So, I’ve been screwed.

I’ve been writing about how I was one of the finalists for the Best Brews Summer Intern position and how I was going to fly to New York to interview with the Chief Beer Officer as well as the Sheraton executives, and I’ve been waiting patiently for my phone to ring with details.  I even called them five days after receiving the phone call and asked for some details since, well, it had been five days and I still hadn’t heard anything, and the PR person I’d been incontact with said she’d have to call me back.  That was May 7th.  It’s been two and a half weeks, and I hadn’t heard anything.  I got a UPS envelope delivered last week with a copy of my background check, so I figured things were just moving slowly.

Imagine my surprise, then, when Hanne discovered that the Best Brews Intern website (which I will not link to from this blog) was updated with the four finalists.  Four people, none of whom are me.  Wait, what?  Wasn’t I explicitly told I was one of the finalists?  Wasn’t I outright asked “What are your plans next week?” when first called to tell me I was one of the finalists?

I have been taught to be as professional as possible when dealing with others, and something like this smacks of amateur hour.  Or just corporate bullshit.  Not even a fucking phone call to say “Well, we decided to go with another candidate, but thank you for your video submission” or “I’m truly sorry, but there’s been a horrible mixup.”  Not a peep.  I found out second-hand.  I would have found out for myself when I checked the website the next day, but the fact that I didn’t get a phone call, email, or letter telling me as such (and I know they have all three of those since they’ve used two of them twice apiece) reeks of the worst kind of shenanagins.

Just in case they didn’t know what my email was, I made sure that they got it last night, too, and I sent this email to the PR person I’d been dealing with, the Chief Beer Officer, and every executive who sounded like they might have anything to do with this project.

Dear Sirs,

This letter feels extremely unprofessional as I write it, but I would like a moment to express my displeasure with a situation I have been involved with regarding your corporation.

I was one of the many applicants for the Best Brews Summer Intern position and one of the 20 finalists chosen from the thousands of submissions. I spent most of the week following that news producing a 5-minute video and overnighting it to [name removed] so that I could share my love for beer–at my own expense, I might add, since a mailing label was mistakenly not included with my packet and the instructions I was given were not sufficient since I was not given billing information for Starwood’s FedEx account.  I received a call two and a half weeks ago from [name removed] informing me that I was one of the four finalists and that you would like to fly me out to New York in order to be interviewed for the Best Brews intern position, and I was directly asked, what was I doing the next week?  Would I have the time to fly to New York and meet with the executives and [name removed], the Chief Beer Officer?  That was on May 2nd.  [name removed] told me that she would get back to me with some specific details of plans.  When I hadn’t heard from anyone by May 7th, I called [name removed] in order to confirm that plans were still in place to fly me to New York, and after I reached her she told me she would have to call me back.  It is now May 19th as I write this, and I never heard back from her or any other representatives from Starwood after that phone call on May 7th.

It was brought to my attention tonight that the Best Brews Intern website was updated with the final four applicants, and you will have to imagine my surprise and disappointment that I am not among them.  After being contacted by [name removed] and informed that I was not only one of the finalists, but one of the final four, you can imagine my surprise at the discovery that the final four faces do not include my own.  Just last week I received a UPS envelope containing a copy of the clean background check that was performed on me, and while I did not take this to be a guarantee of anything, I believe it showed that there was still interest in me for the Best Brews Intern position and it renewed hope that things were just moving slowly.

I feel that I must be blunt: I find the lack of professionalism I have encountered so far to be appalling both as an applicant for the position as well as a consumer.  A simple phone call telling me that while my submission was appreciated, the company was going to proceed with a different candidate would have sufficed, but since I had also already been informed that I was supposed to be included with the four candidates that can be found right now at the URL at [I'm so not linking to the website] I obviously felt I was beyond that point.  Was there a mixup somewhere?  Why was I not informed of this change after almost three weeks of waiting?  I am disappointed that I did not get an opportunity to talk in person with [name removed] and the other Starwood executives about my passion for beer, yes, but after being explicitly told that I was a finalist for this position and then finding out second-hand from someone else that I was not included with the finalists was a bit of a shock to me, so I hope you will pardon my vocal displeasure of the process.  In particular, the lack of communication from your end that could have avoided this mildly angry correspondence would have gone a long way in allaying the disappointment and annoyance I feel right now.

As one final note, I was assured by [name removed] (and also in the letter I received as one of the final 20) that the cost of overnighting my video submission to you would be paid for by Starwood, and I would like to request the $30.66 in FedEx postage I spent for the video I produced for you to be returned to me.  I was going to write it off as money well-spent in pursuing what might have been the beginnings of a very interesting position, but the lack of any kind of communication from your company have convinced me that I would like my postage money refunded.  I was assured that Starwood would pay for the postage both over the phone and in writing, and I would like to exercise that assurance.

I hope that the individual who is selected to be your Best Brews Summer Intern serves you well and that they have a memorable summer, but please understand that due to the circumstances I have outlined above, I will most likely not be voting for any of the candidates.  Thank you very much.

I don’t know if I got the executive and Chief Beer Officer’s email addresses right, but I used the same format that the PR person’s email was in (firstname.lastname).  I haven’t gotten any bouncebacks, at least, so I can only presume that my email was received and someone has seen it, but frankly, given my experience thus far I’m not hopefully that I’ll ever hear back from them.

Ideally, what would my desired outcome of this be?  I thought a lot about that last night as I lay awake in bed most of the night (for the second night in a row, I might add, but for unrelated reasons the previous night) and I think my ideal outcome would be my $30.66 back and an apology from someone of consequence (as in, not the PR person who never called me back) where they admit that either there was a collosal screwup somewhere or they acted completely unprofessionally.  I don’t want this job now.  I mean, I do want the job, but I wouldn’t want it under the circumstances that have transpired even if they offered it to me or offered to put me in the finalists after all.  For starters, there are four people with their faces on the website with friends and families who want them to get the job, and I could never bump them out of the running even if it were offered.  Secondly, I don’t think this is a company I want to work for/with at the moment.  I understand about screwups (I’ve made a few of them myself, after all), but this is just something else.

So I’m both upset and embarrassed.  I’m upset that a job I worked very hard to get didn’t give me the courtesy that I was due, especially since they had told me that I was in the finalists for it.  I’m embarrassed that I’ve gone around for the last two and a half weeks telling my friends and family I was in the running for this job when apparently I wasn’t.  I stood in front of the Oregon Brew Crew and told 75 Portland homebrewers I was in the running for this position.  I told my friends in the industry.  I told a friend in the media.  I stood in front of a dozen of my friends and family last weekend at my BBQ and I told the story of how I was in the final four candidates and how they wanted to fly me to New York to interview.

If the embarrassment I feel at having to admit to them that not only did I not get the job but there’s a chance I was never going to get it in the first place can be offset by anything, it’s that I can go back to all my friends and family and my contacts in the industry and my friend in the media and 75 Portland homebrewers and tell them the story of how Starwood Hotels and Four Points by Sheraton screwed me over and treated me extremely unprofessionally.  I look forward to telling people of the amateurism I had to deal with.

And I look forward to the apology I deserve but likely won’t receive.