Poor people should just simply try working for their father’s company for a year and then taking a VP position at a small fortune 500. I don’t understand why they won’t try that, and pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Tsk tsk tsk.
There’s so many other issues too, such as the fact that old job posts don’t really get removed, employers/recruiters also spam multiple websites with their job posts and forget to check them, and some of the job descriptions don’t even match what you go and sign up for.
No salaries mentioned on lots of posts, multi stage interviews that somehow demand your free time during work hours, so good luck interviewing for other roles while you have a job. Take home assignments that take multiple hours sometimes, sacrificing a whole evening.
Recruiters that will ask for all your information again, despite having found your phone number from your CV, and once you go through that, tell you they have nothing for you and that they’ll be in touch.
Questions that mean nothing in an interview, including acronyms I haven’t used or even heard of outside of interviewing for other jobs, because my job doesn’t need or use them, we just do the work.
Job is listed as remote
During interview they tell you they expect you to move to bumfuck north dakota within 6 months of starting
Job is listed as remote.
During the interview they tell you it only requires 2 days a week in the office. You tell them you don’t have a car… they reply there are trains from where you live to where the office is located… you look it up and they’re right, it’s just a 2 hour commute each way. You start to think “8 hours a week, is like 1.5 hours a day for 5 days, could be worse…”. Then you realize their hiring process requires 3 more on-site interviews before even getting an offer.
Got this with Anchorage, Alaska. How did they expect they could hoodwink somebody up to Anchorage?!
Take home assignments that take multiple hours sometimes, sacrificing a whole evening.
Do NOT do this.
Taking a live proficiency test is one thing, particularly if you’re applying for more senior roles, but doing actual projects for free in your spare time should be a hard pass. Full stop.
Not doing a home assignment(or work test as we call them) would mean never getting a job within the industry I work in, or at least not within the country I’m in.
And as someone that have been on both sides of this they are a great tool especially as it gives something to focus on in a technical interview. Though I would say that a requirement for this is that you always give/get actual feedback.
Don’t forget the tech listings that require 5 years experience in a particular programming language when the language has only even existed for the past 2 years…
Catch-22 situations, where it’s impossible to meet the qualifications. 🤦♂️
I feel like these are the real issues - I can’t tell how much of OP is meant to be a joke … “You forget to check the website and you miss the time”. I mean, that’s on you. Also it’s often easy to blag the magic words an interviewer wants to hear, the real danger is that the job is NOT as advertised.
The number of interviews I used to sit in on, and wonder WTF the interviewer was thinking… One asked a service designer “if you were a type of cake, what would you be?”
I would disagree, those issues are valid too. Why does every website needs its own account, phone number etc? I get so many spam calls when I start looking for a job because of this. Just e-mail me. I’m not going to check your website every day for 2 weeks just to see if you get back to me.
The spam calls also put less value on actually answering my phone, because half the time it is a spam call. Why does every recruiter need to call? Why does every site need a number when I just need one answer, yes or no. I have my CV, I have my skills on my CV, and with one reply I can send you a very short list of what I’m looking for in 2 minutes, not every job needs a 30 minute phone conversation only for the recruiter to decide they have nothing for me.
And yes, there are magic words the interviewer wants to hear as well. As someone who sometimes struggles in higher pressure situations (which my field does not require at all btw), and also struggles with using the correct vocabulary or recalling random phrases and key words they want to hear, it’s frustrating to no end.
Honestly, I feel this should have all been streamlined by now, especially when I’ve already worked somewhere for years and my company has been satisfied with my performance - why is this not enough? Why can’t this be quantified somehow? An alternative which very few companies do is give me a technical/practical interview that’s actually like the job as advertised. Much easier for remote roles, but can be done in person too. Let me do the job, show you I can do the job, and then you decide to hire me based on that.
I do relate to your last point though, the amount of unrelated riddles or whatever get asked to ‘see how I think’ or something is ridiculous. Even when I get the answers right, the interviewer themselves don’t seem sure. I don’t get it.
In my industry, practical interviews are very common, but they’re not always reliable. I can get as much from asking someone about their process and being talked through a case study they’ve chosen, as giving them a practical exercise to perform on the spot. I’d usually do both.
I’m not disagreeing with the overall inefficiency and frustration of the whole process, I’ve felt it on both sides. It’s messy - bad or overstretched HR teams, slow managers, unclear budgets, poor choice of tech platforms…
One asked a service designer “if you were a type of cake, what would you be?”
“Cheesecake with chocolate frosting. Don’t ask me why, it’s confidential.” (stupid questions deserve stupid answers)
The only possible use I could imagine, was to test how people respond to irrelevant stupid questions, since that happens a lot in some workplaces. Do they get frustrated and make it awkward, or shrug it off politely.
Well, problem 1 is using indeed. What an obsolete site for most places. But i get the joke.
Not that prospects are much better elsewhere. Like LinkedIn for instance with their “click here for instant apply” and then you see that you’re one of 50 people (today) to apply for this open role and some AI in the background estimated based on your profile that you have 22% chance of getting the job BUT if you pay for premium you can knock that 22% up to 50% and an AI writes you a better profile…
I really do feel sorry for the crap the boomer gen and even my generation (genx) has left every generation after.
#eattherich
Is that really the way? I mean, there’s just not enough of the ruling class to go around for everyone to have their turn.
Depends on your level and job. Honestly I’m still going to say LinkedIn in most cases, if only because Its the professional social network. Companies can look you up, so you need a good profile to attract those recruiters that pay to find people. It’s a sick game, but at least now there are AI profile services that can help you get ahead.
Indeed is cheap and used by cheap recruiters to get the most applicants directed to some other job board that costs them near nothing to aggregate resumes. You can’t even be sure you’re using the company job site to apply in some cases. At least with LinkedIn you can do the searching for the real job post.
All of the jobs I’ve had in my life, that I didn’t get through personal connexions, I’ve found on glassdoor.
Except indeed has replaced every job listing and recruitment. Even the “top” recruiting firms now are doing all their work on indeed.
Yep. Comes down to money and they can’t make big money off you if you hide behind the great LinkedIn pay wall. Look, recruiters like everyone else are trying to milk every penny out of their sale (you). You say “top” but are they exclusive? Are you applying at the company portal? Can you find this job yourself and apply direct? Top recruiters doesn’t mean as much as is used to. Right now you’re one of 30 applicants being submitted by a semi-competent recruiter that uses a tool to evaluate how much your resume fits and how much profit they can make if they bring you in under the salary range.
Indeed is a crap job site used by cheap recruiters. at least with LinkedIn you’re better armed with searching.
At my last job I got sick of the management so I just did easy apply to like 50 jobs that were suitable as they came up. Actually got my current job from it. Unfortunately probably won’t happen now since there are like 20k laid off people looking in my field.
I have applied to over 500 jobs on LinkedIn. I got one interview. I swear sometimes that it’s all just a hamster wheel and nobody ever gets a job through it.
My hubby went in for an interview and was told he got the job so he told his other prospective employers that he was no longer interested. Before he could arrange a start date, they ghosted him. He tried to call but it went to an outsourced helpdesk that told him they would create a ticket and he would get a call back. No call after several days. He physically went into the place and the hiring manager seemed flustered that he was there and told him they would contact him. After two weeks from when he was told he would get the job, he finally got a hold of the guy he interviewed with and was told they gave the position to someone else because he was “unreachable”.
Problems like this are the reason why I don’t hold loyalty to any company unless they’ve proven their competency. The ones that are good rarely hire because the employees don’t want to leave.
That’s terrible, I hope it all worked out, but absolutely never say anything until you’ve both signed a contract unless you’re looking for a counter offer, which is risky AF.
People pull out of informal agreements all the time, it’s not an employer thing - legal issues, real estate, appointments, competition prizes, dates…
Yeah that’s why I hold off on turning down other offers until the last possible moment when I know 100% the new gig is locked down. Then you inform them as gently and kindly as possible to leave the door open if it doesn’t work out. Usually the good ones won’t take it personally and are open to working together in the future if you decide to leave.
You apply for 20 jobs on Indeed. “Do you want to fill out the application manually, or upload your resume?” You select the latter and upload your resume. Indeed loads the next page: “Please fill out your work history manually.” You scream 20 times
Pro tip: for the workday applications with the manual forms, I have a separate file I upload without formatting that perfectly fills out the forms in the fields they want, then I upload a formatted resume.
