The Devil’s second greatest trick (and it has nothing to do with Trump)
“The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.” — says Kevin Spacey in “The Usual Suspects — (with apologies to Charles Baudelaire). If that’s true, I’m convinced the second is making me believe the line “We’ll keep your resume on file and if other positions become available that fit your qualifications, we’ll contact you.” I’m truly convinced is that this is the vocational equivalent to “We can still be friends” or “It’s not you, it’s me”.
Something to keep in mind is that it’s all a game.
“What kind of game” you might ask?
Simple. It’s the “getting-you-a-new-job-because-the-last-one ended 6 months ago and your wife is tired of carrying the financial burden even if you do pick up the kids from school and make her a nice dinner 5 nights a week” game. (“And just got laid off 2 weeks ago because her position was eliminated”, but I digress)
You know how you can tell it’s a game? When JK Scheinberg (Apple engineer for 30 years) can’t even get a callback for a position at a fucking Genius Bar, that’s how you know.
When I (literally) got yelled at by the man interviewing me for an entry-level/minimum wage position at a small consumer electronics store with a fresh college degree in my hand (“You have NO experience! Why am I wasting my time with you?”) I should have known. Yeah he was a dick, but I still should have known.
We all have our stories of that perfect job description that looked like it was a photocopy of our resume, and couldn’t even get a sniff of a response. If we’re lucky, we might get a canned response couple of months later that reads:
Dear Sir/Madam,
We really appreciate your spending a couple of hours crafting that lovely cover letter that perfectly captured both your strong interest in working for our company and the obvious match with regards to skills, personal interest, and job history. Unfortunately, we will be moving forward with other candidates at this time because:
1) We already knew who we were going to hire, but I had to show my boss that we did our due-diligence.
2) You’ve been out of work for 6 months, so there must be something wrong with you.
3) We filled the position months ago and just forgot to remove it from our job board.
4) Your resume says that you’ve been working in the field for 16 years. That means you’re old.
5) We received a resume from a girl named “Sonjia”. She sounds hot and we’d like to meet her. If she is, we’ll probably hire her.
6) It says on your resume that you’ve been at the same job for the last 9 years. You sound boring.
7) It says on your resume that you’ve had 7 jobs in the last 9 years. What’s the matter with you? Why can’t you keep a job?
8) You’ve got too much experience. You’ll get bored and leave. Just like everyone else.
9) You’ve got an advanced degree which makes you smarter than everyone else here. We find that a little intimidating and feel that might make us even more insecure than we already are.
10) You don’t have enough experience. We’ve got more qualified candidates to meet with. Her name is Sonjia
I used to analyze those rejection emails like a Biblical scholar looking for clues to Jesus’ return. “Not moving forward at this time” (emphasis mine) meant they were still considering me and I should expect call a month or two down the road.
I will say that I’ve fixed my attitude just a bit and now say a silent thanks to those precious few companies that even bother to respond. “Thank you for your application. We filled the position so long ago that you probably don’t even remember our name-but we’d like to let you know that we hired someone a while ago who might still work here and it wasn’t you.” Truthfully I do remember those companies and their canned responses and don’t let it stop me from applying again in the future. I appreciate the (largely automated) gesture.
Any point to all of this? Maybe you got a chuckle and clicked the little heart down at the bottom to let me know you enjoyed/could relate to a bit of it — there will be more later, and even some practical tips that are hopefully a bit different from what you are used to seeing in posts like this. Life is the place in between setting and achieving (or not) our goals — enjoy the ride and always look for humor the absurdity of it all.
