When we were told that we were going to be interviewing board members, at first I didn’t know how to feel because I knew it wasn’t going to be easy; at the same time, if I followed the directions I was given, it wouldn’t be too hard. The week before the interview I felt okay and I thought about it but it wasn’t an overwhelmed kind of thinking. The day before the interview I felt a little nervous because I thought “Okay, so I know and have the questions I want to ask but how is it going to go?” I didn’t know what to expect even thought we talked about the process and everything. The hour before the interview I was filled with anticipation, excitement and nervousness at the same time. The minute before the interview I was more relaxed because I had a partner to do the interview with and I knew we could feed off each other and work together.
The thing that surprised me about George Knight was the fact that he was so cool and that he really, really had this love for New Haven -- so much that he moved some of his family out here. He considers New Haven the arts capital of Connecticut and joined the board at a bad economic time. If that doesn’t show love for the arts, I don’t know what does. Before I interviewed him, I honestly thought that he was just going to be a typical board member and say nice things about Arts and Ideas because that was something he was supposed to do. But when Inez and I began to ask him questions, he answered them so genuinely, you couldn’t help but believe what he was saying because of what and how he said it. I learned that an interview is only as comfortable as you make it. It’s just a conversation between two or more people. I’m not saying you won’t get nervous while doing that, because I did; but, I learned that if you make eye contact, ask open-ended questions, listen and ask follow-up questions, relax and be comfortable, make the person you’re interviewing comfortable, “foster” respect, and think of the interview as a conversation, you’ll be fine, or at least you should be. If I could do anything differently it would probably be to ask some more questions.