Through a mirror, darkly
Last week I wrote one in a series of posts for jobseekers on LinkedIn.
I try to pull the curtain back on recruitment to show the work of an independent recruiter like me. Feedback is generally that they help demystify our roles, and manage expectations of people looking for work.
It was a minor post that exploded in a major way, for me, with the most divided responses I’ve experienced as a niche writer on social media.
(Engagement was pretty weird too, with 1,000 likes and 500 comments, something I’ve experienced a few times; 3 million views, on the other hand, is my most-read post full stop)
Around half of the comments were complimentary, mainly from people who have or have had hiring authority.
Whereas the remainder was anything but:
“cold and calculating”
“disgusting”
“dismissive”
“condescending”
“this isn’t the flex you think it is”
“your judgement is clearly no good”
“why can’t you give people a chance”
“your boss would be disgusted with you”
“I hope you meet your applicants in a pub and they punch your lights out”
And so on.
Plus a couple of worrisome comments that led me to blocking them.
You be the judge - here’s the post in its unadorned ‘glory’:
I've just spent an hour rejecting 150 applications, some of which dated back a month.
These applications were clearly unsuitable, having reviewed their CV a couple of times, earlier on, and which did not meet the minimum viable criteria I describe in my adverts - the minimum needed to be successful in a role.
Truthfully, I've let these slip, over the past couple of weeks, due to a combination of being busy and having a virus that's been hard to shake off.
But it fails my commitment to replying to every application within three days, so I'll need to up my game.
'Unsuitable' relates to reasons such as having no valid work permit when one is needed or, for example, being an inexperienced retail assistant for a Head of Sales role. Sometimes it's less clear-cut when suitable experience isn't shown against a pool of suitable candidates.
I invite these applications to reply if they disagree with my decision, because I know CVs don't always tell the full story, but it's rare to hear back in this way.
I also give them a link to my articles on navigating the modern UK jobs market, which may help improve their odds, particularly if they are relying on a wing and a prayer approach.
Every other application that exceeds this threshold either gets a call or, if I'm unsure to their candidacy, a message asking for further clarification.
It's common in recruitment that applications will never receive an answer, so while it might be time-consuming, reciprocating an applicant's level of care and investment is my minimum.
Just sharing this to show what goes on behind the scenes.
A link if you’re interested in reading the comments too: clickbait.
Truthfully my reaction to these comments initially was one of alarm.
However, I quickly saw it for what it was, which was confirmed by asking a couple of people I know to be honest with me what they thought (who have also been job seekers at one time).
It’s an example of candidate resentment in action.
If you’re unfamiliar with the term, here is my article on it: more clickbait.
Candidate resentment is the notion that the past experiences people have of recruitment inform how they react to new experiences.
One example is how anyone who has ever received a low-ball offer, off the back of an advert that has £competitive salary, will assume all such statements will lead to a lowball.
Which means they may not apply to the advert of yours that states £competitive salary for fair reason, even if you are a top whack payer.
The responses to my post were from job seekers in the worst recruitment climate I’ve experienced.
A combination of a high number of (often excellently qualified) job seekers x few vacancies x overburdened hiring processes (especially where those employers have laid off TA folk) x systemic issues in recruitment.
One of those systemic issues being the ability to automatically apply to adverts you haven’t read through tools like LazyApply. 5,000 applications overnight!
As well as a population that doesn’t know what’s involved in recruitment, and reliant on the information they have access to, often from people who also don’t have recruitment experience.
A perception we can only influence through providing clear information (which I attempted to do here), acting with good intention, and creating good experiences that counter the expectation of people in bad situations.
The problem is though, rather than work closer with job seekers, we often respond in kind -
either combatively “you’ve never recruited, so how would you know”
or without empathy for the experiences of job seekers “I’ve been ghosted by 12 candidates this week”-style posts.
The point of this series, which this is the 12th part of, is to show how the experiences of jobseekers reflect our experiences as recruiters.
And how what we put into recruitment is reciprocated by what the population of jobseekers and candidates do.
How can we bridge the gap so that we are all on the same side, rather than them vs us?
After all, we want to fill jobs with the right people, and the best way to ensure that is to give everyone a consistently good experience.
I’m not perfect - I understand exactly how that post came across to people pissed off with recruitment, and I accept there are some conversations that can’t be had constructively.
You’ll see from my post I’ve tried to reply neutrally and with logic and evidence. Because I see this post as an opportunity to help, even if it may come across to some as condescending and cold.
Would I write something in a similar vein again? Yes, of course, because I believe they help, and I’ll accept a minor price for it.
I think there are a number of lessons we can take from candidate resentment that serve to improve outcomes we want, while giving everyone a better experience.
I’ve written about these in the first 11 parts, which you can read here:
‘Enjoy!’
Everything else aside, these viral posts are very time consuming, and often start the wrong conversations - I definitely don’t recommend aiming for them!
Thanks for reading.
Regards,
