Philadelphia H.R. Executive anonymously applies for job in his own company, fails screening process

[Amerigo Vespucci]

In an essay in this newspaper last fall, Peter Cappelli, a professor of management and human resources at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, challenged the oft-heard complaint from employers that they can't find good workers with the right skills. "The real culprits are the employers themselves," he asserted.

"It is part of a long-term trend," he adds in an interview, "and the recession caused employers to be able to be pickier, to get even more specific in the skills they think they can find outside the company and to cut back on training."

Not surprisingly, his essay drew a lot of response. What did surprise Mr. Cappelli—as he describes in a book, "Why Good People Can't Get Jobs," to be published in June—was the frequency of complaints about the hiring process itself, particularly the now-ubiquitous use of software to screen applicants.

A Philadelphia-area human-resources executive told Mr. Cappelli that he applied anonymously for a job in his own company as an experiment. He didn't make it through the screening process.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304821304577436172660988042.html

[Blue_Tires]

1. Anyone who applies through a company website without already knowing

at least one person who works at that company is a sucker...I speak from experience...

[obamanut2012]

2. this

[Amerigo Vespucci]

5. I've held several H.R. positions in the past...you are 100% spot-on.

I remember the "cattle calls"...H.R. reps being sent to job fairs and such. They would come up with a stack of resumes and would divide them up among managers who had open positions. The resumes would then sit on the managers' desks, gathering dust, and they would yell to H.R. "WHY AREN'T YOU SENDING ME ANY CANDIDATES?"

You really do need someone to take your resume and "walk it through"...especially in this economy. That doesn't mean someone CAN'T get a job by simply applying online. It means the deck is so seriously stacked AGAINST you that it makes it almost not worth doing.

[1StrongBlackMan]

7. As an HR professional ...

I second your comment. While having someone walk your paper through doesn't guarantee that you'll get the job, it does guarantee that someone will look at your paper.

In my 30+ years of professional employment (not counting the stock-clerk/cashier jobs I worked in highschool), I have only once filled out an application, before I had accepted the position - some of which were never officially advertised.

[canuckledragger]

9. I agree & can speak from experience

At least for the company website bit.

I applied once to a local call center that had recently changed it's polices to accept only online applications, & required answering a questionnaire (the 1-5 sliding scale "I strongly agree - I strongly disagree type) on top of supplying a resume, work history, etc.

I answered the questionnaire as honestly as I could, just to get an automated email later saying I didn't meet their requirements.

Being the technically inclined guy I am (Fix & build PC's for a living, used to finding workarounds) I figured out the apps were tied to email addresses, submitted a new application but this time giving out the 'gung-ho' I strongly agree answers, & later got an email saying I passed the app & would be getting a call for an interview soon.

The online work application was based on a pre-set of answers & automatically rejected you if you did not meet up with the gung ho attitude they were looking for...I doubt previous experience, expertise, references, etc played any part in the hiring process..

..Just a cold non-human program that merciless dump anyone with honesty, integrity, etc.

I believe they had only 2 H.R. people there..for a building that housed 500-600 employees at any given time..the program did most of the work for them..freeing them up to do pretty much...nothing.

Any real issues or grievances that were brought before them by the front-line agents (the people manning the phones, that did the real work, everything else is just support, really) resulted in them taking the company side pretty much all the time. The center tried to unionize to combat the unjust firings, etc, just to have that squashed due to intimidation & other methods (also threats to 'move elsewhere' if a union was formed)..along with an ineffectual labor board.

I put in a year & 1/2 before I decided to call it quits..after watching too many brown-nosers promoted to potions they couldn't handle, (due to too much time getting OUT of real work in various ways.. resulting in less real knowledge & experience doing the job) & watching various people getting fired for whatever reasons they could justify.

It's a common practice at most call centers..it keeps wages & salaries from getting too high..another trick being moving campaigns to other locations & setting everyone back to zero again, getting paid much less for the 'new' campaign. Of course you have the 'option' of moving to the new location to keep your old job...but the locations were usually pretty far away..as in the other side of the country or another country completely.

The company in question was named StarTek...whose client at the site I worked at was...T-Mobile.

[AngryAmish]

3. Although illegal, employers would be better off just giving all potential employees an IQ test,

a background check, credit check and make sure the person is not a job hopper.

I haven't fired someone in years but I've been lucky. My best employee never went to college but is smart (went to a terrible HS and never had the chance to go) and works like a demon.

[1StrongBlackMan]

8. I disagree ...

IQ test,

a background check, credit check

Indicate exactly nothing about a persons ability or desire to succeed in a job.

I have found that one of the best methods for securing "good" employees is to offer current employees "Referral Bonuses."

People will refer people that they know CAN do the job, even if they referred person doesn't appear so on paper.

And people refer people that they feel WILL do the job ... their personal reputation rests on the referred persons success on the job.

[marmar]

15. 'IQ test, View profile a background check, credit check '

Wow. Just wow.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

4. That would be hysterical

if not for the fact that a whole lot of qualified job applicants got probably got rejected ("screened-out&quot by nothing more than a computer program. Is it too much to have people interact with other people any more? I feel like we are becoming a society of automated phone systems and "call centers" that are basically useless for most people's immediate needs. Don't even get me started on PayPal and how they use software to determine whether or not people can immediately get the money they earn through transactions (i.e. eBay) or if it gets put on "hold" for 3-4 weeks after the transaction has been completed.

[zbdent]

6. I applied for a programming position, and an online test was part of the process ...

of course, when you have to answer SAT questions, read e-mails as they fly by as headers, and provide relevant answers to later e-mails, all as timed ...

how good are you really going to do???

I've described it as similar to texting while driving while talking on another cell phone.

I guess the company WANTED today's "workers" ... you know, the ones that people complain about all the time ... merrily tweeting while they're supposed to be working.

The "test" had absolutely nothing to do with knowledge of the programming language.

[Matariki]

10. I get job descriptions sent to me all the time that are beyond absurd

It's like some HR person takes every development language and acronym they've heard of (and throws in visual design skills for good measure) and tosses them into one big Requirement Salad. Including number of years experience in technologies that have only existed a fraction of those required years.

Cracks me up every time.

[leftyohiolib]

11. an hr "professional" who does this should lose their job for being lazy. do they find reading

too difficult? wtf. people send in resumes and are not granted the courtesy of someone even looking at them? hr people just sitting at their desk waiting for someone else to walk in someone for them to hire.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

12. Online applicants need to know the right "buzz words."

[jcboon]

13. Yes

Because using the right "buzz words" in business these days is more important than actually doing any work.
I'm not kidding. . .

[AnotherMcIntosh]

14. You must have encountered an MBA or two.

The trust-fund babies with their MBA degrees have been trained how to destroy American businesses.