I’m not sure I agree - it was this kind of passivity that led to the situation in the first place. Supervisors aren’t mindreaders and they shouldn’t have to be. I am a big believer in getting issues out in the open constructively.
The OP has a question about a supervisor’s action/behavior. The person best positioned to respond to that question is the supervisor herself.
OP, it’s only awkward if you allow it to be. It is within your span of control to clear up this miscommunication calmly and professionally by approaching your supervisor. And using the discussion not to mourn this lost opportunity (as you say, it’s not that big a deal to you) but to put it behind both of you and set yourself up better for the next one.
My guess is that there was something missing from your application, and because your application wasn’t complete, you were in a limbo state. When your supervisor told you that everyone should have either gotten a rejection letter or an interview, and you got neither, that was a signal that you weren’t an active candidate. That’s what you would have found out from the e-mail that you sent, and they would have responded by telling you what you were missing.
Unfortunately, she told you too late, and the decision was already made.
I don’t think so. The application requirements were very specific and I met them 100%. I also received an email confirming receipt of my completed application. I’ve been thinking about that confirmation email today, it said, in effect, please be patient with the lengthy process, we will keep you updated as things progress. I never did get an update though, nor was I called for an interview.
So along the way I made some mistake, but I have no idea what it was. Not sending a followup email? maybe, but I didn’t send one two years ago when they originally hired me and they still did hire me. I tend to think of a followup email as something to send after an interview.
Or maybe I didn’t make a mistake and they’re thinking of me for one of the other positions, but I learned at my review that this is an organization that never promotes anyone nor do they ever give merit based raises (thanks union!). If you want more money or responsibility you have to get in line with all other applicants for some other position, and if the process for those is as much of a drag as this one has been I’m not sure I have it in me to bother. I really would prefer to be able to progress over time in my current position, but that’s not possible so it may be time to move on.
I appreciate all the advice and ideas. I’ll update if I learn anything new.
I’ve never been in a union and I’ve never heard of any of my co workers getting a merit based raise of more than 10% or so without getting promoted (and even then, the raises do not usually bring the employee up to the level that a new hire to the same position would get.)
What to say to your supervisor - when you’re talking to her privately, I’d say something like, “I received notice that I didn’t get the job last Friday.” The ball is then in her court to explain what went on - most people like to spill the beans, and this gives her an opening to tell you what the heck was up with her cryptic comments.
As for the hiring committee, I’d say nothing about the job to them at all - just business as usual with them. Did you send a response email saying something like, “Thanks for considering me for the job - please keep me in mind if something else comes up”? That’s about as far as I’d take that.
This might not be the best reaction here. I have worked at an organization where the expectation was that you need to show some interest in promotion well before being actually promoted - in other words, you were unlikely to be chosen when you first applied, but just the act of applying raised managers’ awareness of you and your skills.
Not saying that’s necessarily what’s going on here, but if you trust your supervisor, I’d suggest sitting down with her and saying, “hey, I really would like to get promoted to the next level. What do I need to do to show I can do it, and how did this last application figure into it?” Don’t let the fear of being the guy that applied for too many things make you into the guy that got nothing.
No, it isn’t. That’s the maximum. For minimum wage workers it would be like the maximum wage increase for the absolute best worker ever would be a hike from $7 an hour to $7.70 an hour. And most would get something like 2% which isn’t even enough to keep up with inflation so that’s like saying the maximum merit raise would be worth like 50 cents an hour to a minimum wage worker, if they’re the best goddamn burger flipper the universe has ever known.
Plus that’s the entirety of the raise. There’s almost no such thing as contractual or cost of living raises in non-union jobs. So when you take inflation into account the maximum merit raise would be more like 6%, which rarely ever happens. It’s an anomaly.
Maybe. Then again interviewers have pet peeves. The old “I can tell who to hire by looking at their shoes” test. It’s bullshit. But you can cover the basics like sending a thank you email for chrissakes within 24 hours of your interview. Make sure your resume is spell checked. Bathe. Shave. Wear new clothes/suit/shoes (or at least make sure what you wear is clean). Be early to the interview.
In other words, play the game because it might make a difference between you and the other candidate, and it is something you can control. You can always turn the position down.
Well, the mystery is solved for anyone still curious. One of the hiring committee members pulled me aside first thing this morning to apologize for the order in which I received the emails and say he was sorry they hadn’t had the opportunity to interview me. He said they were all grateful that I hadn’t asked about the job during our regular work days since they would not have been able to discuss it and he agreed it would have made for an awkward situation.
Since he was willing to chat I asked him why I never got to the interview stage and here’s the deal: They had 35 strong applicants for the position, so they decided to interview them by twos. They interviewed the first two and made an offer to the one they liked best, she declined. Since #2 had not interviewed well they went on to interview 3 & 4 and made an offer to the one of that pair they liked best and she accepted the position. I was #6, so if she had also declined (or neither had interviewed well) they would have interviewed #5 and me and made an offer to one of us.
So my boss was out of the loop in the sense that she thought they were moving on to 5 & 6, and was not aware that they had decided to offer the position to 4. She thought a new show of interest might look good and encouraged me to send one. Mystery solved.
I guess that’s a very efficient way to interview, but I’ve never heard of anyone doing it that way. Anyway thanks for all the advice, and for talking me through a tricky situation.
Thanks for the update. That seems like a really weird way to conduct interviews. Not sure what the position was nor the rank, but interviewed one candidate and made that person an offer without interviewing anyone else. Not a process I’ve heard of outside of a proprietorship or really low entry level position. But what do I know?
Best of luck if you apply for a new position down the road.
I’m late to the party here but I just wanted to add my personal experience.
A while ago I was out of work due to a layoff. I applied for a job that I wasn’t all that qualified for but knew that I could grow into it if given a chance. I scored a phone interview with the company headhunter and immediately sent a Thank you email. I received no response after a week so I sent a follow up e mail reiterating my enthusiasm and reasons I thought I’d be good for the job. Another week went by, I followed up again. The next day the headhunter called me and said I didn’t progress in the interview process because of my lack of specific experience but she was very impressed with my enthusiasm and willingness to follow through. She told me that most job applicants don’t bother to follow up and that is their number one mistake.
Sounds strange to me. Maybe it’s the kind of role where a CV/resumé tells you almost all you need to know. Otherwise, interviewing two out of 35 before making an offer sounds weird.
I hate job applications and interviews. They seem to be 90% arbitrary bullshit intended to test you on your ability to apply for jobs. Since when was the ability to ask people we don’t even know “ARE WE THERE YET? ARE WE THERE YET?” a skill that’s not just desirable but essential for many jobs?
Be really careful with this advice. The headhunter/recruiter wants you to follow up with them. The hiring manager almost never wants anything other than a “Thank you for your time today. I really enjoyed learning more about Acme Corporation and am very interested in the position. My experience with big data would be very beneficial to you. I look forward to hearing from you soon” email.
Sorry this didn’t work out for you, but I have to speak up here. That’s not a very efficient way to interview at all. They should be screening people and narrow it down to perhaps 4. If they think they had 35 strong applicants then they didn’t look that close. It’s a huge waste of everyone’s time bringing people in for an interview like that which is why it drags out. HR types do this to justify their existence and in the process miss out on some great people. And when they lose the head count cause they take so long, they start the process all over again instead of simply contacting the few good people who did interview. I have been involved with hiring and gone through a huge stack of resumes and weeded it down to perhaps 4-5. From there you do a phone interview with a couple of them, or all 5. From there you invite 1 or 2 people in for an interview if they look like a great match. That’s the key, they need to be a great match for the job. But then again, I work in private industry and academia seems to spend their lives dragging out the simplest things. Still no excuse for this in my opinion, the economy is still not great and it should be a quick process to find good matches for the jobs.
As for applying for an internal job, you need to treat it like you are applying for an external job. That means do follow-up e-mails immediately after the interview and continue to do so. It shows your level of interest. They have no idea how serious you are about a job you applied for and the only way to do that is to show them by staying in touch. But what is key, you want to be in touch with the hiring manager. Honestly, HR is just a gate keeper for any professional level job so by-pass them immediately in-spite of what anyone there tells you.
