Name Changer

Having been let go after a 20-year career at the same firm, I found myself interviewing for the first time in decades. I was sending out resumes, contacting friends and colleagues, and signing up with recruiters. Reading all advice online, when any opportunity arose to interview, I took it. I was contacted by a recruiter who had an opening at a fintech firm, a company of about 70 people; the job description was vague but having been in fintech sales for most of my career, I knew it was in my wheelhouse. The first interviewer was great, very easy to talk to and professional. After about 40 minutes he told me he was going to call in the director of HR to speak to me who shared my first name. Strangely he mentioned that she hadn’t wanted to even meet me, but he would ask her to come in. He also mentioned to be sure to give her a strong handshake. When I met her, she was professional and pleasant; we spoke for about a half hour about the position, my work history and the market in general. Things seemed to be going well when wrapping up, she said: “So, what does the M. stand for?” “Mary?” I responded. “Do you ever go by it?” She asked. “No, I do not”, I replied. “Well if you come to work here, you’ll have to change your name, I can’t have another Stephanie working here.” She said. I started to chuckle and realized she was completely serious. She was scanning my resume and kept talking, telling me they had a previous employee named Stephanie and it caused her a lot of issues with phone calls, messages, etc. I said I would go by Steph and she refused, saying that wouldn’t work. “Think about it”, she said, getting up from the conference table and giving me another strong grip but I was already lost in thought, wondering how I could possibly not be called by my own name. The following week, I heard back from the recruiter saying they wanted me to come back. I had told him about the name change issue and that I wasn’t really interested in returning but he persisted. The CEO wanted to speak to me. All those advice columns I had read arose in my mind, an interview with a CEO was good practice at the very least so after a little back and forth, I relented. Upon return, I met with my initial contact who was again professional and polite. We moved to another conference room and he said the CEO would be in shortly. As I waited, I thought, is this really where I want to work? What would my name be? How could I spend my entire day being called something else when I’ve spent 50 years being called Stephanie? The CEO came in as did my namesake to introduce him. As she left, we began to talk about the position and evidently, the job description hadn’t reached him either. He told me he was looking for someone with a completely different background than mine. As he slammed his hand down on the table, he said, what are you doing here, almost shouting. I said I was asked to come meet you and again, slamming his hand down, he shouted, “What are you doing here?” I responded, "wasting my time apparently" and I left.