Friggin Corporations and Their HR Coordinators....

[rsmith6621]

I have been trying to find new employment near my home in Seattle. I have been down in the Southeast corner of the USA now for two and a half years and would like to get back to Seattle to be with my mom in her sunset years,she is 88 YO and so my wife can help our daughter who is expecting in September...

......So anyhow Thursday night I am on one of the larger Aviation jobs site and see a position am am qualified for in the Seattle area so I launch my resume and a cover letter template and do some amendments to make each more applicable for the position. Then I go online create an account on the company's website click away submit my resume and cover letter and press send and get a confirmation email a few minutes later...

The weekend goes by and from Monday on every phone call I get on my cell phone generates a bit of anticipation. Last night at 11 pm I look up at my mail icon on my toolbar and I have a message waiting,I click and click again and start to read the mail...Hello..Thank you for your interest in our company. While your credentials are impressive we are unable to proceed as we are only looking for candidates from the Seattle/Washington state and now my breathing begins to increase as my lower jaw drops as low as it ever has. I then took a look at the posting one more time looking for that requirement and did not find it in the 600 words on the page...So I amend my cover letter again now to reflect my desire to return HOME to Seattle and that if there was concern that I would not be able to wrap up business here in two weeks they had nothing to worry I just want the DAMN JOB...I went back to their website and was planning on resubmitting under a different email address.....they pulled the posting.The email was one of those do not [e-mail].

I contacted the career councilor at the college I got my degree from to see if they can help me out as they have had a good relationship with the employer in the past...I was told that if I or them made contact that it would be THE KISS OF DEATH FOR LIFE......after two hours of consideration I said the HELL with it and was able to find the HR phone number and ended up leaving a voice mail and explained my case and told them I would have no problem relocating and starting within two weeks of hire,told them Seattle was my lifelong home....blah blah blah and hung up....I figured that any company that said LOOKING FOR DETAILED ORIENTED PEOPLE and leave out a detail such as you need to live down the street probably isn't a company I want to work for anyhow......we will see if their HR people return my call.

They also asked in their APP questioner if I would be willing to relocate....GO FIGURE.......SCREW THEM they are missing out on having one of the best in the industry working for them.

[xchrom]

1. two different things -- first i hope you get the job you want. -- second --

i think Human Resources departments is about one of the WORST things to have happend in our society.

it is simply a soft approach to management fucking the worker.

[rrneck]

5. I guess I was late

figuring it out, but "Human Resources" does not mean resources for the humans employed at the company, it means humans as resources. As in squeeze them for all they're worth then discard them for fresh ones.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

2. I'd be furious out of my mind, too,

if I had been treated that way.

The stupidity of some people/organizations is just impossible to stomach.

Ah, screw 'em. I hope you find something ideal, and quickly.

But, boy, that is one suckass story ....................

[Berry Cool]

3. Horrible story. I wish it was a comfort to say that if they aren't willing to consider you

after all this, then they're too stupid to be an organization you would want to work for...but in these days of jobs being so tough to find, that's cold comfort.

With any luck, there will be an intelligent human being somewhere in this chain who will take note of the fact that you WANT to return to Seattle and that if they weren't willing to consider candidates from outside the area, it was damn stupid of them not to explicitly say so, not to mention ask applicants whether they would have relocation issues.

Here's hoping that their ONLY (frankly questionable) reason for saying they are looking only for local candidates is that they can't afford to pay for anyone to locate. Fine, then, don't pay for people to relocate--but don't REFUSE TO EVEN CONSIDER THEM! Ask them if they are willing to relocate, then inform them that the company unfortunately cannot pay their relocation expenses, and ask them if they're still seriously interested regardless. If they say yes, take their word for it! Sheesh.

I'm sure some HR people have gotten burned in the past by hiring candidates who said "Sure, I'd be willing to relocate, no I don't mind that you won't pay for it" who then said "Nah, I'm taking a job with Company X instead who I don't have to move for" or "I chose Company Y because they said they'd pay me to move." But come on, this is not a market anymore in which the prospective hire is normally in the driver's seat. The least one can do is be willing to consider all qualified candidates.

Anyway, even if the worst happens, maybe you have learned from it. You need to put your desire to move back to the Seattle area in your cover letters as a reason you are interested in the job. Not THE reason, but "a" reason--and hope a real live thinking human being reads the letter.

Take heart. I was living two states away when I got my current job, and I think one reason I got the interview was that I said right in my cover letter that I was specifically hoping to return to the area to live.

[customerserviceguy]

4. In the good old days, the HR department

was merely called "Personnel" (what was wrong with that term, it wasn't sexist or racist?) and they would really try to work with people who had skills to offer to an employer, then they would take care of getting their paychecks and benefits straight once they were hired. Now, they spew seminar-speak (the "Dilbert" comic portrays this most realistically) and just use goofy methods to weed out as many people as possible.

These days, you pretty much have to know an insider to get a job. Too bad you didn't know anybody at the aviation job site to shoehorn you in there.

[Berry Cool]

6. It's not true that you pretty much have to know an insider.

With the last two jobs I've had, I didn't know anyone there prior to going to work there. The one before that, I did, but it was in the context of his having interviewed me as part of the process for applying for a job in another part of the same organization--which I didn't get. (I found out later that I didn't fail to get it because I wasn't qualified or because they didn't like me; they really did choose someone who counted more as an "affirmative action hire" than I did. As a result, everyone who got to know me during that interview process was really happy the other part of the organization did hire me a few years later when it had the chance.)

The last two, however, have been complete cold calls, so to speak--I sent in a resume and cover letter not knowing anyone at all who worked there, and still managed to get the job.

[customerserviceguy]

7. May I ask when you got that job?

I'm suspecting it did not happen recently.

I, too, have been able to get jobs without knowing someone, but when the company I was working for just six months ago was closing it's doors by the end of 2008 (at least my department was getting the ax, anyway, with others to follow soon) I sure was glad that the person who interviewed me was someone I'd met at her daughter's wedding several months earlier. Also, the only reason I was sitting in front of her was because her boss's boss was the company hiring manager, and my lady made sure my resume was in front of that person.

If it hadn't been for that, I'd have been stuck with the temp agency that got me the 2008 job in the first place. Right now, I'd bet they're deluged with applicants, and only the knowledge that I had made them big bucks about a year ago (the 2008 job paid thousands to 'buy' me from the temp firm) would give me an edge.

[Kat45]

8. I'm confused about something: what does this mean?

"I was told that if I or them made contact that it would be THE KISS OF DEATH FOR LIFE....."

I don't understand what the person was referring to.

[Canuckistanian]

9. I friggin HATE HR departments

They're usually not even briefed on the requirements outside of their little 3X5 card with buzzwords on them.

I find whenever I can talk to the actual supervisor, I end up impressing them.

Unfortunately, this seems to be the standard MO for hiring these days.

[keroro gunsou]

10. it's an oxymoron

they don't very human and they usually aren't very resourceful.

[Avalux]

11. Corporations SUCK.

My last job was for a corporation. They don't give a shit about anyone; I got employee of the year and was told by the CEO my job was safe. 2 weeks later I got laid off.

I will NEVER work for a corporation again. Luckily my new gig is in academia.

[1]

12. nice attitude. no wonder this company is rushing to hire you. applying for a job is like dating...

there are some bumps along the way. you have to learn to deal with them.

i get the first issue. the company is not going to relocate someone for the job at their expense. that is their choice. cool. you are not in seattle. rejected.

(you get that people are not actually reading the thousands of resumes and cover letters they get daily. a lot of this shit is scanned.)

so... put yourself in seattle. you have family there? use a seattle address of a relative. submit your application again using that address.

or fly to seattle, sleep on a couch for a week or two and present your application in person.

try something.

or you could go with "GO FIGURE.......SCREW THEM" approach.

but honestly, that never works...

[rsmith6621]

13. Thanks for YOUR support

Buddy you have no clue about disclosure in this industry nor do you have a clue on how scarce this opportunity comes available...

it is not as easy as you say.....so... put yourself in seattle. you have family there? use a seattle address of a relative. submit your application again using that address.

or fly to seattle, sleep on a couch for a week or two and present your application in person.


It sounds easy for you say that I should quit my aviation job I have now but once you get out of the big circle i is very hard to get back in especially these days.....I work in a very specialized sector of aviation...only about 4000 are doing what I do in the USA....I can not quit my job....Alo they only accept applications online...

I am confident in saying...They missed out on having the best person possible on staff....plain and simple they are a shit-ass company and they are the ones who left out important details about the region that they were considering...I know am glad I won't have the opportunity to show them...

THANKS FOR YOUR SUPPORT