When 21 year old Harry Potter graduated from the prestigious Hogwart’s Institute as one of the hottest students in his year, he expected a keenly contested bidding war for his services. But six months down the line he was still searching for paid employ of any sort. It had been a sobering period, in which he had come to the horrible conclusion that his expensive education and range of transferable skills (Harry was basically a classically-trained, fully accredited and famous wizard) left no impact in the modern UK employment market.
His stepfather, John Keith Rowling, had warned the young Harry that wizardry was a sunset industry, in which career prospects were disastrous at best. Dumbledore, the trade body for wizards, had folded in 1985 amid much infighting and subsequently the entire industry had been mired in a rearguard battle against the effects of Thatcherism, Majorism, Blairism, and Brownism. It was certainly against his stepfather’s wishes – and those of most industry insiders – that, at age eleven, he proudly enrolled at Hogwart’s Institute, Bolton. A disappointed Rowling was to later tell anyone listening that the boy would never amount to a tin of beans – unless he turned himself into one, using his wand and a cod-Latin incantation. Not a very supportive thing to say!
Most of his fellow graduates were likewise unemployed – or underemployed. His girlfriend Emma Watson was stacking shelves in the UK’s ‘big four’ supermarkets (Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrison, Asda). It was tiring work, although there was at least the dangling organic carrot of career progression in some management scheme or other. His best friend Ronald Weasley (nickname ‘Weaselchops’) was also on the dole, although he was doing some volunteering shit to improve his CV – pro bono catering work for homeless tramps in north London. Some graduates had better luck, however. His hated rival Ian Voldemort had been recruited by a hedge fund in the City, where the arsehole was gleefully trousering £110k pa with an uncapped bonus scheme, company car fully expensed, a pension scheme, family healthcare, 30 days annual holiday and share options. Ian had always had a ‘golden touch’ and his success was no great surprise, even though he was without a nose on his face.
Harry had a strong CV that had been feverishly honed over many days while playing Farmville. It described him as a ‘shameless teamster’ who is ‘equally comfortable plugging away solo’. The document bandied about some powerful attributes – ‘self-starter’, ‘results-oriented’, and ‘customer-facing’. Impressive! He also enjoyed most racquet sports and yogilates. He kept a blog and had 9,413,983 followers on Twitter (Harry Potters fans to a man).
Unsurprisingly, the document had earned him some interviews (on average, between two and nine a month). However, all the interviews had gone quite badly for Harry. He had prepared for each of them feverishly, while playing Farmville, had hit them with his best lines (e.g. ‘’For all-round office admin, I’m the leader of the pack’) but to no avail. He asked for feedback after one interview and received the following: ‘You’re certainly a strong candidate. You’re smart as a whip and fizzing with ideas and optimism. However, with the best will in the world I cannot employ you at his juncture. I ask you once again, please leave my office.’
Harry could not be disappointed for long. He still received some royalties for those films he had been in and was a millionaire several times over.
THE END
Harry Potter, his girlfriend, and a friend (Ronald) in happier times
