by Becky Cole

I recently had a conversation with the president of a consulting company. He was sorry I was frustrated with his company, and felt a need to explain to me why they do things the way they do. Unfortunately, he didn’t seem to get it that they way they did things didn’t make a whole lot of sense.

The job I saw posted said it was for a part-time technical writer near where I live. Since it asked for manufacturing experience, I re-wrote the resume I typically use for technical writing. Instead of a chronological resume, I created one with categories of industries in which I have worked. One of the industries in which I have worked is manufacturing, so that word was clearly written on my resume.

The instructions said to include the job ID number in the subject line of the email.. When I submitted the resume to the address they gave, I got an email telling me it did not recognize the file format, even though it was in one of the file formats it said was acceptable. So, I called the company and asked for a different email address to send in my resume. When I sent it to the second email address, I got an automatic email thanking me for my submission and that I would be put into their database in case something came up.

There were several things wrong with this situation. The biggest one being I didn’t ask to be put in their database “in case something comes up.” I was applying for a specific job – the one for which they told me to include the job number in the subject line in the email. I’ve been in their database for at least five years now, and have never gotten a call, even though I have been more than qualified for at least 80% of the jobs they posted online.

After receiving my email telling them how I felt about this process, I got the call from the president of the company. He said the reason I didn’t get considered for the job was because the person who screens the resumes couldn’t tell if I had manufacturing experience. I wrote the word “manufacturing” on my resume.

When I asked him why they even post jobs online anywhere given their website claims they have a database of 15,000 writers, he said “not everybody is available at the same time.” I found myself repeating several times, “but you have 15,000 writers in your database” hoping to help him make the connection that he’s not filling 30,000 jobs, he’s just filling one, and surely he can find one among 15,000, but it didn’t happen.

“We don’t stack resumes. When we post a job, it is for a legitimate opening.” If reminding him of the 15,000 people was a futile effort, I saw little use in pointing out the auto-response I got telling me that my resume will be put into a database, “in case something comes up.” He apparently didn’t consider that to be part of stacking resumes.

Unfortunately, this type of thing is more the norm than the exception. When you go online and do a search on “best practices” a company can use for hiring someone, you will find all kinds of things. One company targeted HR managers by saying they had a “proven, scientific” method for making sure they hired the right person that sounded more like a way of finding the perfect date, rather than a good employee. The number of sites that talk about analyzing an employee is mind-numbing, as well. There is no one way employers use to find employees, and often they make up their own rules by picking and choosing from the wide array of “best practices.”

So, what do you do?

First and foremost, understand that their hiring practices are not personal. It may feel like it, but they had their way of doing things long before you came along, and will continue to do things that way regardless of whether or not you are hired.

Make sure your resume uses the words they use in the job description. Don’t assume they will figure it out. I used “manufacturing” as a category header on my resume and the person reading it still didn’t get it.

After three or four days, follow up to make sure they got your resume, and ask them if the job is still open. If you don’t get a straight answer from them, chances are probably slim that you will end up being considered for the job or that there was even a job available in the first place. If the job is still open, ask when they will begin the interviewing process.

Keep moving on an applying for other jobs. Deal with the one as it comes up, but don’t put your life on hold hoping to hear from them.

Ask them to remove you from their database. If you still want to work for the company, it’s much better to apply for a specific job at the time they post it. This way when you apply, your information will be current. The resume the consulting company had in their database was five years old. The resume I have now is much different than the one I first submitted.

The end result of the discussion with the president of the consulting company was I decided they were no longer worth the effort to keep my resume on file with them. They now have 14,999 resumes in their database.