This morning, I took a writing and editing/proofreading test for the managing editor job I applied for. The writing portion was basic: take portions of two press releases and write a news story.
The editing/proofreading part was heart-rending. It was a printout of four stories so riddled with errors that any editor would beat the writer senseless with his own stapler.
My testsheet was a web of red marks by the end. I was as clear and neat as possible and I hope I caught everything. I’m concerned about my performance correcting the lead story, which was something like eight nightmarish paragraphs of spelling, grammatical and style mistakes, which I painstakingly corrected.
By the time I got to the last paragraph, I realized what was actually the lead of the story had been craftily planted there by the testers. I fell into that trap. I ended up writing a note at the top of my paper explaining that I understood what needed to be done and described the new focus of a rewrite. Was that enough? I’ll know soon enough; I’m to expect a callback by the end of the week. If I pass, I move on to some more interviews. Here’s hopin’.