excitement, “Mate, I have got you covered. A friend — what’s his name, I forget. A good friend, what a friend! — just told me all about the case study they’re asking in the interview.”
“So, what’s the case study about?”
“Well, that’s what I don’t understand fully. These fuckers are asking candidates to calculate the number of tennis balls that can fit in an airplane.” He replied nervously. “Why would anyone store tennis balls inside a fucking airplane? The cronies have gone nuts. But you should figure this out, man!”
“How?” I snapped back. “And why would they ask the same case study to everyone?”
“Think about it. These people won’t give ten seconds to review our CVs. Why would they waste time preparing a unique case study for each of you? And if a sucker like you slipped through their funnel, they are not as smart themselves, are they?” Buddy had a point. I was amazed at Buddy’s brain working at full speed when he was sober. Except, he had no clue how to solve the case study. Neither did I.
“Well, I know a guy. What a guy, a genius guy!” Buddy took out his phone and dialed. The guy answered, “Hey Buddy, how you doing? You know, I was thinking of calling you myself. I found a place where they serve Irish beer on the tap. Freshly brewed as cow’s milk. How about we pay it a visit?”
“Fuck it, let’s have a pint!” Buddy replied. “Is the place next to the City Mall? Man, I’ve heard of this place but I …”
The clock was ticking. “Buddy – what are you doing?” I interrupted the conversation.
“Listen, man, before I say anything further, my mate needs your magic. He is about to sit for his interview any minute now and needs your corporate brain.”
Buddy’s guy picked up the case study instantly, “Oh yeah, the famous tennis ball problem. Yeah, it’s simple. Divide the airplane into various zones based on the geometrical proportions and calculate the volume of the individual sections and sum them up. You can calculate the volume of a tennis ball, can’t you? Account for the gaps that would remain between the balls – assume 80% and now divide the total useful volume of the plane by the volume of a ball. And you get number of balls that can fit.” He solved it like two plus two.
I looked at Buddy; he smiled like he was the genius taking full credit. I knew I would have to pay for their Irish beer now.
He continued. “Look, the case study is not about how accurate your numbers are. All they evaluate is if you have a process of deriving the answer. Good luck!”
My name was called. The interviewer sat right opposite to me – “Tell me about yourself.” I didn’t quite know how to answer, so I blabbered what I had practiced, like a trained politician, and bored myself to death by talking about myself. The interviewer, impressed with my memorized answer, moved to the case study which Buddy had brought to me. I spent over ten minutes pretending to frame the problem and solve it. Thanks to Buddy’s guy. What a guy, a genius guy! I left a good impression.
And then, out of nowhere, a woman in red lipstick and a business suit walked confidently into the room.
“The case study has been leaked. One of the panelists saw a candidate blabbering it to someone outside.” I laughed so hard inside that my face betrayed me. The woman, mistaking my smile for confidence, said, “Looks like you did well in the written test as well as the case study, at least from what I can read on this sheet. Ah, and I must compliment you on your CV – polished, one crisp page just as we like it. Oh, and you have done a course in finance, I see.”
She started saying all sorts of things about her firm, almost as if she was trying to woo me into her organization. She kept blabbering about the work culture and organizational hierarchy at the firm – my hibernating skills kicked in like a muscle memory. I woke up from the dream when she said, “We like your analytical skills, and especially your composure and ability to handle stress.” I felt confused.
“We would like to consider you for a role directly reporting to the group CFO. You will work as his right-hand man and be involved in high-level strategic decisions.”
Until that moment, I had only feared rejection. I had not considered the horror of being believed.
I had accidentally become employable.
Just when I thought the interview was over, she leaned in and said, “One last question: What do you wanna be ten years from now?”
Somewhere inside my head, Buddy opened a beer.