Lara Warren

Lara Warren was the interviewer for a company recruiting telesalespeople in 1991. Successful applicants worked from home, selling designer fitted kitchens.

In May of that year, Deirdre Barlow applied for a job and was called in for an interview. Deirdre had just lost a Council election to Alf Roberts and was finding it difficult to find work, hence her applying for a position in telesales which was far from her first choice. Lara was also wary of the candidate; the company preferred their salespeople to be informal and inject their own personality into the conversation with clients, and as Deirdre was a former councillor, Lara was concerned that she would be on the hoity-toity side.

The interview itself was informal, carried out in the company's reception where Deirdre had been waiting. Lara set the tone by telling that her mother had a thing for Doctor Zhivago, hence her name. Relieved to find that Deirdre was down-to-Earth, Lara appeared to make up her mind right then and spent the remainder of the interview giving Deirdre advice on how to "sell the dream".

Deirdre got to work that morning but found the job soul destroying, consisting mainly of people putting the phone down on her and men making improper suggestions. After ten days, she was sacked for not making any appointments.