At some point, I went from the three-day book polish and nervous sweat to the cut-it-down-to-what’s-relevant-and-read-the-dunn-and-bradstreet mode. I didn’t do it on purpose. It was somewhere around the point that I decided that I didn’t care about my book, that I was happy in my job and I was ready to do good work.

Sure, there’s the snarky ad with the obvious joke still in my book. And I do get a bit sweaty when they ask the stupid, “And if our agency were a bird, what kind of bird do you think it would be?” But at this point, my book is just a launching spot for me talking about how I can make the person across the table look really, really good. To their clients, to their boss. I’ve finally started treating the CDs and the HR people like the target market I told myself I had to focus on all along. And it’s not even phony.

When you’re a junior, you can’t wait to get your foot in the proverbial door. You “network” – which usually means pestering people you admire to pay attention to you and give you advice. As you start working, though, it’s not the people you look up to that get you in the door wallpapered in opportunity. It’s the people who still remember you from grad school, or the school show, or your thesis presentation. It’s the guy you helped get a job by working on his junior book with him. The gal who was really bad at the last job you had together, but somehow had an epiphany, got an amazing job and remembered “that cool thing you did, you know that one time?” You run into people who know you on a bus heading into Chinatown drunk on the way to an indie show and when they see you, they just happen to remember this job opening up at their work and how you’d be just perfect.

But when you get to be old and bitter (and everyone over 30 in this business is both), you find that somehow the power that used to be in the hands of the person across the desk is somehow in perfect equilibrium. You know what to watch out for when a creative director says, “But next year, this place will be amazing.” (It’s a sinkhole. Run.) You understand the subtext when the midlevel folks tell you you’ll do great work, “when you’re not stuck in a meeting.” (We’re too mired in meetings to do anything”) You find yourself asking questions in the interview. Not because some job manual told you to. But because you’re not going to jump on the least little thing that offers you two-weeks, four sick days and the ability to expense a Moleskein every two months.

You’re no longer the single guy who can’t meet a nice girl because he seems desperate. You’re the guy who’s got a fine relationship, but that’s not going to stop him from flirting with hot girls who are begging in case something truly better comes along.

Like dating, you can’t force it. You can only fake it. You can polish your book until it gleams, but fake the confidence enough to take criticism well. You can know the strategy, the positioning, the business issue behind everything you do so you’re the one they’re interviewing, not your book. You can ask smart questions. You can have a poker face. You can know your true market rate and walk if they offer you a crap salary without a promise of a review in three months, six months. You can treat everyone you talk to like your potential lunch and beer buddy, without talking like a trucker. You can be modest, be honest, be smart. You can know that people would rather hire the nice guy with the good work than the arrogant shit with the terrific work – unless they’re looking to put their name on it for the awards shows.

And then you’re at least playing grownup. Which puts you ahead of more than half of the candidates they see.