Week 2 EOC: Sweet Charity

In the movie Sweet Charity, Shirley Mclaine plays a taxi dancers looking to get out of the biz and do something better with her life. "There ain't no use flappin' your wings, 'cause we are all stuck in the flypaper of life." (Sweet Charity). exclaims Helene, another taxi dancer character from the film. Charity refuses to accept this and while everyone else around her becomes complacent with the life they've been dealt, Charity actively tries to make a difference.She goes to a staffing agency hoping to get hired somewhere even though she has no office experience and essentially does a lot of things wrong in the interview itself. "The industry in general, and many organizations more specifically, have implemented and publicized efforts to upgrade the industry's reputation by making genuine efforts to offer career opportunities, with all of the advantages that accrue to them, to all interested persons" (Hayes and Ninemeier 15). While the interview definitely was not the most welcoming, Charity still should have done her due diligence in what was needed for a job. Looking around the staffing agency, one can see that she is dressed differently than the other women in the office. The women in the office are all dressed in skirt suits and she is dressed a bit more casually in a top and skirt. She should have come a day earlier and scoped out what the company attire and culture of the office was to get a better sense of how to dress. Another misstep she makes is getting emotional during the interview. She feels as if her chance for another life is slipping away when she cannot answer "yes" to any of the answers the interviewer is asking her. While this is certainly discouraging to anyone in the situation, the best thing to do is to stay calm and approach the situation in a professional way perhaps by asking what courses she can take to prepare for the position, etc. A woman entering the professional workforce, or any person, so leave over the top emotions at the door and become the professional (enter job title here) they are meant to be once they enter.

Charity did however do somethings that she should be applauded for! She was the only taxi dancer who actually followed through in their resolve to have a better life as she tried to answer the question presented in song in the film, "Where am I going?" (Sweet Charity). That takes a lot of gumption! The first step to success is making that first step and Charity made the decision to go to the interview and try looking for a professional position in an office setting. Another thing she did correctly is not give up when the interviewer kept asking her questions she could not answer yes to. Her tenacity is to be applauded as it is a tough job market out there and one must definitely have a tough skin.