We should have known we were in trouble when companies across America decided to re-brand personnel departments with the chillingly impersonal moniker, “human resources.” Seemingly overnight, employees morphed from living, breathing members of a company’s “family” or “team” to disposable “resources” or widgets. And it’s even worse for job applicants.
These days, unless a company wants to hire you, their HR department treats you like you were some drunk they picked up at a bar. They take you home, have their way with you, mutter “I’ll call you” as they push you out the door, and you never hear from them again.
When you’re out of work, it’s hard enough to muster up the mojo to shower, shave (if necessary), and get all cleaned up to go to an interview…or two…or three (if you’re lucky), especially when you’re so comfortable in your sweats and t-shirts for weeks on end between interviews. You know what I’m talking about.
Then there’s the time and consideration spent on selecting and submitting samples/evidence of your talent. Preparing for an interview (or multiple interviews) doesn’t just take time, it takes money many of us can’t spare (gas for your car, if you’re driving to an interview or carfare, and dry cleaning or purchasing interview suits/clothes).
So, when you’re done with the dog and pony show and they decide you didn’t make the cut, why don’t HR recruiters call or email you to let you know they hired someone else and to thank you for your time and interest? When did this professional courtesy become unnecessary?
What, they had a hot date with a PowerPoint presentation? They were distracted by the donuts in the break room? They needed to send out another useless United Way fundraising email to their underpaid employees? Are they all trying to hide the fact that they are more than functionally illiterate (although, this may be a likely reason)?
Like most of you, I’ve known and worked with my share of HR people and they don’t seem to be saddled with a lot to do.
And when they do appear busy, it usually comes at your expense. They tend to pull you away from your 50-hour work week for an URGENT meeting about the holiday party, or to set up a task force to determine whether the company should replace the Skittles in the vending machines with tofu chips.
Seriously, why can’t these people acknowledge the effort you made to audition for their company?
Sorry, HR people…there is no excuse. On behalf of unemployed people everywhere who wait for calls that will never come, and to acknowledge your autistic-like indifference to the plight of those of us who DARE to ping your email box with our resumes, I propose we re-brand your profession once again; let’s just call you social misfits what you are: person-null un-professionals.
What do you think, fellow working stiffs? What would you call these gatekeepers of corporate incompetence?