You need only to spend five minutes with me to pick up on my affinity for sports, and a few more moments will inevitably lead to my fancy with ESPN.  As a lifelong sports fan, athlete, broadcaster, writer and trivia buff, it's literally the ultimate gig for people in my line of work.  Recently, the TV sports network considered me for a position; while the process didn't work out in my favor, I'm motivated to document my courting (pun most certainly intended).

While I won't divulge the particularities of the interviewing process, I will use this space to give aspiring and prospective staffers of the self-proclaimed "Worldwide Leader in Sports" an abstract view of what to expect when interviewing.  Hey, I'm not working there and I signed no non-disclosure agreements, so all's fair in love and human resources, right?  :-)

So last week I get an e-mail from an HR staffer letting me know I'm being considered for the organization's vaunted Stats & Information Group.  The process, I was quickly told, involved me securing a timeslot in a published schedule for a quick oral exam over the phone on general sports knowledge.  I booked such an appointment, which wound up being the next morning.  The exam was administered by the HR staffer himself, taking 7 minutes and consisting of 5 questions.  You really can't prepare for the grilling - by the company's own admission, it's trivia. You either know the material or you don't.

I assume the questions change from time to time and candidate to candidate, so I'll say only that the inquiries probed my acumen of baseball stats (dissecting the mathematical formulas for statistics), college and pro football (significant events, all-time leaders), golf and the NBA.  While I flubbed the baseball section, which in my case was the first question, I rebounded well and apparently did well enough to allow me to advance to the second phase - the written assessment.

The next stage was administered the very next day, and was a "speed drill exam" - a series of categorical questions on sports math, assuring accuracy in data from wire reports, general knowledge of players' collegiate associations, player names, terminology and esoteric rules.  The exam is long, and you only get 45 minutes to complete as much of it as you can and then return it to your proctor within the time limit.  It's open book/web, but the more time you spend looking up stuff the less time you're working on the exam.  

I drew from my SAT days and skipped an entire section I was spending a little too much time on to get to stuff I could breeze through faster.  I was tons of fun, and very draining.

I was informed two days later that the conclusion based on my scores was that I wouldn't be proceeding to the next phase, which is actual phone time with a hiring manager.  I was down, but still grateful for the opportunity, and hopeful another might pop-up in the near future.

To their credit, the gentleman helping me was incredibly gracious and patient; he answered all my questions honestly and responded quickly.  When it was determined that I didn't have what it took to proceed any further along the interview trail, I was informed right away.  This was actually the second time I'd interviewed for a spot - the first wasn't as enjoyable, being run by a junior staffer for a JavaScript developer position in 2005 who wasn't into sports at all.  Needless to say, this time I had much more fun and encourage anyone interested in a career in sports at that scale and scope to give it a shot.

If you're up for a challenge, the testing alone is worth the price of admission.  So to speak.