After being unemployed for 6 months, I have decided to compile a list of everything I hate about looking for a job. Feel free to comment, add you own or be offended by my comments:
I hate working - I feel like the guy from Office Space every second of the work day. I’m not really lazy, but I don’t relish the idea of busting my ass and sacrificing my personal life for 20 years so I can make partner or director just in time to die of an embalism.
I hate looking for a job - Because of number 1, looking for a job feels like trying to find a mugger to beat me about the head.
HR people suck - There is nothing worse than dealing with a smiling simpleton who has no understanding about what his/her company does other than “this is the best place to work because we only hire the best people who work here because it’s the best”. It’s nice to know my future is determined by some moron who will be judging my existance by ccounting the number of action words in my resume. You know, the Nazis had people who used to catagorize individuals by their background…
Headhunters also suck - Do not send me on an interview for a position I am not qualified for. Do not assume that I have a car living in Manhattan and then send me off for a job I am not qualified for that requires a car. I don’t care if you look at a hundred resumes a day. At least pretend that you remember sending me that email for that position. Do not call me asking for help networking because I have a name brand company on my resume. Your job is to find me a job, my job is not to find you contacts.
Campus career services suck - I do not need advice from someone whos job is to sit in around talking to undergrads all day about networking. If you were so good as an investment banker/brand manager/ accountant or whatever you used to do in your former life, you wouldn’t be here making $40,000 a year.
Do not say stupid shit trying to make me feel better - Saying “you should travel”, “enjoy your time off”, “a lot of people are out of work”, “only 6 months? it took my friend 18”, “have you thought about bartending?”, “maybe you should apply for [FBI/CIA/Reality TV show/some other job with a ridiculously low chance of getting hired]” will likely get you punched.
I really enjoy interviewing with some asshole who is doing work on his laptop during the interview.
I really really enjoy going to an interview and being told I am disqualified because of something that could have been determined by looking at my resume (ie experience)
I especially enjoy going for an interview and never hearing back from the company. Or even better, being led on by the company as if I had the job. Nothing I enjoy more than being told “We’ll let you know Monday but it looks good!” and then sitting around with my thumb up my ass for a month waiting to hear back.
I understand it’s important to find that perfect candiate. A lot of companies like to have the process go on for months just in case there’s some Ivy League MBA out there with 20 years experience willing to work for $35000 a year.
Does Monster or Careerbuilder even work? I have received calls from having my resume posted online but I don’t think I ever recieved a callback form an online application.
“Network! Network! Network!” is bullshit. It works great if you happen to have a couple of friends or family who are in the same business you are in and their company is hiring.
I only ask because Dopers will give you any leads, assistance, and advice they can if they know what you’re looking for and where you’re looking.
Good luck!
Seriously, I do appreciate the advice however I started this thread in the spirit of allowing people to vent their anger or provide ammusing or frustrating anecdotes of their job search…possibly tales of revenge.
As for what I do, I am an unemployed Big-4 management consultant in NYC. Basically, used to work for one of the Big-4 accounting/professional services firms (Deloitte & Touche, Ernst & Young, KPMG, PricewaterhouseCoopers) going into companies and helping them implement technology, run their processes more efficiently (often resulting in layoffs and don’t think the irony isn’t lost on me) or just doing the bullshit work that no one else wants to do. Essentially, it’s like a temp with a lawyers salary and billing rates.
Of course the profession is now the Andrea Gail in a Perfect Storm of the 9/11 attacks, the Andersen/Enron fiasco, and the burst of the dot-com bubble.
Sadly, it appears the other alternatives are: (a) spend 7 years of your life working towards a doctorate in the field that you used to enjoy before the joy was beaten out of you, only to find that when you graduate there are no jobs available in the field due to economic circumstances that weren’t visible 7 years ago, or (b) starve.
And you’re supposed to thank the mugger, of course.
Crap, that’s rude. I sincerely hope that if I’m ever in that situation I have the balls to call the interviewer on it.
Well, at least in this situation you’ve been given a chance to make your case as to why you shouldn’t be disqualified. Of course, the interviewer likely won’t listen and so the interview is probably a waste of your time and money anyway, so…dammit I’m trying to find a bright side here…
I’m right there with you, msmith537. I
m worse off than you–I’m a writer/editor with a background in educational publishing, a field that is dead in the water. I can’t get temp agencies to respond to my e-mailed resume, and I’m feeling really useless these days.
Being given a typing test even though the job I am applying for does not involve typing and I have no intention of being a typist. “Oh, we give these tests to everyone!” Umm, to senior editors? I think not.
Yeah. What I should have done was pick up his laptop, smash it against the wall and said “now then…lets talk about those benefits”. What’s he going to do? Not hire me more than he isn’t hiring me now?
Here’s another favorite of mine. A friend of mine (who was out of work for 18 months) from B-school took this job working for some college. They are looking to hire someone for their group so she introduces me to her boss and they bring me in for an interview. Everyone is pretty cool except for this one lady who is a total bitch. She starts trying to grill me with these questions like “have you ever done this kind of work before? Why should we hire you?” etc… all in some sarcastic tone like they think it’s a 2yr I-banking analyst program. Oh and by the way the job pays $400 a week (unemployment is $405 a week). Yeah…you know what? I am pretty good and speaking to people. I have experience with this “telephone” of yours. I’m pretty sure I can synergize the two skills into performing your telemarketing job.
I want to know when this came about. I graduated from college in '95 and recently going through files I found several old rejection letters from various places I interviewed or applied to. And this was for entry level positions!
In a recent job search I suffered through, it seemed to be SOP that you would never hear from potential employers again, no matter how many interviews I had or how close it seemed I was to getting an offer. I found it to be very insulting and frustrating. When did this become the norm?
But I thought Capitalism was great! You just can’t find a job because you arn’t trying hard enough. If you were really motivated and a good person, you could be a CEO by now!
At the risk of repeating info. probably already posted on the Boards numerous times, you might check out this page for some fun stuff on the subject of being laid off:
The first cartoon, “Laid Off”, is the probably best (and has probably circled the world via email several times over), but the others are fun/funny too.
and the main reason I posted: In the “Help Wanted” cartoon, there’s a short bit on applying for jobs online which sums up the OP’s take on it pretty well.
Look, i don’t wanna hassle you too much, because i feel for anyone who’s out of work. But i am interested to know whether your own situation has given you any sort of new perspective on the work you did before. How did you rationalize your job then? And has that changed now, or do you still feel pretty much the same way?
The reason that i ask is that i’ve met a few people who did “management consulting” for firms like the Boston Group, and they all seem rather unconcerned with the fact that much of their work involves overseeing the firing of other people. Some of them rationalize it with arguments about efficiency leading to more jobs in the future. Others concede that it sucks, but are loathe to give up the money that comes with the job. Others just don’t give a shit about anyone except themselves.
Oooh, if we’re gonna tell some job hunting stories, I’d like to tell one of my favorites…
It was an interview for an entry-level Web position with a local company. Everything was going just fine until the interviewer leaned back in his chair and said, “Well, we just have to hope the FDA doesn’t find the loophole we’re operating under and close us down.”
It’s 8 months and counting for Mr. Pug. Add to all of the above woes the fact that he’s 51 years old and has had not one interview in all that time. He is going to his first interview this Saturday, for a civil service job that’s about 90 miles from our home.
As futile as Monster.com and careerbuilder.com seem, they seem more professional compared to some of the other career search sites I’ve seen, e.g., “NotJobs” and “No-Dice Tech Jobs” or maybe “Flip-Bird.”
Ageism is certainly a problem, but leaving off telltale clues from his resume, like omittin the dates off his education and only putting down his last ten years of work experience will help him get through the filters.
Shoot, I didn’t figure that one out until Mr. 'Addi commented that I needn’t list my employment history back to the 70s “and for God’s sake don’t include that part about the M.F.A. program in poetry!”
I acutely feel the pain of all the above job searchers. My last dozen years were spent in the desktop publishing prepress software biz. It doesn’t seem to even exist anymore, best I can tell.
I’ve actually given this one some serious thought (substitute llamas for sheep). It doesn’t solve the health insurance dilemma, though. At this point I’d consider working for that, all by itself.
