Hiring in 2018 SUCKS

I found out the hard way that a lot of companies have a terrible Talent department. Over the years I’ve had a successful handful of jobs, great places, great people, great everything. No complaints. The hardest part of finding a good opportunity, is the process of sifting through all the bad weeds who are just out there to waste your time - so you can happily live, work and prosper. 🖖

In the last couple of months between my freelancing gigs, I started applying for full time positions at local companies. Why? It’s a more secure way to build a life (and a future) for yourself, with a lot less stress and overhead.

In the ideal world I would spend my life near the beach working for clients that I find through the internet, but no one lives in the ideal world - or at least not many of us.

Warm intros beat any form of job application

Truth. Luckily for me, a friend of mine who is very influential, was able to introduce me to a couple of local companies. Not having to write cover letters and doing a lot of manual labor (pro-tip right there) is a blessing. That does not mean you shouldn’t do company research before meeting.

However even using this trick, my experience has been very hit-and-miss and really overwhelming.

Recently I was discussing hiring with others in a forum for local devs/tech-skilled folks and the cringe stories that came out were absurd. How can we live in 2018, a time where cars drive autonomously and we’re about to send stuff and people to Mars and still can’t follow a simple “let’s not be jerks” process?

Ghosting

This has happened to me. I think the most hurtful feeling is spending time applying for a job, or getting a ‘coffee’ with a potential company interested in hiring you, just to end up having a one way conversation with someone’s voicemail, email inbox or worse - totally ghosted and isolated.

Poor matching

A lot of times your resume will be mis-read, twice in my life I was interviewed for the wrong position. I show up to interview for Role-A, and as I shake hands and walk into a room these hiring professionals are like:
Them: Actually this interview is for Role-B..do you still want to do it?
Me: *My eyes widen up* Excuse me?

Change of Plans

Picture this, you do your research on a company, do a few calls or face-2-face meetings but suddenly they decide not to hire for that position anymore.
The whole world goes up in 🔥 at this point.

What can we do about this?

Honestly, there needs to be a very clear process and a standard that professionals in the recruiting field need to live by.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a small 10 people company or a 20.000 people powerhouse. In my eyes the best companies have a clear process, that is easily found on their website - that goes in detail into what an applicant’s journey looks like.

Finally, the cringe. There are a couple of websites out there, where applicants can leave reviews regarding their application process. Unfortunately those are rather inconsistent, easy to fake and usually full of resentful people. Trash-talking a company because you did not get the job is easy to do behind the screen of a computer.

Every time I see one of those posts, I feel the same way I am when reading a review of an item on Amazon. Or the feedback of a seller on Etsy. That is, the feeling that all those feedback notes and reviews are fake.
Talent management, job applications, headhunting…those are only some of the things that keep me up at night, and we’re still waiting for the company to make it 100x better!