Sue Shellenbarger* says in a tight hiring market, job application and interview etiquette is a must for all concerned.
Photo: Amy Hirschi
Employers are battling to hire skilled employees in a tight labour market.
So, they must be courting jobseekers, wooing them with care and consideration — right?
Some hiring managers apparently didn’t get the memo.
A growing number of job applicants are being ghosted — interviewing for jobs, then getting no follow-up response from the employer.
Others say employers’ dismissive handling of their applications or interviews is leaving them cold.
Yechiel Kalmenson took a full day off a previous job, without pay, to interview at another organisation.
Then — nothing.
He got no replies to a series of emails, so finally gave up.
Mr Kalmenson considers such behaviour toward applicants a sign of how an employer is likely to treat its employees.
“Being ghosted may be a disappointment, but it probably saves you from a more lasting disappointment down the road,” he says.
Employers often complain about jobseekers who disappear, but organisations’ vanishing act does serious damage too, with lasting effects on their reputation on the labour market, says Brian Kropp, chief of human-resources research for Gartner Inc.
“If you treat candidates poorly during the recruiting process, they’re going to tell their friends,” he says.
Ghosting by employers isn’t new, but changes in hiring practices are making it more common.
Employers are taking nearly twice as long to hire new people as they did a decade ago.
The extended hiring process also raises the stakes for applicants, who must invest more time and energy.
Of course, hiring is fraught for employers too.
“It’s actually quite hard to say no to somebody you like, who has good skills, and tell them that you’ve picked somebody else,” Mr Kropp says.
Many employers overlook that applicants would rather have closure than be left in limbo.
“‘Yes’ may be best, but ‘no’ is better than ‘maybe’,” says New York career coach Judith Gerberg.
Only two out of five frontline managers are trained in how to make the hiring process a positive experience for candidates, a 2017 CareerBuilder survey says.
The training they do receive tends to be defensive in nature, on avoiding charges of illegal discrimination.
Other employers confuse applicants by changing their hiring goals midstream.
Other companies alienate applicants by posting misleading job descriptions.
It’s difficult for jobseekers to avoid being ghosted or mistreated, but there are a few things you can do to lessen the risk.
Research the prospective employer carefully, talking with past and present employees.
Ask early in the interview process about the employer’s timeline, whether it’s firm, and if they’ll be contacting people who aren’t offered a job, as well as those who are, Ms Bumgarner says.
“And if you still get ghosted,” she adds, “be thankful that you probably dodged a bullet.”
Employers interviewing candidates should strive to:
- Make sure your job postings accurately describe the openings.
- Acknowledge applicants’ résumés soon after they’re received.
- Train hiring managers to treat all applicants well.
- Keep candidates informed about where they stand.
- Let applicants know if you change course in the middle of a search.
- Leave the losers as well as the winners with a positive image of the organisation.
* Sue Shellenbarger writes The Wall Street Journal’s ‘Work & Family’ Column. She tweets at @SueSWSJ.
This article first appeared at www.wsj.com.
