Schmoozers

Some people are born schmoozers. I am not one of them.

The schmoozer’s glittery vocabulary lands with a brassiness that doesn’t ring true for various reasons. Let’s just say I don’t like being schmoozed.

Back in 2003 I remember stepping outside one summer workday to pick up a voicemail on my cell phone. It was a female recruiter from a local work source agency. Years previously I had filed paperwork with them while looking for a job. I had found my own employment since.

That’s where I was the day I received her message: at my desk in a ground-level office that was surrounded by large hanging plastic sheets coated with sheetrock dust and the intermittent awful noise of construction workers and their power tools. While just outside, unseen from where I sat, was a serenity garden with pleasant pathways, footbridges and benches, and summer’s raucous floral display of color.

It was a perfect day to be schmoozed.

I returned the call and was soon listening to her speak of my ‘stellar’ skill set, along with excitedly telling me about the anonymous (of course we can’t tell you who has the opening) company needing my wonderful ‘stellar’ set of skills that I could bring to their table. Without pride, I can say what she said was true. I did have a great set of skills developed over many years of working in my chosen field.

Here’s what else I knew. She did not know me, not one iota. The sense of being schmoozed oozed in. From the few details she did disclose, here’s what my non-schmoozed brain filled in for me:

• As mentioned previously it had been a number of years since I had any dealings with the agency.
• Work source agencies have new people in and out of their doors every day looking for work.
• Since I had not heard from them for years I could only assume others were filling open positions.
• I didn’t need their services; I already had a job. Sometimes you can be a chooser of schmoozers.
• She mentioned ‘reaching back into their files’, which told me several things that might apply –

a) the recruiter had exhausted her supply of most-recent potential applicants, which
b) could indicate I was not the ‘stellar’ potential employee gleaming at her from the top of her pile of applications but rather was dug out of the dead file of submissions from years past,
c) the unnamed company in question was extremely hard to please and/or hard to work for,
d) I had no idea how many temp to hire employees this company may have already gone through

With just the right amount of schmooziness, she seemed intent on setting the hook and reeling me in. I didn’t bite.

How do you want to lead with your life?

I think that’s an important question for each of us. Personally, I don’t want to lead by schmoozing.

Please don’t get me wrong. There are schmoozers who are nice, fun and friendly people! They have gregarious personalities. That’s also part of why they’re so good at schmoozing.

But when there is the distinct sense of an agenda afoot, my schmoozer radar goes up.

• They want something. Make a sale; get you to do something for them that they can do for themselves; make you the third party in their attempt to triangulate a strangulated communication; get you to move boundaries or schedules for their comfort; .. add your own.
• They want to impress. Like the time I was a church secretary and had called for a quote on cleaning the carpet in the fellowship hall. Did you know carpet likes coffee too? Anyway, the young man sent out to survey the caffeine stains launched into a scenario of how coffee spilled from this height leaves a different stain than coffee spilled from this height..presumably the shorter you are the more beans for the buck. It was all I could do (after all, I was the church secretary) to not tell him to put a cork in it and just write me up the cleaning bid already. To make matters worse, the pastor was the third member of this carpet coffee klatch.
• They want to get ahead. Ingratiating is the term that comes to mind with this point. Call it what you want – networking, cocktailing, making business connections, lobbying, campaigning, fundraising – gaining an advantage is the motivation (hidden or not) for those ingratiating chats. I love God’s favor and have been the recipient of it at different times in various ways. He does not need me to ‘help His cause’ (which is really my cause for my advantage for what I really want). If ever the motivation of my heart is tempted to lean in that direction, He has permission to spill His coffee on my carpet from way up there.

Epilogue

Within 24 hours that August in 2003 proved to be a stellar month. With a few minutes of my break remaining, I called our church secretary to ask a question. We chatted and hung up, then the phone rang less than 30 seconds later. It was her again, this time with a question for me.

“I don’t know if you are looking for a different job. Are you? I mean, I think you like where you’re working. Don’t you? When we hung up I saw something on my desk and immediately thought of you. I just had to call back.”

I asked what she was talking about. It was an announcement sent to local churches for a job opening I had been waiting for at a local nonprofit ministry. Twice, job openings had come available there; twice I had been in contact with HR. Both times I declined going for the position after reading the job description. It was not the one position that held any interest. Think heart and ‘skill set’.

An incredible story of God’s stellar faithfulness and favor began to unfold. Turns out it was all part of the journey that has brought me to where I am today and how I lead with my life. The work source recruiter was simply a nod from God that change was coming.

My epilogue may be part of your prologue. To benefit from some life coaching, I welcome your contact. I promise not to schmooze you, just offer you a cup of coffee and try not to spill it!

 ~ Nancy

photo credit: 299/365/2855 (April 5, 2016) – Smile More via photopin (license)