Missing Class: Cold, Rainy and Possibly Worthwhile
I receive a message from a classmate at exactly 10:19, a minute after Data Analysis had just let out: "Why weren't you in class today? One week in and you're already cutting? Unbelievable." It's a good question and one I don't have a quick answer to. I suppose the best response I could have mustered at the time would go something like this: "The Cleveland Indians and Pittsburgh Pirates don't send recruiters to the Varsity Club to mingle with students too often...I have to go to them."
So, this past Tuesday I skipped all my classes. Only my fourth day at Fisher and you won't find me at Gerlach, Schoenbaum or anywhere near campus. I'm racing up I-71 through the pouring rain instead of sprinting up to the 3rd floor to avoid our professors' wrath for walking in late. I am driving to Progressive Field, home of the Cleveland Indians and location of a job fair that might give me access to the hiring managers of two Major League baseball clubs. More likely, it will lead to nothing at all and I will have missed a day's worth of class, driven 6 hours in the rain and sat through a few hours of speeches focused on every job but the one I am seeking, which, of course, had no speakers at all.
Upon arriving at the entrance to Progressive, two things become immediately apparent: I am 5 years older than nearly every other person here and my suit and tie are a little dressier than the Doc Martens, cargo pants and wrinkled shirts that my fellow attendees are sporting. Going in, I had some idea that things would be a little different than most other professional networking events, but I was not prepared for this drastic of a change. The job fair consisted of tables in a breezeway between the lower and upper deck of the stadium. The howling winds, driving rain and 50-something degree weather are not making this a pleasant networking experience.
Still, my goal was simple: create some kind of a connection with someone from one of the teams that I want to work for. I soon realized that the elevator speeches that we were taught to practice and master during orientation were invaluable ways to strike up good conversations with the various employees of the Indians organization. I am immediately glad that I had those 3 hours in the car to think about what I wanted to say (and I am also immediately cursing myself for taking the orientation session where we learned about elevator speeches more lightly than I should have). So, I quickly map out my pitch (ha!) in my head and set out to meet everyone at this fair currently employed by a Major League baseball team. After a couple hours of furious hand-shaking, head-nodding and small-talking, I am lucky enough to be able to stumble into a conversation regarding a possible lead on doing some kind of collaborative research project while still in school. If things go right, I would have a chance to do research at Ohio State that would ultimately be used by the Cleveland Indians. The mere possibility of this made the entire trip worthwhile.
I returned to Fisher around 9pm that night thinking I would be behind the 8-ball on all my missed classes and that my team would be upset about having to pick up the slack. Instead, over the next 12 hours, every one of them emailed, texted or asked me in class the next morning how the job fair went. They let me know what I missed and even offered to let me look over their notes. It was yet another refreshing moment of reassurance about why I returned to the Ohio State to get my MBA. They were genuinely interested in my success and well-being, not solely focused on the snowballing amounts of work that were being set before us. Two days later, when I returned to Data Analysis and Econ, as the returning AWOL student, I was approached by a professor and he remembered why I missed, asked how it went and got me back into the flow of things.
I was, and am, genuinely shocked how putting forth the effort at the job fair may lead to a wonderful opportunity. I was, and am, still continually surprised by the genuine sincerity of my fellow classmates and the program-wide attitude that we are all in this thing together.