Daves Here asked:


Ok, to make a long story short, ive been looking for a month, after i was laid off due to the company closing. Ive been out around 4 days a week putting in applications everywhere-ive lost count as to how many ive put in to tell you the truth. Sitting around drawing unemployment is not my style-i need a job. Its driving me nuts.
Anyways-something just hit me. Where i worked at last was a guy with the exact same first and last name as mine, yet we were not related at all. While a nice guy on one side, he really was not the ideal employee and had been written up several times and was always in some sort of argument with management or other employees.
Is it possible that companies im applying at are calling my past employer-asking about me and they might be getting confused between the two of us? Could they be giving these companies im working at a bad review, because they are getting the two of us mixed up?
I know all that is a long shot………..
Also, i have a job interview today with a company i really want to work for. Should i possibly bring this up somehow? Should i tell them that if they call my previous employer to make certain they ask about the right “Joe Smith” (not my real name) because there was two of us there by the same name? Or would that sound dorky?
We do have different middle names, so hopefully this will help.
I just dont want to sound like some little kid blaming “the bad Joe” for breaking the lamp. Hahaa.
I do think i will bring it up as a side note, just to be safe.
A whole other issue that just came to mind is the fact that the plant we worked at closed, but the corporate office is still in town with mostly a whole other crew of people who have never met me. This is the address and phone number i put down on my application. They probably have my employee records-but would know nothing first-hand of me. My immediate supervisor-he retired around the same time i got laid off and moved out of the state.
Im certain it all will work out in the long run.