iPhone: the perfect job interview tool

I'm deep in the job interview process, and I have been driving up to San Francisco nearly every day for the past 3 weeks for interviews. The iPhone has become the perfect and indispensable tool.

I don't use many of the features on it, but those that I do use are critically valuable. The phone, obviously, to make and receive calls. Email, to check for new missives on the go, and to respond to anything time critical, SMS for last-minute syncing with interviewers. And the maps. Oh my god, the maps.

Mapping is the killer feature for me. I use it all the time. Obviously I use it to find destinations and get driving directions to them. But I also use it to find parking, look for local vegetarian restaurants, find nearby shopping and just seeing where the hell I am while traveling. (Tip: double-tap to zoom in, tap once with 2 fingers to zoom out. Yeah, totally non-obvious. Maps needs better single-handed zooming.)

I have the original iPhone, so my current location isn't as good as with a GPS. But it's good enough, and that's all that matters. Using my iPhone, I found the Portsmith parking garage, just 1 block away from my meeting at the TransAmerica tower. I got to the meeting on time and only paid $7.50 for 3 hours of parking.

Because of my iPhone, I no longer need to plan before leaving the house. I can do everything just-in-time while I'm out and about. I've even had several phone interviews in the car with one company while driving up for an on-site interview with a second company. Now that's multi-tasking.

And when I'm done with all of my job-seeking tasks, I switch over to the iPod app and groove to Death Cab, Ben Folds, and Dr. Horrible.

I have seen the future of mobile computing, and I am living it today with my iPhone.

Comments

[andyruff.myopenid.com]

I'd say you've seen the future of computing, not just mobile computing. I've been tracking a rough estimate of the percentage of non-work time I spend performing tasks on my iPhone vs. my laptop. It's amazing how quickly my habits have shifted. As someone who used to spend a fair amount of time tethered to my laptop, my iPhone is now outpacing the laptop nearly 3:1 in time and many weekends my laptop sits idle until Sunday afternoon rolls around and work begins. I'm now trying to see if there's a shift in what I do as a result of using the iPhone, but I've noticed that change seems far more subtle short of geo scenarios.

[Josh J]

Welcome to 1997 Japan!