An email template for candidates frustrated with unresponsive employers
blog.landing.jobsWhat is ironic is I had no reply on a job posting on landing.jobs after talking directly with landing.jobs too. I was able to leave feedback directly through the site that the company was unresponsive, but landing.jobs hasn't communicated since that feedback.
Update: Proof http://imgur.com/m34rFUX
Hey, (Founder of Landing.jobs here)
I can't guarantee you'll get feedback from the employer but I can definitely make sure we'll always insist on your behalf, and that what I just did :)
Let me know if you don't hear back from them until the end of the week!
Pedro
Thanks Pedro! I know it isn't your or landing.jobs fault at all. I like what you guys push for, unfortunately getting everyone to make the world a better place is hard. If companies abided by the golden rule everyone would be happier!
too meta man, too meta.
Great superhero/villian name! Meta Man never solves the problem at hand. Instead he/she/it/they obliquely solve the generalized case. Meta Man Sees a mugger stealing cash from a victim, works on legislation to make BitCoin the default for all transactions.
JRPGS have had quite a few of those. "In my past, I suffered from $SOME_PAIN. It made me realize that the path to end pain was to END ALL LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE so there would be no more pain." Particularly hilarious if $SOME_PAIN fails to connect with you, so the villain from your point of view essentially leaps from "chosen last to play kickball" to "DESTROY EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE" (and on occasion "EVERYWHEN").
You say that like it's a bad plan.
Please post to HN if you discover one wing growing out of your back. Let us help you before it's too late. When my min-maxing ways [1] are put into motion and I've worked out how to rip the very moon from the sky and drop it on your erratically-floating head for the low, low cost of 0MP (which, fortunately, will have no other side effects than to cause you precisely 9999 points of damage), it'll be too late for you to decide that you could have just settled for a cup of hot chocolate, enjoy curled up in a blanket sitting next to a roaring fire.
You just made me spit coffee all over my keyboard, thanks for the chuckle!
First, however, MetaMan will need to end the Hollywood accounting practice so better superhero movies can be made... about him!
The reason you don't get a reply (in the US anyways) is for legal reasons. If you say anything which could be even remotely (mis)interpreted as some sort of bias, your company could lose lots of money/time and potentially go bankrupt due to a discrimination lawsuit.
It's sadly safer to just not reject candidates at all. Don't hate the player, hate the game.
I'm pretty sure laziness would have more to do with not getting a proper rejection than the chance of triggering a lawsuit. If I'm applying to a small to medium sized business in my neck of the woods then nine times out of ten when I don't get a reply its because the hiring manager hasn't taken the time out of their week to get back to me.
When I applied to a local company the hiring manager kept emailing me about how he was "swamped" or some other variation of the word busy and would get back to me in the next few days. He did that for about two weeks before calling me and finding out I had accepted an offer somewhere else.
Heck when I applied to Google the recruiter (who contacted me first) took 5 months to get back to me after I sent in my CV and transcript, apologized profusely, and told me that the reason it took so long was because who ever was handling my case left abruptly without handing off the cases she was working on.
I know these are anecdotal but I have an extremely hard time believing that HR managers in the US are so worried about triggering a discrimination lawsuit that they choose inaction.
Very little, if anything, supports your claim. A quick search on the topic of why recruiters don't follow up with candidates reveals that the vast majority of people in the industry just have a really hard time with the hiring process. Its just plain broken.
Does your company not get back to candidates because they fear a discrimination lawsuit? Someone else's? I would love to know which companies' HR teams or recruiters have discrimination lawsuits at the top of their "things I'm really scared could happen if I reply to a job seeker" list.
Legal/compliance is a significant part of it. That rejection letter has zero upside to the employer and offers many opportunities to screw up.
If a company has: a mature HR process, people who know wtf they are doing, and give a crap, they'll do rejection letters. Most lack at least one of those things.
The guy at your SMB example is some jack of all trades, and dealing your resume is a priority-2 in a sea of P1's. He doesn't have a recruiting process. Google does, but even there it's still dependent on a human making a judgement call about what to write.
What you said about my resume being priority-2 in a sea of P1s is spot on in my opinion. However the OP's assertion about fearing a legal reprisal on the grounds of discrimination is farfetched to me. People don't just go around trying to sue people who send them nasty rejection letter. If the candidate could afford the legal fees then they probably wouldn't be looking for a job.
People do.
Also, you don't need to sue. You can file an EEOC or similar complaint to your state/local Human Rights Commission. The process is designed so that you do not need an attorney. You get assigned a hearing officer, they perform some sort of investigation and issues a finding, which can include a variety of remedies.
It's not something to be paranoid about, but when you're a bigger company interviewing alot of people, you want to tie up the loose ends.
This is merely a convenient excuse for companies behaving inconsiderately. Since many companies in the U.S. do send rejection emails, it's clearly one of any number of other reasons why some companies neglect this basic courtesy. The silver lining is, you probably don't want to work for these companies anyway :)
>Since many companies in the U.S. do send rejection emails
Are you able to provide any kind of data backing up that claim?
I am strongly in the "don't hate the player, hate the game" camp on this issue.
This is NOT a basic courtesy but a business process that requires a lot of resources to be at least somewhat meaningful. How long do you think it takes to write a rejection letter that provides useful, actionable data for the potential candidate? Multiply that by 10-100 for every position.
Oh, and I've seen much more nasty replies and general insults than thank yous in response to rejection letters.
I would be in support of rejection letters if the process would be mandated by the hiring platform / shared culture / etc.
Try applying for a position at a large company with a reputation for a highly-engineered hiring process, eg. Google [0]. Rarely will you get specific feedback, but you can expect to get a notification when you are no longer under consideration.
[0] At Google's scale, some candidates fall through the cracks. But their recruiting process does mandate rejection notifications. It'd be great if a Google recruiter would back me up here :)
I interviewed at Google; they said they would give me a decision at some (soon) future point, and they did. They called me during work hours to do it... but they definitely did give me an explicit rejection.
My impression is that rejection letters are fairly common but they're almost universally in the form letter "no fit at this time. Will keep on file" vein.
Maybe some companies do more personalized responses but I've never seen it and I would think it would often be difficult. As with many other things, say picking talks for conferences, you're usually not so much rejecting as you're picking some other person or thing. And, yes, there are a lot of reasons the typical HR department would have issues with brutal honesty even aside from the effort it would take.
At least that is some form of response. My experience with big tech firms is either a request for a phone screen or tumbleweeds. I'd prefer the courtesy of a one line email rejection instead of the application disappearing into a black hole.
As for me, I'm still waiting for a response from the SouthWest Research Institute. I know, I know, most people would have given up by now, since it's been 25 years, but the initial interview went so well....
[Edit] Holy shit, I'm old.
> How long do you think it takes to write a rejection letter that provides useful, actionable data for the potential candidate?
I see nothing in the post nor this thread that indicates that's what people are looking for. An obvious form letter would be just fine. The point is that a candidate wants to know that the process is over, instead of being left hanging.
Facebook gives candidate feedback.
"I am strongly in the "don't hate the player, hate the game" camp on this issue."
I am strongly in the "that is a shitty excuse perpetuated by people to excuse their crappy behavior on a wide number of things" camp.
I have often found myself working _for_ people who had the same negative experiences at other companies, so not only do all bad hiring practices create negative reputation, they create an entire class of people who would be perfectly happy if you didn't exist at all. :)
On "Who is hiring", you can abstain from upvoting those companies where you had a negative experience (or even downvote them, if you feel that's justified).
I stated on the update about "Who is hiring" that there needs to be a way to track and review the interactions with these companies. Glassdoor doesn't really have a "these guys never bothered to reply to my job application" section. I just went and "reviewed" companies on "Who is hiring" as this community should try to promote those we'd recommend others try to apply and those we don't believe others should waste their time with. Eventually, we'd be left with only quality job postings.
A simple "you are no longer being considered for the [x] position, thank you for your application" is all most people are looking for.
Exactly! And modern HR tech makes rejection en masse so ridiculously easy. So if your company has an ATS that doesn't make it ridiculously easy to reject en masse with a boilerplate message, then you badly need to upgrade your ATS.
(LEGO even sent me a nicely formatted, well-branded letter within 7 business days despite not even making it to the phone screen stage.)
Yes this is all I want. I track all my applications and what stage I'm at with each company. It makes it incredibly difficult when they can't even be bothered to send me a generic rejection email.
Exactly something so simple but so important!
As other said there are plenty of companies that do notify you, personally majority of companies that I applied to do that.
I noticed though that my current company sometimes does it. It typically is when you did not do too well on an interview and effectively failed (or passed with flying colors but you are an international student, and they don't want to sponsor ), but they still won't notify in case they can't find anyone better. From my observation they generally never come back to those candidates.
I've hired people before, and usually when it comes time to send rejection emails it can be very hard.
If someone clearly isn't right for the job, you owe it to them to mention why- I'm an engineer, I work in absolutes and "Culture fit" or something so wishy-washy doesn't roll well off my fingers.
But how do you tell people that they lack basic knowledge or experience in certain areas without sounding bitchy or attacking.
Even worse is the ones that interviewed well, or showed significant competence.. yet were not as strong as another candidate.
I agree it's wrong to send nothing- but it can be hard to formulate a pleasant email.. especially if you've interviewed many people. (10-15 at my last employment, I was replacing myself and had limited time to document/check everything).
How about the generic but at least semi-informative
"We received your application as [JOBTITLE] and thank you for your interest in our company. After careful review of the applications for this position, we regret to inform you that we are considering other candidates which match the skills and qualifications of this position more closely. We will keep your application for the next 2 months should the position reopen, if you wish to oppose this please click this link."
That said I completely oppose OP's (satirical) template. If you want news, grab a phone and just make the call. If you can't get an answer after a reasonable time and an active research from your side, is it really a place you want to work at?
This; I have generally been able to get a response by calling the HR or recruiting person with whom I first made contact.
>But how do you tell people that they lack basic knowledge or experience in certain areas without sounding bitchy or attacking.
It frustrates me that you see it this way because it means when I give direct criticism to individuals I'm expected to bring in line via performance reviews, they get upset and take it personally. It also frustrates me because I'm surrounded by people who refuse to give me direct criticism of my work for fear that I will take it personally. Meanwhile, I'm trying to develop professionally...
A solution to that might be some unofficial group that can critique others without having control of their job and/or code review.
I play a lot of competitive games and it is hard to give criticism in a positive way that doesn't make people freak out nowadays.
Here are some of my thoughts. If the person doesn't know enough about something tell them something like: I really appreciate your enthusiasm and interest in the job and would love to hire you in the future. Right now though, we have more candidates with more experience in x, y, z. Here are some resources to help you with those areas and I would love to talk to you again once you get more experience in those areas!
If the person isn't the best candidate you could say something like: Thanks for taking the time out to interview and talk to us over here! You are truly a great candidate and would love to hire you in the future once more positions open up. Until then, I recommend you keep building up experience in x, y, z to become the candidate we and everyone else would immediately snatch up!
I believe if you're honest and helpful you'll come off better than a company that never responds or gives a generic response.
If no one knows what they need to do to get a job, how are they going to get better so you'd want to hire them?
>But how do you tell people that they lack basic knowledge or experience in certain areas without sounding bitchy or attacking.
We would have liked to work with you, but unfortunately we do not feel your skills in $AREA_OF_CONCERN are as strong as we require.
Despite this rejection we wish you a happy job hunt and strongly encourage you to apply to $CORP in the future.
If somebody was better, you say that outright.
If the problem is culture fit? Well I really wouldn't write that in an email (too likely to make you come of as an ass, too likely to make you easy to sue if the person was a member of some minority).
"Thank you for your application, unfortunately the position has been filled."
That doesn't say anything that can be misconstrued as discriminatory hiring.
Sadly as an employer you are sometimes rewarded for being considerate with an argumentative or nasty reply.
Can't you just redirect any response to /dev/null? At least that way you have given the candidate an ack and they can move on.
Interesting idea, it seems a bit harsh! I just ignore any negative response - figuring they are showing their true colors and that I made the right choice.
Don't worry about hurting their feelings. Think about helping them become a stronger candidate in the future.
This is funny, and probably very satisfying, but if you need to send this kind of email, you're doing it wrong. I get that other industries are different, but if you're looking for a job in the tech world, do your homework.
To (a small amount of) background research on companies that would fit with your situation. Find out what the open reqs are, and who the hiring manager is for each one. Pre-screen yourself by finding a req that you're qualified for and apply specifically for that job. Write a custom cover letter for each application, even if it's just an informal 4-line email. If possible, get a warm introduction.
If you do all that still don't get a quick response, move on without a second thought. You don't want to work for this company anyway.
You can, on your introduction message or on the thank you note you send after a first interview, state you understand the hiring manager is a busy person and you will get back in touch on a specific timeframe. And then you get in touch on that specific time.
If even this fails, you should fire the company - you really don't want to work there. As much as this is a fun read, unless you are applying for a job at The Onion, don't do it.
We are hiring right now for a new bookkeeper, actually they start Monday, so we just finalized the hiring.
We regularly post ads for designers, developers and content writers too. Probably every other month I am reviewing resumes, so I have a bit of experience in responding to applicants.
Typically any given job posting gets around 50 to 100 resumes depending on the category. It takes time to read through everything. We use a mix of Craiglist, Indeed, various job boards, LinkedIn and our own website postings. It has worked well for awhile now.
Due to the nature of various job boards, some responses are often automated by clicking a few buttons so it is too easy to apply. With that you get candidates off topic (i.e. wrong skill set) and not putting in any effort (i.e. skipping a cover letter that we want to read). Other times, the cover letter and resume are comically sad in mistakes and grammar, so they do not warrant full attention.
Our biggest gripe is that at least 50% of the applicants never follow our instructions on how to apply correctly. We put very specific steps on how to apply and want it followed (i.e. subject line, cover letter, links to portfolio, PDF resume).
My take on this is if the applicant is not going to take the time to respond correctly, then we are not going to take the time to respond back. Sounds harsh, but kicking out 50 canned replies is tedious work for those who are wasting our time to review. Perhaps we could automate it somehow with scanning emails addresses in the "no" folder and sending out a batch bcc, but it is still extra work.
However, before everyone jumps on us. We do respond to every applicant we interview (phone or in-person). Often we respond with a personal note that helps them out and lets them know where they stand. Sometimes we even try them out on freelance projects in the future.
For every applicant that correctly fills out our application process, or at least made an effort, then we also reach out to them with a more automated message via email. I consider that the least we can do, but we do keep in short and sweet.
Finally, in the future, I am going to probably put our entire application process on our website. This will automate a lot of what we do and require the applicant to fill out set fields that we need answered. Then we could send batch emails back to everyone as needed.
> Our biggest gripe is that at least 50% of the applicants never follow our instructions on how to apply correctly. We put very specific steps on how to apply and want it followed (i.e. subject line, cover letter, links to portfolio, PDF resume).
You need to consider the ROI for the applicant before saying "OMG follow instructions."
Too many of your fellow employers ignore applicants (ROI = none), even those they interviewed. No "we received the application," no "here's where you seem to lack," no "here's where you seem to be strong." Even introductory classes with 300-400 students in them provide more feedback to their constituents than employers to candidates.
Hence many of your applicants decrease their investment as much as possible.
I do not have 30-40 minutes to twist and turn words in order for them to fit to your specific job description to let you know that I know the shit out of [insert skill]. Not because I don't care about you but because I already assume, looking at previous experiences, that you don't care about me (both as a candidate and as an employee).
It is your job to accurately spot potential and current skills from a resume and respond to the applicant with a request for more information. (In situations where you do not have a separate HR department for recruitment, then do ask for all information outright, but don't be surprised and judgemental when you do not receive it. If the candidate is of interest, reply back and ask for more information again.)
This is an excellent point. I have been contacted directly by companies before when they find my LinkedIn, Github or website. Occasionally they interest me so I have updated my resume and forwarded it along only to never hear from them again[1]. Luckily I'm happy at my current job and don't have to deal with the annoyances right now.
[1] Oddly enough, my public profile is pretty sparse so a more in depth resume shouldn't really turn anyone off.
Yes, I definitely consider the time of the applicant. I would hate to miss a good person by making it tough to apply.
I am thinking it should be five minutes or less to apply to our job. 30 to 45 minutes seems like A LOT. I am not sure I would even take that amount of time to apply for a job. I would rather introduce myself personally via email or social networks to the employer than spend that time.
One point is that Indeed.com and other job boards make it too easy to apply. I believe, that within a few clicks and someone can apply to a posting, so often the person may not have read the ad fully.
This is turning more and more into a blog post. I should run the stats on our last posting of craiglist vs. indeed and showcase the data.
Oddly enough, I think our final choice came from indeed. But out of the eight actual interviews, I know the other seven came from craigslist posting (or blog post). Of the other indeed candidates, I remember going on a roll of saying "nope" to about 10 to 15 in a row because they did not meet our needs (no experience, etc). Probably need to add a filter in the job posting.
FWIW, I have, in the past, applied for jobs at colleges and other research institutions which all have their own resume input system. All different from each other, of course, so it takes 30--45 minutes to completely fill one in. Yes, they have a semi-smart parser that will take a .DOC or a .PDF and pull out the relevant info, but they are more often wrong than right, so it's easier to just manually key in every field right off.
So, count me as a non-fan of these web-based systems.
With such a system, one may expect a quick response, but most of my applications went into a no-reply black hole, except for the submission confirmation provided by the form.
The most annoying one was a phone call from one institution, that I received the first day I started work at a different institution, 6 months after the application was submitted.
On the other side, most of the private sector jobs I have applied to have been very efficient at responding: either a quick rejection after a few days, or moving ahead in the process.
Good point. I think we were going to keep it super simple.
Name, Email, Question 1 - Cover Letter, Question 2 - Some question pertaining the job, and PDF attachment (only PDFs - we hate getting Word docs and other file attachments)
This way we could automate our subject line, track the emails, and the two questions would hopefully weed out some lower end applications.
We may need a CAPTCHA too, to keep out spam.
[Edited for commas as the list did not format correctly]
"The most annoying one was a phone call from one institution, that I received [...] 6 months after the application was submitted."
Was that institution the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, by any chance? (Or possibly another federal entity?) I've heard that story and have reason to believe it several times.
I've always liked the tactic of requiring the applicant to follow some sort of instruction. Something like, "begin your cover letter with 'My favorite flavor of ice cream is <insert your favorite flavor>.'" Once they've followed your instructions, they've earned the right to be informed of all changes in the application lifecycle. This will allow you to ignore a surprisingly large number of applicants who couldn't be bothered to read and comprehend the instructions but gives any well-meaning applicant the respect they deserve.
I also like questions like the above because it lets you know something about your new hire. I've used the question I listed above before, and then followed up by having a pint of their favorite flavor for them and their new team at the end of their first day. For a few bucks per hire, it's neat positive experience that let's the new hire share something, albeit superficial, that they wouldn't normally share until much later.
Just curious, but what ATS are you using that makes sending 50 canned replies tedious?
Every resume just comes into Outlook as a single email and then sorted into a folder based on the subject (hence our need to follow directions). A bit old-school, but it works.
So we would need to reply individually to every single email (i.e. hit reply and cut-paste). 50 emails would probably be 15 minutes of work, but I would rather not waste that time.
The main point is that some of the resumes we get are completely off topic. I wish I could showcase some examples, but alas that would probably get us into trouble. Why should we waste the time in responding to auto posters, people who just attach a resume with no cover letter, or misspell subject lines?
I think our new system would solve all of this, just need time to code it this summer.
I'm sure that this is something you've considered and chose not to do for a good reason, but it seems like using a different email address for each job posting would eliminate a lot of the problems caused by an incorrect subject line.
Actually, oddly enough, I did not think about that. Thanks for the tip. We have changed the email address from time to time, when one gets picked up by spam.
We do like the subject line to be a pass/fail test though - especially on jobs that require attention to detail (i.e. bookkeeping or junior developers who are on support/punch lists).
The instructions are pretty clear and if someone cannot follow step one, they are probably not going to be able to follow our internal checklists.
Oh, it's definitely a great screening mechanism for the candidates. But you don't necessarily want it to mess up your own organization process too. :)
People I actually interview will be informed if they aren't hired, of course, but I don't generally email people I don't interview. I guess I could start adding all the email addresses of people I don't hire to a list and then sending them a generic message once a hire is made, but I'm not sure it's realistic to expect the hiring manager at a startup to respond to every single applicant. If you send me an email asking for an update or advice, I'll usually try to provide a useful answer.
That said, I feel bad. If anyone has recommendations for candidate tracking software/services that would make it easier for me to make this happen, I'd be interested.
I recall a friend ~12 months ago (in their final year of university), hearing positive news back from IBM after 6+ months of silence since their interview, by which point they had accepted a job elsewhere.
I expect some companies prefer not to officially reject, so they have more applicants to potentially consider for future positions, although many may have taken jobs elsewhere by this point.
I was once rejected by Spotify 6 months after i sent application in. No hard feelings, I just wonder who was that who waited that process out and got hired ;-)
I have no experience on the hiring side of this, but I always assumed that a lot of companies prefer not to make any clear statements until after a decision is made, since at this point it's basically zero cost to defer making a first contact with someone. It's quite possible that the person who got the job applied 2 weeks before they hired him/her, went to the top of the "interview" pile, and soared through the process.
Of course, it's also possible that someone did wait in the queue - I've been interviewing for jobs since the beginning of the year, some of which had almost no lag in contact but a fairly long process (multiple phone screens, etc), others had long lag time but a quick process.
RedHat was the worst when it came to this.
In 2007, I interviewed for a professional services position within RedHat. I had a phone screen and then three or four weeks would go by, and then the recruiter would ask me for another phone screen. It eventually ended up with a stay in Chicago for an in-person...series of phone calls and one face-to-face interview.
Another six months(!) went by before they called me to ask me if I would be interested in working with them and started the verbal negotiation process.
Suffice to say, I turned them down (my work situation had changed and I wasn't looking to leave), but, I always remember that process and the length of time that it took to get there when I hear friends talking about applying to RedHat.
Happened to me. By the time company A managed to get me through the second interview, I was receiving a phone call from the CEO congratulating me for my excellent interview cycle with company B. And, while I'm sure company A would be interesting, I loved my time at company B.
And yes, they'll both remain anonymous.
It sounds, based on the comments here, that both job seekers and employers can sometimes run into a frustrating lack of response (job seekers when they submit an application and never hear back; employers when they try to engage an applicant and never hear back).
I wonder if there might be a business opportunity here.
Suppose there were some way for both job applicants and employers to publicly commit themselves to offering at least a cursory reply (sort of how LinkedIn guarantees a response to each InMail, even if the response is just a boilerplate "Not interested").
If either party fails to respond within some designated timeframe, the penalty could be as simple as publicly noting the fact that they broke their commitment, which is likely to affect their trustworthiness.
This would be advantageous for both parties.
There might even be some decent money-making potential in being such a commitment clearinghouse. For instance, employers who participate might pay to have their jobs listed on the site, with the expectation that a "reply guaranteed" will be an effective way to bring in applicants.
> I wonder if there might be a business opportunity here.
There's an entire multi-billion dollar industry of executive search and staffing built on this premise.
A commitment clearinghouse would threaten the existing schema of ambiguity. There are always outliers, new information, and change. There in lies the rub.
I have another suggestion. How about giving some real feedback on how a candidate performed on an interview? I realize that its almost impossible for companies to reveal what they really think of an interviewee but it would be immensely helpful for everyone involved.
Was I really not qualified, or did you just not like my tie/cologne/hair? Did I know the material but am the wrong age? My whiteboard coding was great but I spilled my drink at lunch and ate with my mouth open?
I realize that most (all) of these things could get a company in truly hot water (ie. age discrimination) but without some additional information a candidate can be left feeling very confused and unsure how to improve. If I'm really too old then maybe I should get out of the business. If I flubbed the algorithm part of the interview then maybe I can study up and be ready for the next company.
I wish there was a way to give companies a one-time "Get out of jail Free" card and have them tell me exactly why they didn't want me to move on to the next step. :/
I guess this is a joke, but all the comments so far seem to take this seriously. So let me say what is obvious to me- there are many legitimate reasons why you may have not heard back in a manner that seems timely to you. There are also bad reasons, such as disorganization and poor communication skills. But what message does an email like this send? "If you hire me, be prepared to deal with complaints about my professional behavior!" Seriously, poor communication is an everyday workplace occurrence, so if this is how you respond...
And then there is general networking stuff- which is even mentioned in the email! He acknowledges he may one day be a client or partner, and yet still thinks sending this type of "cathartic" email is a good idea.
I don't think it's unprofessional and I wouldn't want to work with anyone who did, so if that's the effect it has for some people, then it's self-fulfilling!
Isn't that the norm?
My career history is journalism (producing TV news). The vast majority of jobs I apply for never reply. Not so much as an automated or form-letter "thank you". Even if they do reply, and we talk a couple of times, they stop replying when they go with someone else.
Back in March, on a lark, I applied to a few tech and game companies. Five days ago one of the game companies sent me a "thank you for applying, but we went with another candidate" email.
I sent her (the HR lady) a letter back thanking her for caring enough to bother. Erica is good people in my book. She's absolutely an outlier.
These guys:
https://www.manager-tools.com/all-podcasts?field_content_dom...
have excellent advice for situations like these.
While I agree that companies who go quiet are behaving poorly and would think ill of an applicant who was not responsive myself. My reaction reading the note was that its a bit long to send someone who already blew you off. I hope it makes the sender feel better, I don't think there is much else you are going to do. In this case reporting to the job site that they are unresponsive is probably better (though depending on the site and their rules it may do little as well)
My approach with TrueJob to solve this is allowing employers and job seekers to favorite or block almost anything about each other. Employers get back anonymous analytics as to how to improve their job postings, and job seekers get back anonymous analytics as to how to improve their resume.
It seems to work pretty well so far, but there's a lot more to be done in the job space -- the lack of transparency and information can cause a lot of frustrations for both employers and job seekers.
Fun read!
I'm having the opposite problem. I'm trying desperately to get people to apply for mobile dev positions... and of the FIVE applications I've managed to lure in, none of them replied to my phone calls or emails back.
I was considering asking for an address in the application so I could go wait on applicants' doorsteps, but maybe a letter like this is a less litigable idea.
It is an employees market when it comes to developers at the moment. Developers are lured by interesting projects, flexible schedules, money, work environment, etc. so you just have to promote whatever of those you are able to offer.
I frankly believe there are candidates applying for jobs based on the title and maybe skimming the ad, and then waiting for a response before considering if they actually want to work there.
You're probably right, and my responses probably could be improved. In which case I sympathize even more with job seekers who get silent rejections, and don't know what went wrong. :)
I think it also depends on how "cool" the company is.
Obviously, this comment should be taken with a grain of salt since I was not selected (so I'm probably biased), but I felt like Google's hiring process was pretty haphazard. I had actually assumed I wouldn't be interviewing further when they told me about my on-site.
Awesome! I have committed this sin myself. :(
Would love to actually see someone's response to this.