What does your schedule look like?

The key to sounding busy when you’re incredibly available.

Welcome back Job Hunter!

In this latest installment, we’re talking about one of the questions most often asked by companies and recruiters during the early stages of the interview process when attempting to schedule the actual interview:

‘What does your schedule look like?’

First off, for those of you job hunting while you already have a job and scheduling conflicts that might actual inhibit your ability to interview for the role in question let me be the first to say, ‘Good for you!’

You’re the same kid who would ask the teacher if they meant to give us homework on a Friday afternoon when the rest of us had one foot out the door.

Your success and initiative are impressive and simultaneously unhelpful to the majority of us who find a question like the one listed above to be an insult to our intelligence and our schedules.

‘What does your schedule look like?’

For most of us the honest response to this is,

Bleak? Open? Like a mirrored reflection of the emptiness in my soul?!

Like many questions you’ll invariably face during your hunt for employment, this one is ripe for a sarcastic response! However, responding with sarcasm isn’t going to land you that highly un-coveted job, now will it?

Most of the time when someone asks you this question what they’re really asking is, ‘I want to sound flexible about scheduling this call but you and I both know you’re probably totally wide open whereas I am doing 5000 of these meetings all week long because I wasn’t capable of finding my own job so I took a job helping other people find jobs. Having said that, Is there a window in your schedule next week when we might be able to speak for 30–45 minutes about this role?’

That has been abbreviated to, ‘What does your schedule look like next week?’

Interviewers, HR Reps, and Recruiters do this to sound flexible and accommodating and to expedite the early stages of the interview process so we can move quickly to the part where they have you interview with three different people, the last of whom is on a satellite phone with poor reception, and spends most of the call talking about how he ran successful Brazilian Presidential campaigns. (Yes, that happened to me.)

It’s funny then that something they abbreviate in order to save time actually ends up taking more time because the reality is your schedule is much more flexible than their’s. You can’t say that though. I mean, you can but it’s not a good look.

‘What does your schedule look like?’

It’s a funny question for an employed person to be asking an unemployed person.

‘Well, let’s see Mondays. Typically, my wife will rise around 6a and begins working from home. I’ll slip out for a latte if my schedule allows. I return home, by which point, she is usually ready to dish about work and I’m equally prepared to update her on the drama at our local San Francisco Starbucks.

I pour my coffee into a Yeti, slide back into bed, and nap/look at my phone.

Melancholy Mondays aren’t reserved solely for the employed so I like to start my weeks off with a nice long extended sulk. Really lean into the depression. Like a deep-knee bend so my whole being is submerged in the sadness. And I follow that up with a nap.

I’ll send out resumes from bed. Particularly for positions that don’t require a cover letter or any resume revisions. (Nothing worse than spending hours revising your resume just to have it rejected anyway, am I right?!)

Around lunch I’ll stumble down to the West Wing of our modestly priced Bay Area one-bedroom and ask my wife if she needs anything for lunch. The afternoons have become something of a blur lately. Not to mention the days. Around 4p I’ll start prepping/ ‘app’ing dinner. This is followed by a steady stream of streaming. And then bed!

‘‘What does your schedule look like?’

For those of you who are just looking for a useful, professional answer to this question it is thus…

I call it, The Busy Available. The key is to sound extremely busy followed by acting like you are going to move mountains to prioritize whatever time works best for them.

The reality is if you’re unemployed then you are completely available all day long with no interruptions. You can’t say that though because it sounds desperate. No one likes desperation. So you have to play the game. The game in this case involves sounding busy.

Sample Email Response:

‘Well listen Jim, not gonna lie, next week is jam-packed for me. I’m in back-to-backs from sun-up ‘til sundown, Gordon Lightfoot style. Tell ya what, why don’t you tell me a window that works best for you and I’ll fit it in. ’Cause quite honestly, and please don’t share this with anyone, but you’re my number one priority. So whatever works for you, I’ll make it happen on my end.’

Side Note: It’s highly unlikely you’ll be on the phone with them for this conversation, but if you are, a nice touch is to yell off to your imaginary assistant. Makes ya sound important.

‘…one second there Jim… Hey Gladys!… GLADYS!… What?… No, I didn’t eat your donut… Listen, yeah, Jim Swarthout from Provo needs 5 minutes next week… No, next week… Jim, you there? Just a sec…’

You’re Busy but Available. Works like a charm.

Of course, the alternative is to actually send them a few windows of time that you’re available. I don’t know about you, but that always seems like the most ridiculous option to me as I try to pretend like I have blocks of time where I’m unavailable. It ends up looking like this:

I’m available:

Mon. 10/7 8a-11a. 11:15–2:45 and then 3p-5p,

Tues 10/8 8a-5p on Friday 10/11.

Remember Job Hunter, desperation is not appealing. So like most areas of business and politics it’s best to begin this professional relationship with a lie.

And that lie is, The Busy Available.

Happy Hunting!