Unbelievable responses to our help-wanted ad

[Jennasis]

Ok, I have two rants. The first is about the degradation of PHONE skills in this day and age (now I sound old...) and second is the information people have given me during a brief phone interview after we placed a help-wanted ad in the paper.

1. When I answer the phone by saying "Thank you for calling ABC Company"...the proper response is NOT "Yeah, UH...You all hirin'?" And THAT was an example of one of the better candidates! I am regularly amazed at the lack of phone skills/etiquette lately. People don't say hello when I answer and 9 out of 10 times don't say goodbye before hanging up! They just demand information from me and then hang up. It's crazy! I get people calling after 9pm every night of the week (even weekends) to ask the most ridiculous things. I don't even call my family after 9pm unless it's a real emergency. But that I've learned to accept. It's the poor phone manners that drive me batty!

2. We placed an ad for part-time help. I can't tell you how many people have called and almost begged for the job over the phone. They start rambling on about their personal financial situation or life crisis, as if it is supposed to guilt me into hiring them or make me feel sorry for them . One guy told me he needed the job because his phone got shut off, another because she was going through an ugly divorce! TMI, people. I don't want to know about how desperate you are. If anything, hearing that stuff makes me want to hire them less. I would never dream of going to a job interview and either begging to be hired or spilling my guts about how poor I am. I'm pretty sure that tactic isn't mentioned in "How to Win Friends and Influence People."

The people we did invite in for interviews ranged form high school kids, to college kids to a, SAHM, to a guy who spoke broken English...all were pleasant on the phone, identified who they were by name and why they were calling, gave me a brief run down of their qualifications and thanked me for my time before politely ending the call with "Have a nice day...Bye!"

So crazy!

 

[LukenDC]

Yep, this is what I hear every day. I'm an HR Director for a nonprofit and I get many inappropriate calls and e-mails. Lots of people have poor interviewing skills and some of the things I hear from applicants are simply amazing.

 

[ducklite]

We won't even take phone calls, Either e-mail your resume or come in to one of our locations to apply.

Anne

 

[barbeml]

I've been in various positions that involved screening resumes/applications for different hiring needs, and I honestly believe some of the responses were from people going through the motions to stay on unemployment.

I have seen "resumes" written in pencil on sheets torn out of notebooks.

My favorite was a response to an ad we placed for a CEO of a foundation in the health care field. The "applicant" had ripped our ad from the paper, photocopied it, and written in his qualifications, whcih included prison cook and a stint frying chicken at a KFC.

 

[magicmouse2]

Maybe you are getting a truer picture by the phone calls. If someone is not good at communicating are they suitable for the role you are advertising ? I have worked in telephony jobs for years and its amazing how some people cant even string a sentence together.

 

[goodeats]

We just rented out one of our rental units through an ad on Craigs List. I could write a book!

 

[LukenDC]

The creepiest response I ever received from an ad was from a young man who came by our offices to complete an application. I saw him as he was sitting in the reception area and it was clear that he was mentally ill. He dropped his application off, so I looked at it after he left. On his application, he wrote that he was a "slave" in his last position and wrote a lot of other goofy stuff. I was laughing until I got to the part of the application where it asks applicants to describe any "special skills" that they may possess. He wrote the following "I know how to use a scalpel to skin a human without cutting any muscle tissue." Wow.

 

[caitycaity]

we get temp to perm people passed on to us through an agency and we still get all kinds of crazy people!

i am on the interview committee for my division and you would not believe some of the stories!!!

when asked what steps she would take if a certain problem came to her attention one girl (in her late 20's) said the first step she would take would be to go online and shoe shop because it "calms" her!!!

 

[kelleigh1]

 

[jbdreamer]

The creepiest response I ever received from an ad was from a young man who came by our offices to complete an application. I saw him as he was sitting in the reception area and it was clear that he was mentally ill. He dropped his application off, so I looked at it after he left. On his application, he wrote that he was a "slave" in his last position and wrote a lot of other goofy stuff. I was laughing until I got to the part of the application where it asks applicants to describe any "special skills" that they may possess. He wrote the following "I know how to use a scalpel to skin a human without cutting any muscle tissue." Wow.

Uhg, that is creepy. I would have considered calling the police.

 

[LukenDC]

Uhg, that is creepy. I would have considered calling the police.

We have off-duty police officers serving as security guards and I did show the application to one of the officers.

 

[MouseWorshipin]

We had an applicant write, "I once had to kill a guy," on his form! Allrighty, then, you're HIRED!


My biggest Pet Peeve re: phone is that "Yeah..." busines.

"ABC Company."

"Yeah...I blah, blah, blah..." Did I ask you a question? What is up with "Yeah?!"

 

[Jennasis]

This has been most entertaining for DH and I. I insisted that he be present at any face-to-face interviews so he could help me assess the candidates (and protect me from any weirdos). GRANTED we are looking for someone to help out around our farm (not exactly rocket science, or a white collar gig) but STILL, would be great to have someone who can read/write, has a car, and doesn't look or sound like something the cat dragged in.

DH is starting his new job on Monday (will be an exec assistant to the CEO). He went through an extensive interview process. Had to do a phone interview, a face-to-face interview with HR, another phone interview with the corporate guy, and another face-to-face with the CEO! It was like he was on American Idol as they narrowed the list down from 12, to 6, to 2 and then finally choosing him. Now I know why the process was so extensive...they had to weed out the loonies.

 

[Disney Ella]

when asked what steps she would take if a certain problem came to her attention one girl (in her late 20's) said the first step she would take would be to go online and shoe shop because it "calms" her!!!

Studies have shown that Internet shoe shopping is an effective way to solve problems at work! I thought everyone knew that.

 

[icebrat001]

Omg, we are hiring too, and some of the resumes I've gotten, well, we shouldn't even call them resumes and the people that call are rude and have no manners. One girl wanted to speak directly to the manager, I told her I was screening applicants and once they speak to me and I interview them that I will send them to the manager if I feel that they are a match, so she calls the next day, tries to go over my head and tells the manager that I was rude, she went right to the do not hire folder. Another calls and says, I am interested in the job, but I must have $18 an hour and I told her that we could not pay her that amount so she wanted to speak to the manager because the manager would understand why she needed that much money, umm, no.

Another came in and refused to be interviewed by me, because frankly, I am younger than her. They can't even see the manager until they see me first. Geez, what don't they get.


The bad news is, we will probably end up hiring just okay candidates because we really need some employees.

 

[tuckerkeys]

we just ended up hiring 2 people. 1 was my moms neighbor for a secretarial job ( and she's great!)

the other was a bit tougher...it is AMAZING how people will just call and right off the bat ask " yeah how much" well, wouldn't you like to know what the job entales first? or is FT sign shop help wanted enough info???

we looked for over a month. we ended up hiring someone we have to train 100% but he was the best of the bunch ( he had some brains to him! and he was CLEAN!!!) and so far he is working out ok, but it has only been 3 weeks.....he is doing some pretty hard stuff so far, so i hope all will be ok

i can't tell you how many people have been 1. in jail 2. arrested ( for drugs) 3. arrested ( for dwi). we have an extensive application and we also drug test and do a background check. we've said all of the great workers already have jobs!!! the other thing we think is funny is the amt of people who have NO TRANSPORTATION to get to-from work. ummm, ok so how are you going to show up for work at 9am m-f anyway? you live 12 miles away from my work, what are you going to do, WALK??? we actually have to ASK people how they intend on getting to the job b/c we have had a prior issue w/ someone relying on someone else to bring them to work...it didn't work out b/c this person was always calling out b/c they couldn't get to work.... 1-2x a week...

the other thing we find interesting is how people have no personal pride when applying for a job! they smell and are dirty! we are a jeans and t shirt kind of place so for us to find fault with people they really need to be bad!

on our last round of hiring, we had a monday morning interview set up with this guy at 10am. he called @ 4am to leave a msg to say he was sick " cough cough" and wouldn't be able to make it... we were not going to call back to re schedule ( he blew it) but the next day he just comes strolling in & says i'm ready for my interview now! well, i'm glad someone is! We did interview him, just to get him out of there & he proceeds to tell my DH how he just spent the weekend in Atlantic City and ended up blowing $5000 on craps tables and didn't sleep the whole weekend...DUH! weren't you sick? he got a thanks but no thanks letter....