I hate teamwork. Rant.

[teqrevisited]

I'd have to agree that group interviews are not something that should continue. I'm not someone who typically goes in search of social interactions at work so I started by being the one who spoke to everyone that I knew I would be working with on the first day. The ones who shared vaguely similar interests ended up coming to talk with me after that and then I had reasons to start the conversations myself. A lot of the time I do end up blanking people when I'm busy though they got used to it after a while. It helps that once I do eventually get settled I can start to gradually unleash my sense of humour.


I think the worst I've seen this kind of thing affect someone is when I went to an interview for a well-known budget food shop. Around 6 people including myself had turned up, suits and smart dress et cetera. We filed in and I found myself sat next to a woman who couldn't have been much younger than me. We then had to do the whole 'tell me a bit about yourself' bit and so on. I lost a couple of words myself but I managed to put a decent enough statement together. Then it was her turn and I honestly didn't know where to look. She had her head angled down looking between her lap and the table we were all seated at and I just had to awkwardly sit there and stifle the crushing defeat that I felt coming from just inches away. I felt so bad for her.

 

[Loonyyy]

You need to work with others for most jobs. If it cut your charisma in half, well, I'm sorry, but that demonstrates pretty well how you'd handle a group dynamic.

I feel a lot of sympathy for you, I was very asocial right up until college, all through schooling up till just before my 18th birthday. It only changed because I decided to change it, and it'll be the same for you. I still feel uncomfortable in a lot of social situations, but you learn strategies to deal with it, and how to properly interact with people and groups of people, especially strangers. You just have to work on it. It's really easy to isolate yourself, and reinforce that prejudice. Don't do that. All you'll do is make it harder to gain these skills later, and they are skills, make no mistake. They're useful skills, and valuable aspects to a person.

I had to work on it, and develop some charisma and people skills. And eventually, using a few of them helped me land a job, which gave me more of a chance to expand those skills.

Yeah, some people have it easy. I have a friend, a complete moron, he's not clever, he's not skilled, he's not qualified, his opinions are straight from the papers and the culture around him. There's not an original thought in his head. He's fucking smooth as fuck though. He can change to make anyone like him, and charms like a ************. I know what he's doing, and I still like hanging out with him, because he's just charismatic. And it's gotten him pretty far. Basically his social skills have helped him along his careerpath, despite having no skills. Yeah, he's lucky, but there's nothing I can do about that. Instead, I can see that he's got something that I want, that I need, and do something about it. Change myself. If you envy something, make yourself better. You don't have to be the slickest person, you just have to hold your own. I'm sure you've got your own skills, your own merits. All you have to do is be able to socialise well enough to let those shine. If you can destroy a one on one interview, then you have the requisite skills, you just need to be able to handle a group environment.

Look, being totally blunt, being asocial, lacking social skills, is a serious disadvantage, and it's something you almost certainly can work on. It sucks, and it's hard, but it's the only way to get better. I did it as a young adult, it was a fucking nightmare, but now at least I can hold my own, and that's all you need. It's something you need to do, because it will help you massively in the long run, and it will get easier as you go. I know many people who've changed, who've improved themselves, and I know a bunch who haven't, and it's just tragic. They miss out. They miss out on careers, they miss out on people, and they miss out on life, and it's all for the sake of their comfort zone, even when it's hurting them. Don't do that, don't be that. I've said it to you before, and I mean it, it's easy to take comfort in it, just hide away, or even take pride in it and dismiss people, and it's not worthwhile. If you need help, consider consulting a psychologist, councilor, or health professional.