Instant Interviews: 101 Ways to Get the Best Job of Your Life

Chapter 43. Bossing around Your Boss to Get You Interviews

The adjective boss means cool. That's your boss now—a boss boss!

You must tell your boss you're interviewing. (You genie, me wisher. Do 1) If you don't, your boss will find out anyway. From you.

You'll smile more, you'll have a spring in your step, you'll stand up to the staff-meeting bully, and you'll start saying what you really think.

You'll also start getting more calls, having more "dentist appointments" and spontaneously singing in the middle of customer meetings.

Being upfront will ease your mind and force you to get out, out, OUT! It's really liberating and will energize your happinesshunt.

While you're checking that definition of boss, let me tell you what I did. It was while I was still in law school. I was working full time as an HR manager with family responsibilities and no money. My wife, Bev, was a key employee on her job. The facility relocated, so she commuted far on the company bus. That summer it was very hot, and Bev was very pregnant.

It was one of those times we all have when you look back and think:

How did I ever do it? No—how did I ever survive!

The HR in my manager job didn't stand for Human Resources—it stood for Heavy Responsibility. As in, "If anything goes wrong, you're responsible."

I was responsible for everything from hiring employees to fixing the vending machines. It wasn't like I had a job as a systems analyst or a contract administrator. I had to be there, or the newsletter didn't get written. ...