Day 165 - The Road to the Foreign Service

Interpreter image by xmacex, via Flickr.com

It all started in 1965 when Miss Buslee assigned a research paper on careers we were interested in. At that point all I knew was that I wanted to do something with foreign languages. I had started studying German in ninth grade, the earliest time that foreign languages were offered. The alternative was Latin, but I wanted to study a language that was still being spoken. I would have had to wait a year to begin studying French or Spanish. So German it was.

I was a long way from mastery of German then - still am - but I jumped into the research enthusiastically. I learned about the difference between translators and interpreters. I learned that beyond those two career options, nearly every other career that involved foreign languages involved mastery of something else. In fact, the foreign language part was secondary to whatever that something else was. Even translators and interpreters had to understand the subject matter they translated. A musician wouldn't necessarily have the vocabulary or knowledge to be able to translate a medical or engineering paper.

That led me to explore careers that involved travel where knowledge of languages would be an advantage. That is how I stumbled on information about the U.S. Department of State and careers in the Foreign Service.

As exciting as such a career sounded, however, what I learned back in 1965 led me to conclude it was not likely a career for me. First, there were the medical requirements. Somehow I had gotten the impression that my eyesight was so bad that I would never be hired for certain jobs, as a flight attendant, for example. And the information available in 1965 about the Foreign Service made it sound like only those with perfect vision could get in. And then there was the fact that until 1972, only single women were accepted into the Foreign Service. It was never in the law that women in the Foreign Service who married would have to resign, but it had become practice. In addition, it was practice that only married Foreign Service Officers would be sent to certain countries of the world, including eastern Europe. As a result, after completing that research paper, I put aside any thoughts of a Foreign Service career. I concentrated on other options for using foreign languges and travel. Teaching English as a Second Language was the path still open.

Ten years after completing that research paper, I rediscovered the Foreign Service. Several people I met in Tehran signed up for the written exam, the first step in what was then a several year process of gaining acceptance into the Foreign Service. The written exam was only given once a year, on the first Saturday of December - in every country of the world on the same day. I heard my friends who took the exam talk about how difficult it was. Everyone seemed to know someone who walked out in the middle of it, giving up at that first step.

I was still devoted to the idea of teaching English around the world, so I didn't sign up for the exam while I was overseas. But after a year of living in Romania where my sense of civic duty was heightened after watching the effect of oppressive practices in both Iran and Romania at the same time as I gained first-hand experience with what those working in an embassy did, I decided I had to try to get into the Foreign Service. I loved teaching English, and I loved the travel it offered, but I was not excited by the lack of certainty such a life offered. Both the job in Iran and the Fulbright position in Romania were temporary options. And in both cases, I didn't know that I was going to get them until less than a month before I needed to ready to leave. A position with the federal government that would transfer me from one place to another seemed the perfect solution.

In 1978, I took the written exam for the first time. There were two separate sections that were graded in addition to a written exercise that was only looked at if the candidate passed the other parts. I passed one of the two graded sections, but not the other. So the following year, I took the exam again. That time, I passed all sections. That meant I would be invited to the second round, the oral assessment.

That year, the oral assessment was offered in Minneapolis where I was living. On each assessment day, six candidates are invited to attend. On my day, only five of us showed up.

The oral assessment involved an-hour long leaderless discussion during which we were observed as we each made a presentation in favor of a proposal that the group would have to decide whether to fund. About half way through the exercise, one of the assessors informed us that we had just had the funding cut, so we would not be able to fund all of any of the proposals. We had to decide how to allocate the smaller amount of money. Most of the candidates seemed to think they would only pass if their proposal was funded. But the exercise was about leadership, and clear thinking, and making sound decisions, not winning or losing.

Discussion image by Writers' Centre Norwich,
via Flickr.com

Another segment involved a two-on-one interview. Two assessors asked questions of each candidate to assess critical thinking, experience, social awareness, and all those things that go into what I recall Dad referring to as "common sense," usually spoken in the sentence, "You don't have any common sense." I recall being asked to describe the Brezhnev Doctrine. I was sure I failed when I admitted right away that I didn't know what the Brezhnev Doctrine was. Later I learned that was the best answer I could have given, unless I knew what it was.

The final segment involved writing - the segment that had been part of the written exam the year before was moved to the oral assessment stage instead - and an in-basket exercise. I enjoyed that part, although I didn't score all that well on it. The scenario was that the candidate had just arrived in country and had one day ahead of the first business day to go through the in box of the predecessor who had left several weeks before. The in box seemed full, but in time I learned what was represented as several weeks of work was more like a day's worth of work. I discovered that all the names of all the people mentioned in the documents were non-gender-specific. That meant that any gender biases in the responses were those of the candidates, not those who wrote the exam. From conversations after this section, it was clear the other four that day hadn't noticed this. They all referred to the ambassador as "he" when the name was a gender-ambiguous Chris.

Interview image by Writers' Centre Norwich,
via Flickr.com

I passed that stage as well, which led to two more stages that could occur simultaneously - the medical and security clearances. Only when they were concluded did I learn that my name was on the register, the list of names, ordered by scores, highest to lowest. Names remain on the register for 18 months. The names move up and down during that time, depending on the scores of those added or dropped off later. Only about half of the people whose names go onto the register are offered entry into the Foreign Service. I knew that my name was in the middle third, but I couldn't learn more. Eighteen months passed. My name never came to the top. And so I started the process again. The second time around, the oral assessment was in Chicago. Other details were similar and familiar. I passed again, and the waiting began again.

Twenty years after Miss Buslee assigned that research project, I had succeeded. I was offered a position as a Foreign Service Officer. It was a long road. More than once during those seven years that I actively sought entry into the Foreign Service I answered that question that was typical during annual assessments - where do you see yourself in five years? - with the admission that I expected to be a Foreign Service Officer by then. It probably wasn't a wise way to answer that question, but when the opportunity came for me to accept the position, I felt the two former bosses I had given that response were as excited for me as I was for myself.