Yep. Still unemployed.
It’s been over a month now and the market still looks horrid. My recommended jobs on Careerbuilder are the same jobs I feel like I’ve applied for already.
But this isn’t about the market. The market sucks. Everyone knows that.
No…my complaint is with these corporations and organizations that keep people jumping through numerous hoops, trying to make hiring decisions based on empirical evidence rather than actually having to interview anyone. I remember a time not so long ago when you would just e-mail or fax your resume to a company and they’d actually call you or send you a letter telling you they were going a different way.
In the current environment, you must fill out a brand new full application every single time you apply online. It includes your work history (which is on your resume), your education history (also on the resume), references and skills (resume). It would be OK if there was one standardized form that you could fill out and then use each time you had to do this somewhere else (I’m thinking XML, people).
Instead, each application takes upwards of an hour. It’s not that I don’t have the time, it’s the redundancy that annoys me.
Then, at the very end of the application process, you’re asked maybe 3-6 pre-qualifying questions that help to put you into a bucket.
Now, here’s the rub.
I had a couple people who pointed me towards the Graphic Designer position at KU Medical Center. I’ve been a graphic designer for the last 6 or so years, working both on the web and as a print designer. I’m more than capable of doing this position and frankly, if anything, I’m probably overqualified.
But because of this horrible process, I was immediately ruled out because I didn’t actually attend school for graphic design. I didn’t study design or art…I was a writer in school and still am to an extent. Since I didn’t check that one box to their approval, I was rejected right away. No explanation other than “you don’t currently meet our requirements.”
This is a problem. People aren’t being allowed to tell their story and so employees are being interviewed based on their very easy-to-lie-about histories. There are people like me who have a liberal arts background and a variety of skills that qualify me for several different areas. That doesn’t mean that I’m not a good employee, but rather that I have the ability to learn from different disciplines and apply what I’ve learned to my career.
I know that the HR Directors out there have to do all this reporting and stuff and that this drawn-out, empirical process makes it easier for them to do it, but corporate America is not better for it. People are losing their stories. They start expecting to be judged solely on what they’ve done and not who they are as people.
That bothers me.
might be time to include “Graduate, Rhode Island School of Design” to your resume…
yeah, yeah: it’s wrong.
but i once worked with an ‘Art Director’ at an animation house who had it on his resume and he sat behind me one long ass afternoon trying to convince me the computer generated star twinkle i had just created – for a freakin’ water bed commercial, of all things – was “too baroque” for the customers tastes…
this star twinkle lasted exactly 40 frames, mind you.
so i say, piss on the Rhode Island School of Design if it will land you a job…
p.s. – what you’re experience has been going on far, far longer than just this downturn – I remember it back in the…well, a long freakin’ time ago.
Doc has a pretty good idea there.
We went through this (extended unemployment) some twenty years ago when R.B.Rice moved out of town. Tough times. I wouldn’t take anything for what we learned through all that, but I sure wouldn’t want to relive it, either.
I almost shudder to suggest this, since I pretty much hate these guys, but it might be worth trying to find a headhunter. They may not always have your best interests at heart, but they could get a foot in the door past those stupid computer filters anyway.
Shane,
I agree with Brian. A headhunter found me and the rest was history..or his story. LOL.
Good luck, man.
yeah, i’m with you on the “we demand a degree from everyone, even the mailroom clerks” crap.
more than twenty years of experience in the publishing industry, but because i didn’t ever have time to get a degree, i’m out of the running before i even walk in the door.
frankly, when i hear that people with MBAs are in jobs which require frying, i laugh my ass off.
The IRS is hiring for the tax season. Not what you want, but will keep you from starving.
i know the prescreening qualifiers can be frustrating – and you’re correct – it you don’t meet the exact criteria, you won’t get put in the candidate pool. i work in hr and can tell you it’s the new ofccp govt. regulations that are forcing hr to define a narrow candidate pool. it makes our jobs much harder on the other end – i’d much rather hear a story and find a quality person than chase down a liar that doesn’t pass our background screen.
if the only thing you are doing to submit a resume is applying for jobs posted online, you’ll have to network alot more. i’d be happy to give your resume a look and make suggestions – feel free to shoot me an email.
Shane –
This is a very important topic to discuss, and one I am currently writing an article for on the forthcoming creative-cohort.com site. To me, this artificial threshold of education is ridiculous, and is indicative of lazy and irresponsible hiring practices. It shows that the person who is in charge of hiring creative people has no clue how to hire creative people — probably a red flag on the work environment anyway. (BTW — I know someone who worked at KU Medical Center, and they did not have kind things to say about it.)
Your other idea is intriguing — a universal resume format. XML is a good foundation. I think a cross between OpenID and microformats would be totally awesome. Filling out a new form for every company is mind-crushingly stupid.
Point taken Shane. I say start your own company some day and do the exact opposite of what these companies do. You will snag up the best talent out there that other companies would have otherwise missed and potentially have a better product than your competitors. It’s another form of a free market at work, which you know I love.