I sometimes like the art of recruiting more than I want the job

Something about networking and recruiting just brings me joy. I like meeting people from other firms and in different groups, getting a sense of different personalities, learning about various coverage areas.  It's made it easy to get interviews but I seldom want to walk through the door. Is this weird?

22 Comments
 

Yes and no imo. Networking can be very superficial and repetitive which I hate personally. But also can be a positive feedback loop, just having positive social interactions

 

we like that which we are good at 

you became so good at networking that you probably enjoyed it,

arguably establishing connections is more interesting that the repetitive work one does, so it's fair to feel this way

incentives trumph ethics
 

Restless yet again dropping wisdom. Love your posts Restless and agreed. I had a similar experience & how others have mentioned that is common among MDs, am thinking of staying long term.

 

Not weird and a positive to build up professional network as will serve you well over time. My only suggestion is to manage relationships / outreach appropriately as you think about longer term career path and how folks may view you (ie sincere in outreach vs exploratory). As long as you are genuine / balanced in approach think it’s fine. What you don’t want is someone questioning your sincerity at some point when you may really be focused on a a role. 

 

In my experience, what it really boils down to is not caring. This overlaps with self confidence (if you have confidence that you'll be fine no matter what, you can be indifferent to the outcome of any particular interview process) but it's not exactly the same thing. Even if nothing fundamentally changes about your personality or worldview, suddenly finding out that you have a good job offer in the bag will immediately cause you to do better in interviews for competing job offers.

 

OP here. Took time. I still get that same anxiety when it's a target firm, especially when I have an actual shot. Just this week I got on with a recently promoted MD and I actually forgot how to speak english. Same thing with a VP in a group I was really interested in a few months ago. I fare way better when it's a group I'm not that interested in. It takes time, repeated stress, and acceptance of possible failure, until the psychological walls come down. End of the day, we're mostly all just dudes who work in the same industry and have similar motivations and similar drives. 

 

I can oddly relate but didn't realize this until I was on my 2nd job. Something about the unpredictability of recruiting and the rush of receiving an offer is appealing. The actual job? Meh. 

 

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