Open letter to HRNasty

Hey there,

Love the site, thanks for the insight. Despite the smarmy tone, it really is useful an helpful to know what's going on the the HR mind.

I doubt you have time, but I invite you to check out my blog. I have a masters degree and over ten years experience working in schools and nonprofits but haven't been able to land a job in the two years since graduating from grad school. Not all rejections are the candidates fault. In this economy, you can be a 100% match to a job and still come up the wrong one of a dozen.


HOWEVER, I do wonder if you could help out: in my job hunt, now over 1200 applications and 100 interviews, I've come across some shitty HR processes. 

Applications that require to be printed out and filled in by hand. 

Poorly formatted Applications in Word that require me to adjust the formatting. (What do you think I am, an HR specialist?) 

I have specific special spot in my large intestine for Taleo. The job hunt process is frustrating, but I really wonder what the purpose is of these sites. As a rule of thumb, if an organization uses Taleo, it's not worth applying for.

BUT EVEN MORE SPECIFICALLY, can you call out the Seattle YMCA for having the shittiest HR process in the entire Pacific Northwest? 

It features at two points not one, not two, but THREE scroll bars! 

Three scroll bars on one page! 

Your browser's scroll bar, their page's scroll bar, and another scroll bar in the cut n paste section for your résumé and cover letter, which they then automatically reformat to fit. 

It reminds me of the websites I used to design in the 90s with FrontPage -which is why I'm not in the web design business. 

Seriously, it would be hilarious if this weren't the HR process for a very large social service agency where I've been trying to get a job. (The site also features a skills section, saying in fine print that it's optional, putting applicants in the awkward position of having to guess if HR really wants to know my skill sin accounting, ten key, branding and marketing, when I'm applying to be a camp counselor)

To add further insult to injury, empirical evidence suggests that hiring managers totally skip their own HR process, and use either internal candidates or resumes sent directly to them.

Oh yeah, today I got an email from the Y thanking me for applying to a position recently, I was not selected for an interview. I replied that I had applied to 12 different positions with them in the last month, could they tell me specifically which one was rejecting me? Cause I had an interview three weeks ago and assumed I didn't get it, cause they never called me back. But the interview scheduled for next week, are you backing out of that?

Needless the say, as expected the email bounced back to me as an invalid address.

So yeah, just a chronic job hunters rant of the day. Thanks again for your site. Keep up the good work.

WWF...

Soon this will be me: stuck in a tight spot and wondering for so long how to get out of it, I turn to stone.

Did I subconsciously sabotage myself today?

I've been doing some reflection on my interview today. Unfortunately nothing about the interview itself, but my action afterwards.

After all, if anyone in the office saw me grab a handful of rubbers on the way out of the door, they'd surely ask, "who was that strange, suit dressed man who took a handful of condoms on the wait out the door today?"

Since its a sensitive facility working with  vulnerable, at-risk youth it wouldn't be surprising if they asked around, and it wouldn't take long before te question was answered. "Oh, that must of been the guy who interviewed for the Vulnerable Child Case Manager job. Gee, what would he possibly want with a handful of condoms?"

Those are some awfully small ifs. The realm of possibility here is very high.

So did I do it?

"Why not?"

Cause its unprofessional and could ruin your chances with this job.

So why? Not that free condoms are hard to find (in fact, they are. At least for me. About as hard as it is finding women who want to use them properly with me.)

Knowing it would jeopardize my job chances, why did I do it?

Was I subconsciously sabotaging my opportunity here?

That's the crux of my question.

Many times during my job hunt when I've sought advice, advisors ask something along those lines: Am I doing something subconsciously wrong?

Am I a sociopath?

It kinda pisses me off, cause its suggesting that I AM TO BLAME. That I'm not trying hard enough. That I'd sacrifice my relationship and my sanity just.... Cause. Cause some people are leeches and I must be leeching off the system.

Needless to say, that's not the case. But I still wonder why I grab a couple condoms on the way out today. Maybe cause I wanted to blog about it.

Review of today's interview

Today I interviewed at a small social service organization for a "wraparound facilitator", a term I hand heard of until earlier this week and initially thought it referred to a new special at Quiznos.

Three women conducted the interview, the lead, a small African American woman who had in every appearance burned out on the job already, and another woman who appeared to be transgender (which made me think of a Rule of Life I had recently read: "under no circumstances whatever should you ask a woman if she's pregnant." You should also never ask a woman if she's transgender either cause ultimately, so what?)

I appreciated the thoroughness of their questions and the time devoted to the interview. At first it started like another 6 question meet and great and in 15 minutes I'd be out the door like a cheap whore. But they actually went deeper, asked interesting things about different scenarios and situations and listened intently (well, Lead did. They other two seemed a little spaced out. They're in the social service field, so I understand their spaceyness). The interview last nearly an hour. The worst part, though, when I asked the timeline for hiring.
"3 weeks", said Lead.
Ugh.

I can't wait three weeks. I told myself earlier: I have 5 interviews in the next 3 days, and if I don't land one of them I'm pulling the nuclear option, whatever that is, something about foreclosing on my house and moving back home to live with my mom.
Ugh.

Ps- I'm usually flawless in my delivery and behavior. Well, maybe not "flawless", but damn close. I'm sure to do everything you're supposed to -show up early, suit and tie, be engaging and excited about the job, ask good questions, etc etc- and nothing you're not supposed to do (pick my nose, show up drunk, hit on the interviewers). This time though, as I leave the three interviewers in the conference room and shut the door behind me, there in the lobby sits a bowl of condoms. I think, "well, if I don't get a job soon I'm going to have to start pimping my ass out at truck stops" so I grab a couple. After all, I can't pay my mortgage and don't think condoms are covered by food stamps. Think they saw me? Think this ruined my chances with the job?

Welcome to October

It's hard to say exactly how desperate I am. Here it is now October, and I have myself a deadline to get a job by September 1st. And before that July, and before that June, and before that...

I want to post on Facebook my desperation, but its against culturally accepted social norms to display desperation and neediness. A couple months ago a friend -a distant but long time friend who also works in the social services field- posted that he was in immediate need of $300 an would do any work over the weekend for it. I think he got something, but still I was humbling to read that. I'm not in desperate need of $300, I'm in desperate need of full time employment, and $1000.

Getting worse before getting better

That little koan has been reverberating through me for a little while now.

Which sucks.

A year ago I was offered a 20hr/wk job that paid $11/hr working in an after school program a half-hour drive from where I live. It would have required me to give up weekday reffing (which some months pays more than $220 a week), and was an entry-level education position offered to someone with over ten years experience in public education.

My potential supervisor could've been one of my students.

I passed it up, thinking 'something better will come along'.

Last month, I was offered a 12 hour/week job that paid $12/hr working in an after school program an hour-drive from home.

Uff.

A year ago July I passed up an offer to work in ground-zero social service agency, a very large, very infamous drop-in center for the most destitute homeless population in the very large city that I live in. The office I was interviewed in looked over the spot where a few months early, a 20 year old woman had been randomly and tragically shot dead. The offer was for $26,000 a year to work an entry-level job in the trenches. My rationale was that I had already worked in the trenches, and my last job paid me $28,000, so with a Master's degree I should get more, right?

Tonight I interviewed for a residential care facility for mentally ill children. The interviewer -who was a cool woman by all means- told me flat  out the realities of the position. "Our policy for self-inflicted harm is to not intervene until it's life threatening. So I've sat for hours with clients cutting themselves like this (motions perpendicularly with the wrists = non-life threatening cutting) instead of (motions parallel to the wrist = life-threatening), with blood rushing out of their arms while talking to them about developing coping strategies and problem solving. Is this something you can handle?"

I worked in the trenches with "at-risk" youth 15 years ago and one reason I got a graduate degree was so I didn't have to do that sort of work any more.

I don't want the job.

How much worse is it going to get?

No news is no news

Oh hey there, blog, how you doing?

Long time no see. No, I haven't forgotten you. I know you're still here, like the homeless vets at the freeway entrance asking for money and other social malaise. I've just been awkwardly and cowardly turning my head in the other direction.

It's not that I haven't had anything to write, it's just that this blog is a dumping ground of depressing updates, which are depressing cause they aren't really updates, like "I got a job!" Or "good things are happening to my personal situation and I should be happy!"

Let us recap the summer;

June: Officially pass the two year mark of being unemployed. The date was almost as depressing as passing the 1000 application mark a few weeks before.

June: Also broke up with girlfriend after 7 years. I'd like to think unemployment was only part of it; that most couples real up eventually and we had other issues. The reality is we will never know. 

(I'd also like to say that we just "changed status to roommates, that we're better friends than boyfriend/girlfriends, that we still love each other, etc etc, but this a blog about my unemployment, not my relationship, so enough of that talk.)

July: July was most noted for a particular job I'd interviewed for and had high hopes for, but rejected me after an especially long, drawn out and teasing delay. That really hurt. Almost as bad as the two year mark for unemployment, or the 1000 application date.

I also had a birthday, just reminded me that I'm even older and being unemployed, less successful than I've ever been in my life. 

I'm supposed to be in my grinding years, saving away for retirement, raising kids (which I don't have cause I'm unemployed) or at least saving money so I can help my parents when they grow old, which is coming up quickly.

It was a hard birthday.

August: We had to put our dog down. That was far worse than the 1000th application, the two year anniversary of unemployment, or the good job that rejected me. It was one of the hardest moments of my life, but still nothing like losing a loved one.

August, Part II: Visited family to deal with some family shit that's somewhat unique, fairly complicated and extremely stressful. It's worthy of a blog if its own and let me just summarize by saying that on tip of everything else, it really sucks.

August, Part III: On the other side if the family, some shit erupted there too which is also complicated, stressful, and on tip of everything else really, really shitty. Goddam fucking family.

September: That's leaves us with today, which is now mid-September so I can say I've been unemployed 2 years and three months. And counting.

So that's why I haven't written.

Hope you're well!

Love,

WWF...

It's now July

It's been a while since I posted. Plenty has been going on.

Shortly after my last post in early June, my girlfriend and I split up after seven years together. 

We say it was mutual, we say we're still friends, we say we just down-graded to roommates, and for the most part that's true. But I can't help but wonder how two years of unemployment wore on our relationship. I can't say it caused the breakup, but definitely played a part in it.

She's moved to the back room and gave notice at her work too. She'll be there until November, after which we're hoping she goes on a long voyage to Africa to save the bonobos.

Around the same time I sought out in desperation an old friend and poured out my situation. We got to talking, and what came out of the conversation was a plan for his tiny nonprofit organization (on which I happen to be on the board). I've been working hard on that since, developing a proposal -including a fundraising plan- to the rest of the board in two weeks. It'll be a lot of work, but honestly I have nothing better to do.

I can't remember how many interviews I had in the last month (of, thanks notes, I had four!) but one of those interviews I had in May -you may recall one of them was an especially painful rejection- one of them came through. A part-time, temp, on-call position with the YMCA that might be 30 hours a month.

It pays $10 hour. I can't remember the last time I made $10 an hour, aside from being a camp counselor last summer.

Oh yeah, my birthday is in a couple days, which coincides with a small previously arranged fundraiser for this nonprofit. I'm in the awkward position of asking my friends to come to this fundraiser, which is also my birthday, and breaking to them the news of my breakup, cause my ex-girlfriend/roommate will be there.

And our dog is getting very old. She won't make it through the summer.

Here's me and my dog.