Cintas

Cintas

Part 1

My mom regularly sends me job postings. It's nothing specific, just jobs that she finds while she's working upstairs. Some of the jobs are interesting, many are not, but all of them are with companies that I have never heard of. It's amazing how many different companies are out there today, and all the different industries and applications there are for products in the marketplace. Normally she'll get them from the big job boards and forward them to me, or she'll just send me a link. Some I could have found on my own, some I couldn't have. Regardless, it helps having her send me job postings on a regular basis.

One fruitful morning, I get an email from my mom about a company named Cintas. I had heard of them before, but didn't know much more than that they were the "uniform people." I read through the job opportunity- management trainee, and thought it would be interesting. I went ahead and applied for the job online by sending in my resume and cover letter. It seemed like a good thing.

I get a call on a Thursday from a woman named Maria. Maria has an accent, a thick Latino one, and it is a little difficult understanding her. She says she is calling from the corporate recruiting office and wanted to have an interview with me. We talk about me putting my application in and if I was still interested in the opportunity. I told her I was and that I would love to set up an interview. I was leaving for the beach for a week the next day, so we scheduled to have an interview the following Monday after my vacation. I was happy that I had set something up. My parents were getting somewhat impatient with the fact that I wasn't getting a ton of interviews at this point, and so was I. This gave me some leeway for a week so I wouldn't have to hear them telling me yet again what I should be doing.

The week at the beach came and went, and I found myself waiting anxiously Monday morning for Maria's call. Finally it comes, and we get to talking. We share some small talk for a few minutes before she starts getting into the meat of the interview. She asks a multitude of questions- name a time that I succeeded and what I did that helped me, a time I failed and why, my greatest accomplishment, my best skills, my worst skills, etc. It was a typical interview in the sense that she asked questions that were tough enough for me to think about my answers but easy enough that it did not leave precious seconds of silence on the other end. I tried to be as outgoing and friendly as possible, and had a few questions of my own about the position.

I was interviewing for a management trainee position. It was a 2 year ordeal in which I would train in four different parts of the business for six months at a time- production, customer service, office work, and sales and marketing. Each stage was designed for me to grasp a better understanding of the company and the business. I had been looking for a steady management trainee position, and this was definitely a company that would provide the training.

After about 30 minutes, we started to wrap the interview up. I asked Maria what the next step was. She said that she was going to froward the results of the interview on to the people at the location I applied for (in this case Lawrenceville,) and we'll go for there. I was to expect a call in the next few days. I said thank you and hung up.

The next day I sent Maria a follow up email saying that I appreciated her speaking with me and that I was very much interested in the position. She sent me an email back saying that if I didn't hear anything by Friday I should contact her to see what the situation was. Ok, I can do that.


Part 2

Friday comes, and I don't hear anything from Maria or anyone else from Cintas. I decide I have to do something other than sit and wait by the phone, so I call up Maria and ask her what is going on with my status. She tells me that she isn't sure, that she forwarded my resume on and that someone should have contacted me. I had been through enough interviews to recognize she was buying some time trying to come up with an answer. I asked her if there was anything I could do, and she told me "no," and "just to wait until Monday." I told her that was fine, and I tried to have a good weekend.

Monday comes and I get a call from a woman who we'll call Rhonda. Rhonda seems like a chipper woman on the phone, and even more excited that I am when I listen to the message. She says that she is from the Decatur facility of Cintas, but will be in the Lawrenceville facility today and wanted to speak with me when I got a chance. I called her back when I got the message, but she wasn't there. We played phone tag for about an hour or so until I got her on the phone. She told me that she wanted to just have a quick interview with me over the phone, and I told her that would be great, and we began talking.

Rhonda asked pretty much the same questions that Maria had asked, and I gave her pretty much the same answers. The only difference was that I could understand Rhonda a lot better and was more relaxed knowing she was of original English speaking descent. None of Rhonda's questions were hard, and after about 15 or 20 minutes, she invited me to come to the facility. I was ecstatic. She said that I was going to take an aptitude test and that I should wear a suit because "you never know ho you're going to meet." I thanked her profusely, and we hung up. Great. Two good interviews down and now they want me to come in and take a test! They only give the people they want a test right? Yeah, right.


Part 3

I'm excited for my big break. I did some research on the company and found out that it was actually a solid one. They're what I thought- the uniform people. They also deal in first aid and safety, fire protection, personalized merchandise, and a work in a bunch of smaller similar, but varying industries. I did my homework before the interview- researched the company from it's history to what they're doing currently, and the specifics of the position as well. Ready.

I had made a test run the day before to find out exactly where the facility was. There's nothing I hate more than not being able to find a place when I want to. It really gets me angry. So I knew where I was going. I woke up, did my routine, and headed out the door. I got there in about 15 minutes- which was a very nice commute. I could see myself making this drive every morning. Quiet, through the backwoods of Dacula. Very peaceful. I get to the building about 20 minutes early. It's a new facility, marked by fresh sod, trees staked up with string, and the sound of bulldozers across the street building a neighbor. I park my car and enter the waiting room.

It's a small room with a glass window separating me from a receptionists desk. I tell the woman my name and what time my interview is, and she has me wait in a chair. I sit for about 15 minutes before Rhonda opens the door. "Steven! So nice to meet you, please come in!" She was very nice, and I greeted her back. I walk in and notice the layout- there are cubicles on the left and right of me, and a blob right in front of me. Some high level ofices doted the corners of the building. Rhonda tells me that she has already set up the test for me, and that I can start right away. She leads me to someone's desk, covered with pictures of children, and the pre-Picasso drawings they made. I tell her thanks and she says she'll just be in her office if I need any help. I say thanks again and she leaves.

She told me I was taking a test. What test, I didn't have a clue. I got a bout 5 questions in before I knew what kind. It's a long, comprehensive test that has several aspects. One, is asks about 85 questions regarding my skills as a leader, follower, and employee. Each question is asked about two or three times, with the goal being to trick the test taker into making a mistake when answering and reveal his or her "true" nature. Unfortunately for Cintas, I am not an idiot, and I powered through the first 85 questions or so in relative speed.

Then came question 86. As I suspected, it was the mathematics, or, pain in the ass part of the test. This part, which spans about 30 questions, starts with simple math problems, moves into more complicated fractions, number associations, and that game where you have to figure out what number comes next. I'm about 3 questions into the math section when I realize two things. One, I suck at math. Two, I can't count that high in my head. It had taken me about 5 minutes on the 4th problem and I still couldn't get it. I sit there helpless for a minute before taking action. I got up and walked over to the receptionists desk, where I had calculated Rhonda to be about done with her conversation with the woman. I asked Rhonda if it was alright if I used pen and paper to figure out some of the responses. Her exact response to me was "Oh yeah sure. Go ahead and use a calculator if you need it. I'd rather beg for forgiveness than ask for permission, right?" I nodded in agreement, and went back to my desk, my mind doing flips because now I could figure it out.

The math took me longer than I wanted it to. Several questions dealt with more complex problem solving, the kind that when you get right you're jsut annoyed that it took that long instead of being happy you solved it. Placing people around a table, arranging times for people to "work" on a house, it all was annoying. At least I had seen the problems before when I took a similar test when i interviewed with Target. Overall, I'd say it took me about an hour and fifteen minutes to complete the test, which was well within the time range Rhonda gave me.

After I finish and press Submit, I walk up to Rhonda and tell her I am done. She nods and tells me to wait in the waiting room again for a few minutes while she gets ready to talk to me one on one. I do as I'm told and sit patiently for another 5 minutes or so. The door eventually opens and Rhonda takes me back to her office.

Funny enough, my mom actually knew Rhonda before this interview. As I've mentioned before, my mom is a recruiter, and regularly contacts companies inquiring about them using her services. At some time in the past when my mom worked for another company, she came in contact with Rhonda. Nothing materialized, but they parted ways amicably. So I had an in, sort of. I figured I could slide in the fact that I was Lynn's son. My last name is somewhat unique, and I figured she has some idea up to this point.

We get into her office and start the interview. She was a nice woman- short, small build, with short graying hair spiked in various directions. She opted out of the standard middle aged look apparently. The conversation is relaxed, and I'm feeling good. She asks about my experiences in classes, and I deliver with some better than average examples of times I took over and showed leadership in classes and how I work well with others. We go over college, the courses I took, and how I have tried to apply some of the course concepts I learned into the projects I've worked on. I'm doing well, and Rhonda is nodding more and more as I talk. Our conversation runs about 35 minutes or so, with me asking what exactly the position would entail daily and other general questions.

The position seems interesting. It's two years, with six months in four different areas. It's not rocket science, and Rhonda mentioned that at least once during our interview. It's industrial laundry. We're coming towards the end of the interview when Rhonda makes a surprise move. She asks if I have anything else on my schedule for the day. I tell her no, and she says great. She wants me to interview with Mike, who is one step higher than her and actually works in the management side of the company. She says that he can give me a better idea of what everything is all about. I tell her that'd be great and she walks me into a medium sized conference room with all glass windows on one side. I'm told me wait until Mike is done talking with someone on the phone.

About 5 minutes go by, and I'm still waiting on Mike. I hear him in the back, but I don't see him. Another guy from the back room periodically pops his head out telling me that Mike "is coming." After about 10 minutes, someone realizes that Mike is not coming, and my informant comes out of the back room. He's tall, about 6'4, and lanky. He says hi and I immediately notice an accent not of this country. He's all smiles and introduces himself as Mark. I say hi, and he says that Mike is going to be a while and that he is going to take me on a tour of the facility. Super!

We walk out of the conference room and into the meat and potatoes of the Cintas plant. We walk into what I can basically describe as an oversized, mostly automated dry cleaners. It was huge. He takes me over to the right hand side to show me the process from the beginning to the end. Mark is ducking to avoid hitting low hanging clothes and metal rods, I am comfortably tagging along below him. We get to the beginning and start chatting. I can hardly hear him, probably due to one or more factors that may include: the loud level of noise, the fact that he wasn't facing me when he talked, the fact that there were other people talking around him, the fact that he was almost a foot taller than me. I tried to be as responsive as possible while he showed me what was going on.

The process is very simple: Many trucks are out on routes daily. They are going to about 20 or 30 companies a day that they have accounts with, and picking up their dirty mats, towels, and clothes. These kind people replace the dirty stuff with clean stuff, and haul the dirty crap back to the facility. Here everything is dumped and sorted out into their respective parts. Each item is thrown into an industrial washer and dryer, and then sent to be pressed. Here people place the clothes on hangers and the shirts, pants, etc are pressed and circle around on a huge conveyer belt, much like that of a dry cleaners. There is a tag on each piece of clothing that some computer reads that determines where each piece of clothing goes. It's very interesting, and simplistic in its nature. The fact that a computer just looked at a tag on the clothing and sent it across the entire room to meet its matching pair of pants was really cool. But like I said, glorified laundry.

The entire tour takes about 20 minutes or so. Along the way Mark is introducing me to the workers on the floor. To each person we talk to he says "Hey this is Steven. He's a new management trainee." Everywhere we went he told people that I already had the position. So I had to explain, to every person, that I was still just interviewing and that I hadn't actually gotten the position yet. It did feel kind of good just being led around being told that I was the newest recruit. We made our way through the operating room and back to the meeting room where we began. mark told me that he had to go, but that Matt will be right with me.

I sit down and wait another five minutes for Matt. Finally, a figure appears from one of the back rooms. Matt is about six feet, in shape, with a face that looks like if he didn't shave every morning he's have a Santa Clause beard by mid afternoon. He greets me and sits down next to me. I turn my chair so that I'm parallel to the table and facing him. We start talking. He says that he has to ask me some tough questions, but that "he doesn't really like this part of he interview." He starts asking, and all the questions seem somewhat similar to the ones that I was asked by Rhonda earlier on. So, naturally, I give somewhat similar answers, figuring that they'll probably compare them, but if I keep my stories in line it shouldn't be a problem. We go through about 6 in depth questions where I am expected to give an in-depth answer, what I learned from it, and what I would have done differently.

Then he starts with some of the more personable questions- he asks if I liked the tour Mark took me on, and I say yes, it was definitely very interesting. I don't know how else to phrase the fact that it was an interesting facility. I've never been to a place like this before, I had no idea what sorts of things went on in the back room, and interesting just seems like the best word to describe it. I'm sure that when i say interesting people think "boring" or even "not interesting." Either way, it wasn't the highlight of my life, but it wasn't that bad either.

After about 25 minutes with Matt, the interview is coming to a close. I feel good about this- I had an answer for every question they threw my way, and every answer seemed to impress or please whoever I was talking with. Matt led me out of the meeting room and I said bye to Rhonda. The agreement was that I would be contacted within a week as to whether I would be invited back for another interview. I felt pretty sure that I would get the invite. I said bye and thanks to Matt one more time and left. I walked to my car and checked my watch. Four hours had gone by. Pretty long interview, and I was hoping that it was one of my last.

I got home and the next day sent out thanks you letters to each person that I interviewed with, minus Mark. I thanked them for taking the time to speak with me...yaddi yaddi yaddah. I felt confident about the interviews, and Cintas as well.


Part 4

At this point in my quest for a career, I had somewhat trailed off in my search for jobs. I had had three successful interviews with Cintas, and I felt as though they really liked me. I liked the company, I could see myself doing the job, and essentially assumed that it would work out. Because of this, I cut back on the number of emails and resumes I sent out on a daily basis. I felt like my search was coming to a close, and that I didn't necessarily need to keep sending out 6 to 7 resumes per day. It normally takes time for companies to find a resume and decide that they want to call me in, so keeping a constant circulation of resumes in the market is essential to finding a job faster.

At this point in time I had been in talks with Cintas for about 2 and a half weeks. About a week or so in I started tapering off the number of resumes I sent out, because I was getting a better feel for the company. I was mentally preparing myself to take the job if it was offered when I got a call from Cintas. It was from Rhonda, the HR lady. She said that they enjoyed having me the other day and that they wanted me back in for ANOTHER interview. Wow. I said great and we scheduled for me to interview in two days. I was pumped.

In the back of my mind, I was thinking that some sort of offer might be extended towards my way. The guy I was meeting with, lets call him John, was the head manager of the Lawrenceville facility and frm what I understood one of the big head honchos that would do the hiring. I had already had several interviews from some of the lower managers and employees, and I figured this would be more informal with even some talks about benefits and salary. I wasn't expecting anything difficult, or what I ended up getting.

On the day of my interview, I woke up early and did my morning routine. I got in my car and ended up at the Cintas plant about 15 minutes early. I waited for the allotted 15 minutes before John saw me. He was one of the people who maintained a corner window office that I mentioned earlier. When he finally came to retrieve me, we shook hands and he led me into his office. There was his desk and a smaller round table with several chairs. We sat down at the small table and started talking.

Immediately I notice that this was not going to be the easy going, offer giving interview I was hoping for. John was, for lack of a better term, an asshole. He had a smug way about him that reeked of superiority over others. We started talking about college and the normal chit chat stuff. It wasn't long before he side stepped the bullshit and got into the meat of the conversation.

"So, Steven, what do you want to be doing in five years?"

I answered as truthfully as I could

"Well, I'd like to be in a sales position where I have entensive knowledge of a company and its products, and be able to apply the products to new industries and find new applications for it in current markets."

It's true. That's what I'd like to do. I can see myself doing that. I can also do management- I like management to an extent. I should have thought of that first.

"Oh, well, what we're really looking for here is a manager, that's why we have the management trainee position."

"Oh"

What am I supposed to say to this? I don't want to be the person who immediately recants their story and says "oh no I like management, I want to do management!" Shit.

The rest of the interview went something like this, where I gave an answer that just didn't seem to fit the mold of what John wanted. I was nervous, and after the initial screw up, I kept fidgeting, which lead to sweating, which led to worse and worse answers. I wanted out. I wanted a do over. I wanted it over.

John and I kept the interview going, and I tried to make up for what had happened earlier. I could feel myself being tense and not as open as I could have. I was on defensive mode. When you give and answer and someone immediately says no, thats not what we're looking for, you tend to try to salvage something. After about twenty minutes or so, it was clear the interview was coming to a close. He asked if I had any questions. I had a few.

"Whats the one thing management trainees say about the training after the two years?"
"They say it's the hardest they've ever worked in their lives."

...ok

"What would be the next step after this interview?"
"Well, if we decided that you would move on, we would have you meet with Frank, our district VP, and then the President of Cintas."

Holy shit, I'm thinking. This is my fourth interview and I would have two more just for an ENTRY LEVEL management trainee? They better be paying the big bucks. I ask a few more unimportant questions before I decide to stop the bleeding and leave. I get his card and exit the building. I don't have a good feeling. I blew the interview, and I didn't really say anything that promoted me as a great candidate for the position. But, I told them what I wanted, and I was honest with myself, so at least I have that going for me, which is nice.

The next day I reluctantly sent John an email thanking him for seeing me. I knew the interview went well, and hoped that he would take the email and add some points to my name. I was assured from my family that he would take that interview into consideration with the other people I spoke with, and that it would all balance out. This was on a Wednesday. I was pretty much banking on Cintas.

Friday came and I heard no word from Cintas. Nothing on that Monday either. On the following Thursday I get a response. I was expecting a phone call from Rhonda, or an email from one of the three people I interviewed with. No. Instead, I get a generic email from the HR department at Cintas saying thanks for your interest, but we've decided to go a different direction. No reason why, nothing. I was stunned. Here is a copy of that rejection letter:


Dear Steven:


We appreciate your interest in the position of Management Trainee -
G&A-10044800. After careful consideration, we regret to inform you that you have
not been selected for this position.

We will retain your candidate file in our database and may inform you of job
openings that match your profile if you selected this option. We also invite you to
revisit the Career Section on our Corporate Web site or click directly on this link
www.cintas.com/careers to access other available opportunities or to update your
profile.

We thank you for your interest in Cintas and wish you all the best in your career.



Sincerely,
Cintas Human Resources


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I couldn't believe it. Denied? I spent hours and hours interviewing with this company, spoke to several people in the organization, and they don't even have the courtesy to send me a personalized email saying no? It infuriated me. I decided to do something.

I sent Rhonda an email- simply saying that I received an email from the HR department saying that I was not selected and if there was anything specific that I did in the interview. I wanted to know what I did wrong so I could fix it next time. I made the email out to be very nice, asking questions in an inquisitive nature. I expected to get a response, any response.

I never got a response. Rhonda never emailed me back, and I never heard anything back from Cintas. Once I received the rejection letter from HR, I was written off as a candidate and as a person looking for some feedback. I was pissed. If they didn't have the decency to respond to my email after the fact, I probably didn't want to work for them. I was angry and defeated. I was back to square one.

Unfortunately, since I had stopped sending out so many resumes, I also had no contacts or interviews lined up in the following week. I was really back to square one. So for the next week I to jobs like a bat out of hell- anything and everything that looked appealing. I had to, I had just spent about two to three weeks thinking about Cintas and their management trainee program, and preparing myself to take the job. Now, I had to start all over. Damn.

Total time spent: Several weeks interviewing and thinking about the company, about 6 plus hours total interviewing, many more preparing for the interviews, and about 30 minutes for a good cry afterwards.

Total lessons learned: Always, ALWAYS keep as many options open as possible.