I Smashed It!

Thursday last week, Flyfour received a three-word WhatsApp message from me.

I smashed it!

 And because of the time, he assumed I was bragging a little and that my interview had gone well. What I was trying to tell him though was that I had just been offered and accepted a new role at the school I worked at.

I've spoken before about how worried I was about applying for the position, and I was. I like my current role, I like being the first face most of the people who visit the school see, I like being friendly and open and welcoming and bubbly and being told off for not being what a school receptionist normally is.

Yet, this new role? This role so appealed to me. It appealed to me because it's an area I am interested in. It's an area that I honestly think I understand. It's an area that I think I could make a positive change to society and my local community in.

Yet I'm getting ahead of myself.

I was at work the morning of my interview. It was scheduled for 11:30 am and well, right up until 11:20 I'd barely had time to use the toilet, let alone think or do anything other than my job of answering the phone, talking with parents and other people who called into the school.

Those ten minutes before my interview was a chance for me to focus, to think about what this meant to me and then to start to panic a little about the tasks that I knew I was going to have to undertake.  I knew I'd have a telephone call, I knew I'd have to do something creative and I knew after all of this I'd have to speak to the Principal and Business Manager and they were going to ask me questions that I really didn't know how to prepare for other than to say the thoughts that were formed as the questions were asked.

And so that's what I did.

I sat in the Business Managers office and took a phone call and tried to deal with it as I would hope I would be dealt with if I called with a similar issue.

I created something that fitted the brief of what I was given but gave it a little bit of a PippaD twist.

I edited something, knowing full well that this was one of my weakest areas (checking spelling and grammar!), but knowing that normally I'd have access to Grammarly and Spell Check and they help me to overcome the weakness.

I sat in the Principals office with him and the Business Manager and answered questions and just hoped that my passion, my love of the school and my enthusiasm came across in all that we talked about.

And at the end of it, as I went back to the Reception area I worked in, I took a moment to bounce the adrenaline out of me by hiding around the corner by some of my co-worker's desks and jumping up and down a few times and not allowing the emotions to come out as fat hot sticky tears.

I'd tried my best, I didn't think it had been good enough, but I'd tried and I was so proud of me and I knew my husband and friends would be too.

A few moments later and standing at the Reception desk, hearing what had happened whilst I'd been away and the Business Manager came to ask if my co-workers could cover the reception desk again for a few minutes. You know in those true-life court movies, where the jury comes back quicker than the solicitor expects and they get that serious look on their face because they know they are about to get bad news? Yeah, that's what I looked like as I followed her down the hall to her office. I was being told I hadn't got the role, and they didn't want to drag it out.

The Business Manager started;

Pippa, we'd like to offer you the position...
Wait! What?! I accept!

I was in shock. I really had not expected to get the job and here I was being offered it and accepting as quickly as I could in case they took it back. It's been a week though and they haven't taken it back and I'm ready to learn all the things that make up my new role... just as soon as they find someone to replace me!