A reader writes:
This week I finally landed my very first Big Post-Pandemic Interview! I studied hard, prepared extensively, and dug my circa-2019 interview clothes out of storage, along with my fancy business satchel and leather binder (the interview required me to bring a portfolio of prior work). I was ready to impress!
I sat down with my interviewer, feeling confident, collegial and chatty; got settled; pulled my portfolio out of my satchel with a self-assured flourish … and not one, not two, but FOUR CONDOMS came sailing out of my bag and went clattering across my interviewer’s desk. (Unopened condoms, to be clear, the kind you might grab a handful of from those fishbowls in certain bars and toss optimistically into your fancy business satchel, just before you spend an entire 16 months having zero need of neither condoms nor satchel … but condoms nonetheless.)
I did my best to gather them up quickly and toss them back into my bag, but clearly the damage was done. My interviewer even had to nudge one of them back to me so I could collect it. We both sort of awkwardly sputtered about it (she said something like, “Oop!”, I said something like, “Guess I need to clean out this bag!” which, ew) before continuing the interview, which I obviously have zero memory of because my brain was no longer anywhere near my body. The interviewer kept it professional throughout, to her great credit, but you can’t exactly put the condoms back in the bag, as they say.
Of course my question is, what do I do now? Do I mention the condom disaster in my post-interview follow-up email? Do I just write off this interview as a loss entirely and not even get back in touch? Do I need to worry about this looking like some sort of sexual harassment (I’m a youngish (gay) man, my interviewer was a woman maybe 20 years my senior)? Do I apologize profusely or pretend it never happened or try to get out ahead of it before I’m known forever in my industry as the guy who threw condoms around the room during his interview??
Any advice you have would be so, so appreciated. (Even if it’s just, make sure to empty out your fancy business satchel before your next interview, which, lesson learned!)
Oh noooo.
I’m trying to decide how I would react if I were on the interviewer side of this and … I would think it was funny! I would feel for you, but it wouldn’t change my assessment of you as a candidate unless you were interviewing for a job preaching abstinence or something. There’s a decent chance that your interviewer feels the same way.
It is very, very unlikely that your interviewer thought this was an attempt to harass her or introduce a sexual element into the conversation! (It would have been a terrible strategy if that were your goal.)
Having a hail of condoms explode from your satchel isn’t all that different from having tampons or a diaphragm case fly out of your bag at an interview. You don’t want it to happen, but it’s just evidence that you’re a human who exists outside of work. It’s a little embarrassing because we’re not generally thinking about those parts of life at an interview, but it’s not something shameful.
I would not mention the Condom Incident in your post-interview note! That would risk making it more awkward, and it’s not necessary — you dealt with it in the moment and you can just both move on as if it didn’t happen.
I very much hope you get this job, since (a) if you don’t, you’re forever going to wonder if the condoms are the reason why (when they really probably wouldn’t be) and (b) this has strong potential to become a hilarious story down the road.
Read an update to this letter here.
