This is probably a really stupid question but when a company advertises a job and says that it’ll be posted from one date to another, they aren’t actually intending to/expected to keep interviewing until the end date if someone qualified pops up towards the beginning of the stated timeframe, are they? Here’s an example of a job posting that has this line.
I assumed that this is an indicator of how long they’ve paid to have the ad posted, but I’ve seen it crop up on a few company-owned websites too, which confuses me.
There may be a union or other contract that requires the company to post any new job opening for a certain length of time so that any current employees can ask for a transfer if they’re qualified before the job is offered to a new employee.
If it is a situation where they won’t be actually be able to or need to hire someone until some time after the end date, why wouldn’t they leave the hiring open? There’s always a chance a more qualified candidate will come along. This would be especially true for something like the job you posted where (as near as I can tell) there’s no real clear threshold for qualified versus not. The first qualified candidate in that case would be the first one with a car, but presumably they want to be choosier than that.
Because they run the risk of having that first qualified person be the only one suitable and lose them because the candidate can’t wait two or three months for the company to make up their mind? I believe there’s a related saying, something about birds and hands.
In a situation where the employer can’t or won’t fill the job until the end of the posting period , you’re going to lose that candidate anyway.Not much difference between waiting two months to find out you have the job or waiting two months to start. And some jobs are like that- if the opening is to replace someone who is leaving, the company might not fill that job until the existing employee is off the payroll.
These ads are for jobs where the bureaucracy has a lot of power. A small business owner is never going to post one of these ads. They are just going to post an ad, and if the job has a later start date, state that in an ad. The open application date is for things like:
Universities where a committee is going to review applications for a president/professor type role.
Governments, where all sorts of fair hiring requirements are in effect. The time frame is there to give formality and structure to the hiring process. Basically a speed bump trying to stop nepotism. After a job is filled, they can say “hey, we posted the job for X weeks. It’s not like we just hired the first guy off the street”.
Like the union post above, large corporations where internal candidates are given priority.
Non-profits/NGOs where things need to be seen as being above the board.
Along with a saying about looking before you leap - there are good arguments for waiting and choosing carefully before committing, and equally good arguments for making quick decisions instead of dawdling; the trick is finding out which applies to this specific situation at hand.