The week I almost could have moved to London

Feeling a bit 'stuck in a rut' about our current professional situations in Toulouse, about a month ago I started searching around for other vacancies.

I applied for a job at Sciences Po Paris, but the job had been posted for a long time and had been filled (they obviously don't keep their recruitment page the most up to date...). Three weeks ago I googled "vacancy international study" and ended up on the Guardian's job website, and then on an announcement for a job with the London School of Economics that seemed perfect for me.

I emailed a friend in London to confirm that the salary indicated was decent, then worked on my application. I submitted my CV and cover letter, but figured there would be a lot of qualified applicants and I didn't have a chance of getting an interview.

Then I waited for two weeks with no news. Last Friday I got an email inviting me to an interview. Excited I logged onto the HR platform to chose my interview date, thinking it would be in two weeks.

"December 11 10:30 or 11:00"

So, in five days actually...

After a discussion with my husband and a look at plane tickets, I decided to go for it. I booked an EasyJet ticket, contacted my friend, and logged onto my University account to request a day off. Then I went digging for my Oyster card and proceeded to read the entire LSE website to figure out what the references to Michaelmas term meant.

Tuesday night I caught the late flight out to Gatwick, took the train to Victoria station, met my friend and took the Tube back to her place in an Eastern neighborhood of London. Besides learning about LSE, I had spent as much time as possible during the five days reviewing my key skills and job history for the interview.

Wednesday morning I took the Tube to central London, and walked to LSE. Before entering the building I took out my nice heels from my overnight bag, then checked in with the reception and headed up for the interview.

I met with three staff members who proceeded to ask me a number of scripted interview questions:

How do you know you are providing good service?

Describe a time you took an initiative and what you learned from the experience.

Tell us about a time you contributed to a team and what the result was.

You could say it wasn't what I'm used to in France, and that I wasn't well prepared. No one asked any questions like: Tell us about yourself; Do you have any kids?; What's your biggest weakness?; How comfortable are you with administrative tasks? How long have you been living in France?

After a half hour interview of me stumbling through the interview questions for which I hadn't sufficiently practiced, I was escorted to the office of a professor, and I had a 15 minute interview with two of the professors who manage the Masters.

Then it was time for my test: 30 minutes to reply to two emails (with imaginary situations to take into consideration) and a short task to do in Excel.

And then I was back outside in Lincoln's Inn Fields.

I met up with my friend for lunch, bought some English books for my nephew for Christmas (W H Smith had a promo on picture books to boot), then headed over the British Museum to wander for the two hours I had until I needed to take the train back to Gatwick.

Back at work on Thursday I had to tell one of the professors I work with that she might be contacted as a reference for the LSE, and that incidentally I might be leaving my current position if I got the job.

This morning I opened an email that was sent late yesterday.

I didn't get the job.

I knew my interview wasn't phenomenal, but my heart was still pounding when I opened the email and searched for the sentence about the results of my interview.

I feel a bit like I've been on a roller coaster with two tracks at the end: one track is a huge drop and several loops, and the other is flat and just slows and stops. I got the second one, and now go back to everything as usual. It's a bit disappointing, but at the same time the other option would have been pretty scary. Moving to London and starting a new job would have been a HUGE change, and while I was on the half hour Tube ride to LSE I couldn't help but think of my calm 15 minute bike ride to work I currently have (and also apparently the monthly Tube pass is over 100£! In Toulouse it's 36,50€). There's no British Museum in Toulouse, but for what my friend and her roommates pay to rent a 3 bedroom house with a garden you could rent two similar places in Toulouse.

I'm glad I tried, but I don't know if the take-away lesson is to focus on staying in Toulouse (trying to become a French civil servant, for example), or to keep trying for other opportunities, possibly in other countries.

So that's the story of how I almost could have moved to London.