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Recruiters Are Still Complaining About No-Shows At Interviews (kyma.com)
An anonymous reader quotes CNN Money:
Chandra Kill had scheduled face-to-face interviews with 21 candidates to fill some job openings at her employment screening firm. Only 11 showed up. "About half flaked out," said Kill.... "A year or two ago it wasn't like this." With the U.S. unemployment rate at its lowest in 18 years, and more job openings than there are people looking for work, candidates are bailing on scheduled interviews. In some cases, new hires are not showing up for their first day of work....
While there's nothing wrong with accepting another job offer, bailing on an employer without notice could have lasting effects. "The world is small," said Johnny Taylor, president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management.... He added that he's heard of a candidate being flown out for a job interview only to skip that part of the trip. "I expect that if I send you a plane ticket and block off two hours to meet with you, you will show up." As a result, he said some companies are having candidates agree to reimburse for travel costs if they take the trip but flake on the interview.
In an effort to curb the problem, recruiters have been changing their tactics and moving through the hiring process faster. If they have a qualified candidate that seems like a good fit, they work to get them in for an interview the next day.
Inc. magazine once blamed the problem of no-shows on the low unemployment rate and "the effects technology have had on the communication style of younger generations." But leave your own thoughts in the comments.
And have you ever been a no-show for a job interview?
While there's nothing wrong with accepting another job offer, bailing on an employer without notice could have lasting effects. "The world is small," said Johnny Taylor, president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management.... He added that he's heard of a candidate being flown out for a job interview only to skip that part of the trip. "I expect that if I send you a plane ticket and block off two hours to meet with you, you will show up." As a result, he said some companies are having candidates agree to reimburse for travel costs if they take the trip but flake on the interview.
In an effort to curb the problem, recruiters have been changing their tactics and moving through the hiring process faster. If they have a qualified candidate that seems like a good fit, they work to get them in for an interview the next day.
Inc. magazine once blamed the problem of no-shows on the low unemployment rate and "the effects technology have had on the communication style of younger generations." But leave your own thoughts in the comments.
And have you ever been a no-show for a job interview?
I've never been a no-show period. If I won't make it somewhere I've promised to be, I contact the folks I was to meet with and let them know as soon as I know. Basic courtesy folks.
I've been on the other end of this too. Seen candidates not show up and then submit an application to a different job 6 months later. Guess who doesn't get considered for the job?
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
From what I've seen from my peers, they submit applications to 20+ jobs at once. Two or three will get back to them and schedule an interview (sometimes without even asking if the day/time works). The person applying then weighs which jobs seem like the absolute best fit for them from the offers, and go for that, ignoring the others. That's just basically how things are nowadays.
When you sent in a resume and didn't even receive a reply telling you that you weren't selected. If you hear nothing, we weren't interested. Must be painful to find the shoe's on the other foot now...
It's just been routine in the last decade or so, as I understand it, for employers to say things like "If you don't hear from us you didn't get the job." Or for recruiters to post jobs that aren't available, or to interview folks just so they could say that they did so before promoting internally.
Folks learn the rules of the game by playing it.
Warning: This signature may offend some viewers.
I think it's high time people start talking about their experience with recruiters and how useless they can be.
Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
I had a recruiter from a small Indian (dot, not feather) staffing place. He said I was to report to a certain company at 7:50 AM, at this address, this time, be ready to have paperwork given, the previous employer was given notice about the so-called new job, and it would be $8/hour non-negotiable.
I passed that off as the usual robocall shit, until two things happened. A couple days later, I had someone from $COMPANY that the recruiter worked for telling me that I have abandoned the job, and the recruiter was notified. I told the rep from the client that I never applied, nor accepted, and found out that it wasn't the first incident.
I also had a manager from a previous job call me and ask about some no-name tech firm saying I have resigned effective immediately. Thank $DEITY that I have not listed where I currently work anywhere public.
On the flip side, how about the endless "I need to meet you face to face" before telling you ANYTHING about the job?
In EVERY recruiter call, I start out with "what is the salary, benifits package, location, and reporting structure". Failure to give me a straight answer on any of them results in a hang up.
Most of us send out a few hundred resumes to positions demanding everything I including the kitchen sink, and pay basically minimum wage.
Here in Vancouver, you can spend all day traveling to interviews and get nowhere. Not worth it unless they're up front on the phone.
And yes, I've had my share of recruiters flake on me when I ask them the above.
The system is broken, and until we remove recruiters, it's only going to get worse.
I'm skeptical that there are truly more job openings than there are job applicants. As an example, I can magically create an infinite amount of job openings by declaring: I want to open a medical clinic next week. I need 5 doctors and 15 nurses, nursing salaries will be $7.50 per hour, doctors shall make $8.00 per hour. Wait.... I'm not getting any applicants!! Next, I can create 10 more jobs by saying that I shall need a total of 7 doctors and 23 nurses.
The real test of a worker shortage is to ask, "What jobs are paying significantly more?" Simple laws of supply and demand tell us that if there really is a shortage, then we should be seeing salaries jump. Something tells me that these recruiters are desperately attempting to recruit at the same (relatively) low pay as they always have.
You are interviewing for jobs which dont pay a living wage. a wage below the cost of actually living your life is a disincentive to do. any one can do a mac job, why even interview why not just say lets go start your first shift on x day at y time. seriously, i laugh when interveiwer's go to such lengths to interview for a mac job. who even really wants a low paying job, only the desperate, so then just tell them when they are working, and stop the nonsense of seeming to hire only some people just get them all. chimp chimp.
It *should* be very hard to hire qualified candidates. When recruiters can put a finger in the air and get 500 qualified applicants, there's something wrong.
If you don't show up to an interview though, that is lacking basic courtesy and professionalism.
However, a recruiter/HR-person ghosting an applicant is perfectly acceptable, especially after an interview? I also sometimes have this feeling recruiting agencies post bogus job advertisements and apparently they are doing that just to collect CVs. What they aim to do with them I don't know, but it's pretty annoying to apply for a position and have your application disappear into a black hole, then you enquire by e-mail about progress and get no answer, finally you call them are told by the receptionist that hiring for this job has ended. A month later you check their web site and the ad is still there. Perhaps they are selling off the personal data from the harvested CVs or something?
You got 11 out of the 21, hire one. If you wanna be sick and twist this into an anti-trump propaganda, feel free to increase the unemployment rate. People donâ(TM)t show cause they get a better offer or find out your terms suck. Just like you let them go when you find a better employee or realize the one you got sucks.
but... with such a name, Chandra Kill, what do you expect?
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
I don't condone no-shows, because it's an asshole thing to do, but I'm not surprised by this. For far too long various businesses have considered loyalty a one-way street, something to be extracted and coerced out of your workforce by any means, without giving anything back other than a guided tour to the exit as soon as the bottom line wasn't sufficiently padded.
Well, guess what. Loyalty isn't a one way street. By exploiting and abusing your workforce you inspire nothing but hatred and contempt, and by abusing and ignoring the social contracts you might reap short time benefits but it sure comes back to bite you. And it will hit not only you, but everyone else in your position (as a presumptive employer), because you have well and truly discredited yourself and your peers.
Back when I was last unemployed, I had severe issues managing my time to fit in interviews with everyone. I would sometimes get 3 in a day, and you know, there's traffic, or people are stuck in another interview which is taking a lot longer than expected and can't simply text or call the next recruiter in the middle of an interview where they're being bothered with college-level exercises after a 15 year career.
Recruiters are often like mosquitoes, they seem to have interview targets where they have to interview X number of people for each position, or per month, or whatever. They are a waste of my time. They are sales people, after all, who have to pursue leads aggressively in order to triumph. Their career, as with any sales person, consists of bothering people. I will often get a 6-month cycle of the same recruiter asking me for an updated resume and if I want to come in for an interview for yet another generic developer position offering the same pay. They don't even bother reading my resume and offer me bullshit unrelated to my career. No, sorry, I will not suddenly change my mind and find another job, I have a wife and two kids to feed thank you very much. Oh, and they will often lie about the details of a position making it seem more interesting than it actually is. I was once offered a leadership position and the actual work was more of a junior level thing where you just pick up tasks and have no input or anyone to mentor and supervise. I have managed 30 people in the past thank you very much, I would like to get out of coding, not be stuck in your fucking code sweatshop consulting agency where people are so densely packed they can smell each other's farts, forced to type until they get RSI.
Queue the "this is just karma", "the shoe is on the other foot", "finally they see how we feel", "they didn't tell me I didn't get the job when I sent my resume" posts.
When someone hurts your feelings you don't go to them at night and burn their house down. Recruiters are known for being unresponsive and generally quite poor at their jobs, however how many of you have actual examples of having a fully scheduled part late in a recruitment process flaking out on you without any notification? I'm willing to bet the answer is close to none.
When I send a resume to a recruiter I am a piece of paper on a giant pile. It would be nice to get a rejection notice but at this point it's not like there's much invested in this relationship by either side. Flaking at this point isn't too severe, though these days I find more and more you get an automated rejection notice.
After a few rounds of selection, talking to actual human beings, scheduling, and god forbid actually having gone through an interview and taking a job, flaking just makes you a horrible person. There really is not justifiable excuse for it. You're not sending expensive telegrams to far off places of the world.
The saying is "an eye for an eye", not "murder and burn them for an eye".
In many of the comments, I'm seeing folks equating not showing up for a mutually agreed interview as being a misdeed equivalent to not returning a response to an application. This just isn't the case. Once an agreement has been made, it should either be honored or the party that cannot meet its commitment should handle the commitment with due car; if you can't make it, you should inform the other and provide as much notice as possible.
In the game of employee-employer matchmaking, we should dispassionately understand a few things.
1 - Both sides show their values throughout the process, and choices made will be remembered.
2 - Many listings are semi-genuine - On the employer side, many job listings must go up, even if there are likely employees in mind for the position, due to legal and regulatory requirements. In these cases, employers often do consider applications that come in, but the candidates face an uphill battle.
3 - Many applications aren't genuine - they are filled out because the applicant is required to show evidence of having attempted to gain employment as a condition of receiving unemployment benefits.
The Non-Obligation to Return Initial Communication
4. A response to an initial direct communication is a courtesy, not an obligation.
5. If an employer tells you, "if you don't hear back, you didn't get the job" after a meaningful interview, they are doing you a favor. They mean "keep looking." If the employer follows this message with an offer or request for interviews, they are doing so from a less advantageous conversational position than if they had been more cordial.
6. Without automation, the cost of responding to each application is quite high. Many employers don't have this. Employees should understand this.
In a strong economy, a listing may receive three, ten, or twenty weak applicants to respond to. In a strong economy, it may be hundreds.
After Meaningful Communication - The duty of courtesy grows with the relationship.
7. If the employer and employee trade significant conversation, and send signals that plan to continue to pursue the other, it signals to the other that they may want to decline other opportunities or change how they allocate their time. This is where each party should consider the costs the other party may bear. At this point, either party should expect a signal to the other if the relationship is off.
8. Formal commitments, like a mutually agreed, scheduled interviews, should be kept if at all possible. Either side should take commitment failure at this stage to be indicative of the quality of the relationship if formally entered.
9. When an employer takes too long to return a response after formalities, it is sometimes less the result of values at the company, and more the result of an overly complicated consensus culture or dysfunction at that firm. Take it with an eye roll, not as a grievance.
10. Either party may provide *more* courtesy than what is described above. That reflects a higher standard in that person or organization, and the employee should recognize and appreciate it.
- Regardless of the economy, healthy relationships require continued commitment and care. Though it seems to be getting rarer, we should play our part with the expectation of achieving that aim. Otherwise, in our disillusionment, we may leave potentially great relationships on the table due to our own bad behavior.
I think it's high time people start talking about their experience with recruiters and how useless they can be.
Yours was one of the three comments marked insightful (out of almost 50 so far), and the closest approach to an actual insight. Having said that, I think you didn't get there and if I ever got a mod point, I wouldn't have awarded it to that point. (Moot statement, though I don't know why.)
Think about jobs from the winners' perspective. Who's at the top? NOT the people who are looking for jobs via recruiters or ads. The winners are so exceptionally talented that they are paying their OWN agents to maximize their salaries. Easiest examples are probably star athletes or bestselling authors. They are paying their agents and know the agents represent THEIR interests, not the employers' side.
The recruiters are paid by the companies for a good reason. They help the companies find the cheapest employees who are capable to doing the required work. It's only a slight step up from the help-wanted ads and serves the same purpose. The difference is that the people searching the ads tend to be more desperate and willing to work more cheaply, while the recruiters actually make some effort to find people who aren't actively looking. The bottom line of dividing and conquering the employees by getting them to low-bid against each other is the same.
Acknowledging that I'm not at the top, what I want is some kind of employment agency where the payment to the agency is divided more equitably between the employees and the employers. Seems like there should be a place for real negotiation there. However so far I've never detected anything like that. Anyone got a tip?
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
Submitted my CV for a job, and the indications I had were that they were interested.
I called them up about a week later to chase them up: had they made a decision on whether or not to interview me? "Um.. yes.. we're expecting you here in about ten minutes." Turned out that the recruiter hadn't actually sent the email inviting me to the interview.
Whoops.
So I told her that I could be there in about 45 minutes and got out there as fast as I could.
Sadly, I didn't get the job.
Point is - sometimes, screw ups happen, on both sides. Given my experience, I'm not going to judge somebody for being a no show just because the company claims they were...
11 from 21 showed up? Boohoo, I'd need some really long time ro feel sorry for these guys.
It's still better percentage than the percentage of _any_ kind of response I got from job applications (SoCal): 2 out of 18, one of which led to an interview process, the other was a no off the bat.The rest, nothing. Good thing I'm not in a rush.
While I agree that not notifying an interviewer about a cancellation is rude, I can also understand by the time some people land an interview, or a job, they can get frustrated.
However, there's absolutely no excuse for not going to an interview when they already payed for the travel.
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
...interviews several people and hires 60 of them.
Two weeks later fires half, "This was only an evaluation period. Here's minimum wage rather than the higher rate the people who are staying are getting."
A year later the restaurant was closed. According to management, "We couldn't find competent employees to stay."
According to me, "You fired the wrong half."
Care killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
Okay, pulling from experience, let me lead you through a scenario which I think is perfectly viable, somewhat understandable, and yet shows how silly this is:
- A person applying for jobs will easily apply for a dozen or so a day. Especially if they are sought-after, determined to find a new job, and diligent. Nobody "just applies for the one job".
- That could be happening *while* they are still at a former employer (it's a silly thing to do to know you don't like working somewhere and wait until you leave to start job-hunting). Hell, I do this while I'm perfectly happy with my job as it's the best way to ensure I'm being paid market rates.
- Such a person, if they are any good and choosing their jobs carefully, will get replies of interest from most of those.
- That person could then maybe have half a dozen or more interviews with employers from that one day of job-hunting alone.
- Even if the markets are bad, that person could easily get a dozen interviews a month.
- Each of those interviewers expects to set a time and the candidate to just turn up, unquestioningly. I've had interviewers who were completely inflexible ("Oh, no, sorry, we're doing all the interviews tomorrow. The job will be gone by then"). Not only is this ridiculous if you want the best candidate, it's totally unrealistic and prescient of the attitude they'll have towards project deadlines and days-off.
- If the candidate is any good, they'll likely choose a job from the handful of offers they receive. They probably *won't* wait until the end of the month when you could fit them in, unless the job is something amazing and you go out of your way to convince them (i.e. expensive).
- That means that likely, most of the interviews they get will be unnecessary, and it's rude to waste people's time so they'll cancel. However, while I 100% agree that they shouldn't just no-show, that's very unprofessional, the everyday jobs? Yeah, nobody young/inexperienced/cheap is going to ring around to cancel in time.
It just tells me that the whole hiring process is just wrong. The interviewer is looking for a shortlist of "who can do Tuesday", then wanting to choose from that list and they turn up for work on the Wednesday. The interviewee is trying to fit a lot of people around a busy schedule, pick the best job, handle offers, negotiate, etc. when they may not have the money to traipse across town, and then has to reject everyone else.
There's no distinguishing between "has a job with a notice period and will need a long, drawn-out application process" and "desperately needs something tomorrow and can work whenever you want". Employer want the former person, but the latter availability.
I've always said that, to me, the best interview process is none at all. As in, no formal round-the-table meet with people who'll never even remember the guy's name in ten years of him working there, let alone care about whether he can do it.
Just invite people, at their convenience, to come work on the job they need for a day. Pay them if you have to. Give them the job they will need to do, show them where they will do it, treat them as an employee for the day, and gauge their performance. No pressure of timescales. No stupid arrangements. No huge commitments. And a meeting-of-minds as regards whether they want/can do the job or not.
Likely you "haven't got a guy" who does that when you're interviewing, so you can get some work out of them and see how well they could handle it, and do that with candidates until such time as you fill the position permanently.
But I think there's a hidden expectation that the candidate should be "grateful" and "totally committed" to some company they've literally never set foot inside. That they'll turn up when you demand, that they'll drop everything to come work for you, that they'll dedicate their life to you before they even work for you. Trust me... if they do that, they're probably so desperate that you might want to question why.
That drives the good ca
Employees still complaining about salaries.
I find it ironic that recruiters bellyache about "professionalism" when they're not offering professional salaries.
Pay enough that tech workers can afford to buy a home - in Surveillance Valley or New Jack City, not Bumfuck, Iowa - and maybe people will start giving a shit. Until then it's just a skilled labor McJob. Expect workers to treat it with all the respect it deserves, which is to say none.
The old adage never stops being true: pay peanuts, get monkeys.
Leftie: "Everyone should go to University! It's a Human Right!"
Normie: "Er, everyone can go to university. What's the problem?"
Leftie: "NOOO! Poor Brown people can't because Poor, Brown, Misogyny, Racism, Patriarchy, NAZIS!"
Normie: "Huh? We have bursary programs. Kids with good grades can fill out a form and get their education paid for. So what's the problem?"
Leftie: "REEEEEEEEEEEE! Everyone should go to University! It's a Human Right! REEEEEEEEEEEE!"
Normie: (sigh) "Ok, assuming you're right, how do you propose to pay for all that. University education is expensive."
Leftie: "Well tax the rich of course! Tax the evillll corporations!"
Normie: "Fuck Off"
Leftie thinks about this for a while rubbing 2 brain cells together then comes back.
Leftie: "I've got it! Why not a student loan program! We can setup yet another government bureaucracy to manage it! Big Government YAY!"
Rightie: "Hmmm, my banker friends would like that. They can profiteer from that. I think we need to ask University Administrators what they think of this."
Universities: "So what you're saying is we can take everyone in and we'll just get paid no matter what? HOLY SHIT THAT'S FANTASTIC!!!!"
Results:
Now Universities are all about asses-on-seats and not about higher learning.
It gets worse. Universities pressure professors and threaten their tenure if they fail too many students. Sorry Quantum Field Theory is hard...
It gets worse. Universities emphasize retardo courses like gender studies, intersectionality, postmodernism, Harry Potter, Star Wars, etc..
It gets worse. Kids get saddled with 50000 of debt and useless degrees living at home with mommy and daddy into their 30's.
It gets worse. Now we have a situation where universities can charge whatever they want for tuition fees. 200+% over CPI.
It gets worse. Because courses get dumbed down Industry has trouble finding good candidates and therefore look outside. > 50% PHDs are H1B visas.
Solution: Kill the student loan programs. Whoops not so easy when the Banks, Government and University Administrations all support it.
When "capitalism" works for the little guy, all of a sudden it is unacceptable. How much crap have people taken from recruiters and companies when they have many people applying for their jobs? Suck it up sunshine.
E Proelio Veritas.
This is really the shoe being on the other foot. Jobs were scarce a few years ago... you could expect 7-8 candidates at a minimum for every job you advertised. Now, it is less than one available job seeker per open job so you have to really change how you treat candidates if you want to hire and retain. That includes pay better, especially in unskilled and semiskilled roles which are the hardest to hire right now.
-- $G
In all my professional life, I've never once found work through an employment agency, which I think are disgusting parasitic, often offshore outsourced, rancid vermin. Every job I've had has come from word of mouth or direct ad by the employer. Intermediary agents are horribly stupid. I've never blown off an interview with a company that does show interest, but would happily do it with a recruiter given I have zero respect for them.
On the other hand I understand being ignored by employers who don't reply to job seekers. I think I've had only three negative replies to job inquiries in my life, the rest just leave you hanging. So I can understand the "bale if not better" mind set. If employers want to be taken seriously then they need to at least play nice with potential employees.
However in today's thrifty world, sending out N negative replies by post or even email is often too much a burden (hassle) for a business, so they leave applicants hanging; only fair turn around if an applicant does like wise.
I realize the OP was about working with recruiters specifically, but I can tell you from both personal experience and also from anecdotal evidence based on conversations with *many* small business employers, this behavior is reaching epidemic proportions. And I know I risk being torched by saying this, but the problem is the WORST among twenty-somethings.
We run a small business. We don't use a recruiter, we place local ads and use word-of-mouth to find candidates. We schedule interviews, not by emailing and "telling" them when to show up, but by speaking directly with the candidates by phone, and having the candidates agree to interview at a specific day and time. Our no-show rate is approximately 67%. For SCHEDULED interviews, where the candidate has volunteered and agreed to come at that time.
Now, our industry is probably a bit higher than average for this behavior, but I am on several boards and in several business organizations which provide the opportunity to take straw-polls of other employers in other industries, locales, etc. I hear the same thing from every one of them. This behavior has become commonplace, and particularly among those under 30.
There are countless good-paying jobs going un-filled or slowly-filled, partly because there simply are not enough candidates bothering to investigate the opportunities. I see it every single day. To boot, I work in a small-ish market, and YES, these people are pouring red ink all over their CV and future employability. This is one of those towns where almost everyone knows everyone. Honestly, it is a real head-shaker.
See you space cowboy
Basically, to get all those things, all you need to do is to be a microstate committing wide scale tax fraud on all your neighbours as a matter of state policy.
Then you'll be rich enough to give workers high level benefits.
I see many here championing this behavior with hows-it-feel and shoes-on-the-other-foot excuses to justify it, reminding everyone how it used to be back in the day when recruiters and employers wouldn't bother to notify you that you didn't get the job.
I have three words to address this.
The Golden Rule.
This is entirely a matter of professionalism and respect. Act like a child with some kind of vindictive excuse to justify it, and you'll be treated like a child. If the snowflake generation keeps this up, they're going to find themselves on the wrong side of the technology they adore so much when LinkedIn starts a 5-star rating system to rate the potential job applicant pool . The habitual ghosters will be quickly identified, and will deserve every bit of their blacklisting. Good luck with that 1-start resume of yours. You're gonna need it.
Many people who apply for jobs never hear back and this has been going on for years. I won't shed a tear for them now that it's going both ways.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
First - I haven't been a no-show, nor would I be. That is a personal standard, not because I *owe* some recruiter. Looking quickly in my Inbox I have an appropriate job being offered by a recruiter. Listed as "wage is competitive" and the very next line is "Send my your wage expectations" --So do you think that recruiter or company is set to do me any favors? They are trying to achieve upper hand right off the bat. I don't mind this, it is a valid tactic, but also sets my expectations: That company is likely not to be trusted in negotiations. And company loyalty went out the door well over a decade ago. Again, no sympathy for the companies, the boardroom / shareholders did that to themselves. So, recruiters have created their own mess, especially in the tech sector. Especially if H1B visas get reigned back in (as they should) recruiters are going to feel even more stress, and zero pity for them. I get on average 4 calls a week from some heavily accented person from ComTechSysEng.com firm, trying to press me into wage discussions right off the bat, and would I commit to them without even knowing the position. So, should you show up if you promise to? Yes. Does that mean you can only entertain one job offer at a time? Hell no - you should consider as many as possible. If you accept an offer should you not consider any others, and show up for first day of work? Judge that by how you were recruited. If the company earned a little loyalty, you should show up for them. If not - well - you owe them nothing. Look at the other offers, and take it if it is a significantly better one.
I no-showed the first day of a new job. But it was a total BS job (grill cook at a waffle house) and I applied for the job as a bet with a friend who was whining that he couldn't get any kind of job.
Not the job for me, I already had a job and other commitments, but it was paying almost 2x min wage in the late 80s... my friend could have done OK working it for a few months until he figured out where he was going and what he was doing.
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
Most job seekers these days are going to have multiple irons in the fire.
Whatever make it to temp first gets the interest, and the rest just fall off the table.
We hope that something good heats up first, but the truth is, when we get hungry, we take what we can get, and worry about getting something else later, when we have a bit more financial stability.
I'm still waiting for the whole "there are more jobs than potential employees" situation to actually arise. Maybe the wages will increase past minimum wage as an incentive to attract people.
Now if we could just do something about Affordable Housing so people don't have to work 2 jobs just to have a roof over their head and food on the table, it would be something!
Isn't it cute how employers expect the whole "gig economy" thing to work JUST for them? We've all heard stories, or actually lived through them: You turn up for work on Monday morning and get told your services aren't needed til after Labour Day. See ya then. Or yes, you can attend your mom's funeral. Just don't expect to get paid for the time off.
So if a better gig comes along and you don't need to go to an interview...oh, well. If you're feeling polite maybe you call. But especially if the company has made you jump through hoops to get the interview, why give them one more minute of your life if it turns out you don't need them?
I have to admit, though, I loved this story for mostly one reason: it appears that there actually is a real human being named Johnny Taylor who bears the title "President and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management." I couldn't help but imagine a Monty Python sketch starting with those words inscribed on a door in an endless row of offices in a cookie cutter high rise in Anywhere USA.
And this guy Johnny, whose job title is almost as long as my johnson, claims there could be consequences for ditching a job interview because "the world is small". Yes, Johnny, the world is small. And because the world is small, I can ditch three or four interviews with you, and you'll come crawling back to invite me for another one. Because if I'm good, companies will want me, and delivering me into their tender embrace will make it look like you're actually worth whatever they're paying you to recruit guys like me.
So get used to it, Johnny boy. We both know that if the shoe were on the other foot, you'd ghost me without a thought. The entire HR profession is based on tipping the scales as far as legally possible in the employer's favour. Here is your introduction to Law of Unintended Consequences. Welcome to the real world.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Take the trip. Show up to the interview in cutoff shorts, sandals, and a wifebeater, singing union songs by Pete Seeger. You've legally fulfilled your job of showing up, but won't waste much time there. The rest of the time between flights is yours, enjoy the free trip on your future-but-not-really boss.
Imagine being confident enough in your skills that you can be a massive jerk without worrying that you pissed off someone in (presumably) the same industry, who you may bump into and do business with at some point.
They hired me as is, from my written application, I worked there for 40 years and retired with 85% of my last paycheck at age 57.
Tempi passati.
Robotics and Artificial Intelligence software will replace recruiters in the near future. Most of the resume screening is done by software anyway, at least in larger companies. All that remains is the initial "interview" done by the recruiter. Almost all of the recruiters I have ever spoken to I can assure you have never written a line of code in their lives. They know absolutely nothing about the job I am applying for so this so called interview is pointless.
Things like "cultural fit" can be sorted out by the actual hiring manager or other team members. So we don't need recruiters for that either.
Even the HR department, as it is currently constructed, should just be a part of the Legal department. If you think about it, nearly everything that the HR department does has to be with protecting the company from lawsuits - harassment, discrimination, etc. Traditional HR duties like Benefits sign up is self service these days. Tasks like On Boarding could be contracted out to a temp firm. Just bring in someone once a month and conduct the session for the entire group of new hires from the past month.
Just another useless middleman. Do away with them I say.
Perhaps running tests oriented toward recent graduates on candidates is a sign that HR wants to hire recent graduates and pay recent graduate salary.
At this point, it makes no sense to travel for tech interviews anyway. You can go face-to-face with any modern computer, and it's a waste of time and resources for both parties to travel any significant distance. Not to put too fine a point on it, but if your prospective employer is that mired in the past, you should already be wary.
Same thing goes for insisting you do software on-site. Remote tasking for software is 100% practical and workable. If the employer has failed to their head(s) around that as of this late date, be wary. At the very least. Someone's probably got their head wrapped around looking over their empire and feeling smug, when all they should be focused on is getting things done in the best possible way. Uprooting people for no good reason is never the best possible way to treat them.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
perspective ==> prospective
<rant>
<del>test</del>: test ...broken ...broken ...broken
<strike>test</strike>: test
<s>test</s>: test
It's bloody 2018 and slashdot still doesn't support strikeout... FFS, no wonder the site is dying.
That should have been able to be written as:
<del> perspective </del> prospective
...or...
<strike> perspective </strike> prospective
If the people running slashdot (this week... who is it now?) call you for a job interview, you'd be wise to tell them that you'd really prefer not to work for someone who doesn't properly maintain their software.
</rant>
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Seriously, if a recruiter is getting a number of no-shows, they should be fired. The reason is that they are obviously picking the wrong ppl to interview/hire.
In general, a recruiter that has a number of no-shows, was very likely arrogant, rude, or just a troll type that the person would see unless they got a job.
And the idea of not notifying said recruiter really hints that they are the issue.
OTOH, if it happens 1-2 a year, that is likely the candidate's fault.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
...I'm supposed to feel pity for the same recruiters/HR people who after an interview leaves one hanging and hanging without even a courtesy rejection phone call/email/text?
Yeah, sucks to be be dicked around now that the hiring shoe is on the other foot, doesn't it?
[I am reminded of Apple's trashcan Mac Pro,the crippled Mac mini, unremediated bugs and toxic deprecations in OSX/MacOS, the stupid touch bar on the Macbook, the absolutely ridiculous charging port on the bottom of the Magic Mouse...] - no, apparently not.
Oh. You probably meant McJob.
Never mind. :)
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
but you can't get pay for the recruiters on loan with no way to get out of that loan.
They find people for jobs, not jobs for people. Their allegiance is to the employer and check writer (not you). Contracting is even worse. They are just a useless third wheel that makes a % off you, there is nothing I have seen (after 20 years) that a recruiter brought to the table that wouldn't have made the job possible for me to get without them. And thats a fact.
All of them are sales people that need to go back to mary-kay or used cars or wherever their non-producing talentless asses came from. Words cannot describe the hate and venom I have for all these parasites.
I once had something like that where they said this is an junior level thing and you will not be able do most of the skills listed on your CV. Right up front so after that I did not give a dam about the rest of the interview as I was not going to get the job anyways.
It's just not always a message about you. Sometimes the other person's conduct is entirely unacceptable. And it's not your job to teach adults how to behave. It's not your job to lecture them as if they were children. But you can send a message by exercising your freedom of association. It's not that different from quitting a job because you find the workplace unacceptable. It's not your job to change personalities of people around you. It's their job if they really want to grow. Having said that, if you are not showing up because you are flaking out, people will see it. And that's on you.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
A lot, but not all of the youth today, have no manners or respect, and, some think they are "owed" something. How difficult is it, to just contact them, and say, sorry, I've gotten a job with X, or I have changed my mind? I've had people we've hired just not show up and it took days to contact them and they would say I got a better job, or I changed my mind. In the past 10 years, that's only happened twice. Their names are obviously FLAGGED that if they ever walk in again, looking for a job, they will politely be showed the door.
Turnabout is fair play only if you turn it about to the specific people who screwed you over. If an employer didn't inform you about a canceled interview that you wasted time going to, then it would be turnabout for you to not show up at another interview they set up.
If you don't show up at an interview because another employer didn't see fit to keep you informed and you feel turnabout is fair play, then you're just contributing to a race to the bottom. The employer you screwed over will now have no qualms about not informing other applicants, because you screwed them over for an interview, and "turnabout is fair play." Eventually we'll arrive at a state where employers never inform applicants that they weren't hired, and applicants don't show up for interviews whenever they don't want to.
It's the same reason discrimination is wrong. You can't assume a black person is a thief just because another black person you encountered was a thief. Each individual (or in this case, employer) needs to be judged based on their own behavior. If social media is full of complaints by job applicants that a company doesn't keep them informed of their application status, then feel free to skip out on interviews with that company. But skipping out on an interview was company A just because company B didn't keep you informed is prejudice and discrimination. It says more about your lack of reasoning and good judgment than any interview ever could.
Recruiters should just get used to the idea that if they reserve the right to ghost job applicants, give them the run-around or send them on bogus interviews, applicants are going to treat them the same way. Respect is a two way street.
Acting like a professional is not a matter of respecting your employer, client, or whoever; you do it because you respect yourself. And I'm not talking about some pretentious "I'm better than that" crap; I'm being very practical here: It's your own reputation you're trashing when you act spiteful.
I'm not saying you should be a doormat, and I enthusiastically agree that revenge fantasies are lots of fun!
But, they make good movies, and terrible career advice.
"We're sorry but the position has already been filled" is NOT a foreign concept to an employer; that one flows both ways.
Telling someone things they don't like is NOT unprofessional.
Unless you're in a coma, No-Call / No-Show is unprofessional.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
I took a break for a couple months, when the funds ran low I started looking for a job again. I guess I was still in "holiday" mode, but when I had run the usual gauntlet of tests etc. they scheduled an interview and I forgot to put it into my calendar. For some reason the interview was weeks away from the test, perhaps someone was one leave, I don't know. So when I failed to arrive for the interview the agent phoned and asked me to please explain. I apologized and they set another interview up, which I dutifully put into my calendar. What I failed to do was to check the fucking calendar, had a late night gaming session, woke up late the next morning to be duly notified that I had missed the interview x hours ago... stupid calendar, or stupid me for not checking said calendar. Either way, it was not intentional and I did apologize. All it takes is an email to reschedule, if you can't even bother doing that then I probably would not hire you (if I ever have to be part of the interview process again). I don't like talking to strangers on the phone, a lot of people don't, I get that, but a simple one or two sentence email or text message?
There are three kinds of falsehood: the first is a 'fib,' the second is a downright lie, and the third is statistics.
As TFA implies, the tech industry is a small world and bad decisions can come back to haunt you later. Once I had to decline an offer I'd already verbally accepted, when I got another immensely larger offer a day later. But I explained the situation (It was more money, in an area I had targeted to live in) and apologized sincerely.
I've had interviews still to go after I'd already picked a winner, but I still go to them, because (a) it's the right thing to do, and (b) you never know -- maybe they have something to offer you hadn't considered. I don't think I've ever run into a situation where I had to call and decline an interview after I'd already committed to showing up. But just not showing up would be unthinkable. What if some time later the same guy, working for a company you want to join, is on the hiring team? You're dead before you started.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
So one Friday, I get two jobs, one after the other. I was made redundant on the Monday, with my wedding on Saturday, and landed two roles by Friday's end. Now, the problem was I had already accepted one of the roles, but it was a stop-gap role and I knew might not have led to long term employment.
Not much I could do - My obligation was to my new wife... So I accepted the better role and never looked back.
But I didn't want to let the other company down - they were expecting me to show Monday and I really had needed the work, and had committed to at least a short term with them - so my last Friday night conversation was to a long-term unemployed friend.
"Hey Kevin, sorry I couldn't invite you to the wedding, since we're really tight on the list and it's just close family only, but you know you've been looking for a job? Well, print out your resume, and do me a favor and show up for me on Monday at this address at 7am, and apologize for me since I have to take a job elsewhere, and take your resume with you, because I'm pretty sure they're going to offer you the job on the spot as they will be in a tight situation."
The outcome? He showed up and said the conversation went along the lines of;
"Are you David? I remember you looked different last week."
"Nah, David can't show up, but didn't have a number to ring to tell you."
"Was he sick? He should have just called."
"No, he got another job late Friday, but he felt bad since he knew you needed him, so asked me to apologize for him and stand in if necessary."
"I don't suppose you happen to have a resume on you?"
So my long-term unemployed friend who had done me a few favors in the past walks straight into a job that never would have given him a second glance otherwise since he hadn't worked for more than five years for personal reasons. Turned out to be a good fit and after working there for the full project, he stayed in the industry.
GrpA
Enjoy science fiction? "Turing Evolved" - AI, Mecha, Androids and rail-gun battles. What more could you want?
Oops, forgot the end of the story.... And the punchline.
So a few years l applied at the same place. During the interview, they remembered my name... So I recounted the story of what happened before.
They took it as a demonstration that I was responsible and once again offered me a job there. It was only a short role, but it was very important to me at the time.
So even a no-show can work in your favor.
GrpA
Enjoy science fiction? "Turing Evolved" - AI, Mecha, Androids and rail-gun battles. What more could you want?
What about one day notice for your current shit hole job?
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
As someone from an economy not running as well as you, I assure you. KEEP disrespecting the recruiters. FUCK them, drive the wages higher, make them fucking work for you, because when the coin flips and the job market is the other way, they don't give a god damn shit about you.
"While there's nothing wrong with accepting another job offer, bailing on an employer without notice could have lasting effects. 'The world is small,' said Johnny Taylor, president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management"
So, companies that have been treating their employees as disposable robots to be replaced each time they could save nickel . . . get a free pass? These guys really need to take a hard, long look in the mirror.
C# you can subscribe to events and they can use up all your memory
It's the same in Java, unless your event source is documented as holding WeakReferences to its subscribed listeners.
When you make ANY appointment to meet with another human being, for any purpose, you need to honor it. If you can't, you should call and tell them you won't, as far in advance as humanly possible.
Doesn't matter if you don't want the job, show up, smile, shake hands, tell them you're not interested, but SHOW UP. GEEZUS PEOPLE.
Right, finally, the recruiters feel what the candidates have felt! Before the angry comments start, I don't suggest that you behave like a bum when interviewing. Let me clarify my point. It is the buyers' market right now and, given that there is no shortage of offers, a few % of people turn out to be bums (not a big surprise, unfortunately). I have dealt with recruiters while seeking a job (and worked with them while hiring) and am happy to see that they get a taste of that coin they have routinely paid the candidates.
No one should EVER flake out on an interview. But, stories like this were coming out around 1999/2000 as well, just as the First Dotcom Bubble was about to pop. I think it might be time for another one...maybe not a pop, but a slow deflate,
I really like my job, and I've been at it for almost 10 years. Without trying to sound like a jerk, I'm good at what I do, have lots of diverse experience and should be hopping jobs every 6 months for 20% raises each time while the bubble keeps inflating. But one of the reasons I don't is the difficulty of getting recruiters and companies to follow up. Why should I waste my time crafting a custom resume, wading through phone interview screening hell and not even hear, "No thanks" back from an employer? It's odd to see employers and recruiters complaining when the shoe is on the other foot. Maybe they could learn to communicate a little better with candidates? Even if it's "no" I'd rather know to stop wasting my time thinking about a position.
Bubbles and a crappy hiring process aside, there's no excuse for not being a professional. Maybe you can get away with it in Silicon Valley, but almost everywhere I've dealt with has looked down on people who can't dress appropriately for the environment, can't show up on time, etc. I work in a small technology niche (air transport) and the pool of people who really have a good handle on things is surprisingly small. I run into people from past jobs at totally different employers...we just keep rotating it seems. If I pulled something like not showing up for an interview, throwing a temper tantrum on an exit interview or other "employees' market" items, I guarantee someone down the line in the future would hear about it.
"Generally, people today want to work on meaningful projects."
I think this is true, especially if the employee is more experienced and has choices. When you're starting out with a freshly-minted CS degree or IT certification, you'll take any old front-end web dev/code monkey or desktop support job. Startups and even big tech players at the entry level are fueled by new grads who have no idea that 90 hour work weeks aren't normal.
I'm about 20 years into my "professional" life and I'm way more interested in doing something interesting than I am at achieving an absolute maximum salary. I live near NYC and know lots of people making way more than I do in finance IT (hedge funds, investment bank specialty groups, etc.) But you ask them about their jobs, and you basically get, "It sucks/it's boring and they work me to death, but it pays well." I make about the average salary for my local job market. But I have a normal work week and help build software and systems that's used by thousands of people every day to perform a critical task...stuff I can easily go and watch being used. This beats keeping some reporting service churning out useless figures no one reads running 24/7 (at least for me.)
The whole process needs to change. It's not unusual to have interviews with 5 parts each taking a few hours. Sometimes they even try to give you tasks that take a day or so to complete and look awfully lot like they are just having you do stuff for free. And HR people sometimes don't even bother to acknowledge that they even received an application. I've had a lot of good and bad experiences so I don't see why candidates not showing up is such a big deal. My suggestion would be to make the whole process shorter and more streamlined. Why would anyone need to talk to 10+ people from the company and do it in 5 installments? Why do HR agencies call people without an actual job in mind just to boost their LInkedIn contacts list? None of these is fair to the applicant At my company we only have 1 interview and it's mostly technical and takes about an hour and that's it. After that you get an offer or a letter telling you we decided to send the offer to someone else. That's how it should be for the IT. No time for wasting days on interviews because someone else will just hire those candidates before your whole process is over
"In an effort to curb the problem, recruiters have been changing their tactics and moving through the hiring process faster"
We have had this problem. Screened hundreds of candidates. Made offers to the handful of qualified. Even had a number of acceptances. But then they have to wait for suitability and background checks. Weeks pass. They go elsewhere.
Company doesn't want to pay or offer anything to retain. Companies want to be cheap. Now the market is better, so they can't get away with their BS. Basically, there is a fundamental problem. Companies do not care about individuals. This has worked great for them since the 2008 Great Recession. Most companies have forgotten what it is like to have to be competitive. They're still reducing benefits, refusing telework, cutting back on personal time.
"While there's nothing wrong with accepting another job offer, bailing on an employer without notice could have lasting effects."
Honestly, there is very little reason to give notice. First off, I am not even sure references are routinely check for anything but high end jobs. Second, most companies simply state whether they were employed or not.
But here is the rub, for quite a while now, common practice at companies has been to essentially walk employees out the door the same day they give two weeks notice. Since this has become such common practice, why should employees risk being two weeks without a paycheck for the company's benefit?
So my thoughts on this - "Companies, you reap what you sow."
So enjoy your BIG FU2U, and know this is your fault...not the employee market.
I once missed an interview because I was riding the city bus to get to it and suddenly became nauseous. I got off at the next stop but called them to let them know what had happened and they happily rescheduled. The idea of just not showing up to something, and burning that bridge, is completely foreign to me.
One thing that working in Silicon Valley taught me is that loyalty is worthless. Companies don't care about you, so you shouldn't care about them. I was a no-show for the first day of work at Nvidia, I took a job with Electronic Arts instead. The pay at EA was less but the benefits were better and I wasn't sure that Nvidia was going to keep me around for more than a year. No regrets.
I've never failed to show up for an interview though. Even if I had zero intention of taking the job I always felt that it was worth the time to gain experience interviewing at as many different companies for as many positions as possible to improve my ability to cope with the social awkwardness of the interviewing process. My dad had the same sentiment, he was let go from a major company and would take any interview that he was called for simply to get comfortable with the job hunt process again.
I've had interviews where I could tell right away the the person doing the interview had zero intention of hiring me, their disappointment was immediately obvious and they struggled to come up with questions to ask. I simply focused on remaining confident and spent the time practicing good interview techniques, looking at a person's forehead, being mindful of my posture, asking a few select questions of my own, etc... I always felt like I got something out of the process and if anything, impressed the person interviewing me such that they might consider me for a different position if one were available.
-==- Buy a Mac and leave me alone!
Never in my 30+ year in IT would I have ever considered being a "no-show" at an interview. I've even gone on interviews that in my heart of hearts I knew was not going to be a fit for me. Why would I do that? Simple, one of my favorite jobs started out that way. I was convinced before the interview "I ain't gonna take that job" and by the end of the interview I was psyched and wondering when I was going start. On the hiring manager end I did have a candidate not show for the interview and I never found out why. The recruiter told us he stopped taking calls from him and so we never knew what happened. Had an interview cancelled mysteriously on me but that's yet another story. I am convinced the younger crowd was never taught manners. Not showing up for an interview especially if you had a phone interview and were asked "any interest?" is just bad form. Not showing up is going to bite you someday because the IT world is a truly small place and what goes around definitely comes around. Imagine me interviewing someone who was the worst boss I every had (HR sent him to me blind side). He *could* have ended up working for me and while I tried to not hold a grudge he was most definitely not a fit for the job.
Neither I nor my spouse have ever been a no-show. But my spouse was recently contacted by a recruiter who set up a phone interview. It was cancelled AT THE LAST MINUTE because the interviewer was traveling. The next one was cancelled because the interviewer was sick. If true, I guess I understand being sick, but traveling during a recently arranged interview is pretty weak. All this is coming from the recruiter and its been 3 WEEKS now, yet the recruiter wants to try again. Recruiters and hiring managers are often guilty of delaying tactics and some pretty bad behavior. Perhaps they are getting what they deserve.