Posted on 03/29/2011 5:45:36 PM PDT by buccaneer81
The software company definitely seemed interested in hiring Tom Fleming. It set up breakfast and lunch meetings, then flew the Concord salesman to its headquarters in Virginia for interviews with a half-dozen executives, including the founder and chief executive. But after promising to get back to him in a week, the company never contacted him again.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
I know it sucks but you have have a thick face and a black heart and only concern yourself with getting that job or a job.
It’s not personal and I wish people were more considerate but look at it from their perspective. They know how bad and sometimes desperately someone wants the job and facing you over the phone and tell you they have made a decision that doesn’t include you invites pain.
They know they are going to get questions like what could I have demonstrated better? and a million other questions that come up and believe me, it’s no better telling someone we aren’t hiring you, than it is to fire someone.
I personally don’t have a problem telling someone we have made a decision and feel it’s better for everyone, including my conscience..
Then again, I am never late cuz I consider it a four letter word, as in rude and several others people think of when they think of you because you are like every other person in their life that wastes their time.
I use to get irritated at the interview process not so much because I needed the job, I don’t. I would get irritated at some of the dumbest things that have ever been said or their decision hire moronic, poseurs, who couldn’t close a closet door.
The way you get a job is to distinguish yourself from all other and demonstrate you are a professional who understands the job better than anyone and can execute.
In my case it was sales of telecom services. I never really cared what company I worked for just so long as they left me alone and since I was always 200-400% of quota they should never ever bug me. Yes, I am a primadonna and I only know of 4 others like me in the country.
There are more but the ones I met were just like me. Professional Salespeople whose only goal was to help people solve problems and achieve their goals. Further, we won’t even talk to you if you aren’t the CEO, CFO and CTO.
In each case where I actually competed against them I discovered we all pretty much sold the same and the feedback I would get from clients is the decision was really difficult but there were only two choices with companies who understood their needs.
In sales there are liars(thieves), chumps(they occassionally get lucky), Salespeople(They work way to hard and are deficient in selling skills and how their products and services can help) and there are Professional Salespeople.
We understand the selling process and how our products and services can best help an organization best achieve their goals and we demystify the buying and acquisition process. We can explain it, teach it and demonstrate it at the drop of a dime.
I give several classes on sales and have to push the Mickey Mouse stuff they have learned thus far out of their heads. I then get in the trenches and sit right by them, demonstrating exactly the approach.
Probably went on a bit much but wanted to impress that you can’t win them all, but more doors are always open and sometimes it was meant to be the way it is.
Just demonstrate excellence and it will eventually work out, even if it is painful.
One of these companies was large computer and printer maker where I had three interviews for a position as a project manager and then dead silence. I learned later from a friend at the same company that the position had been filled by a Russian twenty-five years my junior and in all likelihood I had just been H1B "due diligence".
The next company flew me to Texas FOUR times for interviews and told me after the final interview they had checked my references and were preparing an offer and like the first I never heard from them again. My follow-ups went unacknowledged and about a month later I found a post on a blog that the company had hired a guy away from Motorola for a strikingly similar position.
Eventually I came to realize I was just too old, too white and too heterosexual to be considered employable by an American company.
When the Chinese came for me it was completely different, they flew me and my wife to China first class and while I discussed business and toured the company a couple of the executives english speaking wives gave my wife the grand tour of Shanghai. We left with an agreement they have not deviated from.
ka-donk? no idea what that means. having been the cto of 3 different corporations, and president of my own for over 12 years, i haven’t had many rejections (if that’s the implication)
since you’ve highlight ‘i’ many times, i’m guessing you’re the internet syntax police. grats. you’re passive aggressive ‘suggestion’ has been duly noted, and promptly disregarded.
maybe when you’ve typed as much as i have, you’ll come to realize capitalization on a web board is irrelevant compared to content when time is limited.
then again, many people cannot help but stare at their own shoes. while others, prefer to look at the bigger picture.
Yeah, but we all agree I am not your average PC type either. :-)
This is a very sticky subject, and I can see both sides. As for me, I am an HR Manager of a privately-held small company based in Texas. Which is MUCH better than a large publically-held company located anywhere else. Of course my experience is in this small little section in Houston, I don't know what other companies are doing, I'm just making sure my company is doing the right thing.
My job is to protect my company in case of hiring lawsuits, or rather any lawsuits generated by the employees or potential employees. Secondly, my job is to protect my employees from other employees, clients, contractors and general miscreants... heck, even from themselves sometimes.
And before everyone gets up in arms, Texas is a right-to-work state. There are more laws on the books to protect employees than you can shake a stick at. The only things protecting employers are their HR people, their legal people and the company’s own good sense in policies and procedures. And yes I know, that not always the best either.
As for hiring, I’ve heard the “don’t tell anyone until a decision is made” school of thought. I’m not a fan of it. The reason it exists is that if you tell someone they are “not it”, and they find out that you are still hiring, there is a possibility of a lawsuit heading your direction, especially if that person is qualified but you just don’t like them. I’m more of a fan of having a grading scale, each step of the process is worth so many points, and you need to have XX number of points to move forward. That way you can let the people who are “not it” know immediately, and you can tell them why. Just make sure that whatever reason is given is legal and JUSTIFIED.
There are horror stories on both sides, I’ve interviewed some supremely awful candidates, as well as some “knock them out of the park” candidates. I’ve also interviewed with some people and have to shake my head at the entire process.
I will give people this, most HR people have no idea what skill set they are looking for when they source candidates for a hiring manager. I recommend that whenever possible, find out who the hiring manager is and bypass HR entirely. Once the hiring manager likes you, they can maneuver around HR to get you into the position, especially when you are dealing with large bureaucratic type companies who have policy upon policy just to open a window.
I can tell you I’ve been seeing some really odd things lately. My company is a staffing company, we do Information Technology. In the last three months we have seen hiring companies just do, tremendously odd things. For example, this one client hired two people from us, these were full-time direct hires. In one case they let him go in 5 weeks, in the other case 4 weeks. Companies are giving NO leeway to candidates. The excuse their HR department gave was that the candidate was not senior enough, didn’t have enough experience and that they were letting her go effective now. Didn’t the three face-to-face interviews clear that up? There apparently was no other excuse given, just you aren’t senior enough in your skills, thanks, bye. (shakes head). And this is not the only company I’m hearing who is doing this, it’s way strange.
My company is currently looking to hire a phone sales person. This is just a small sampling from that process. We had 123 people apply for the position (this is a draw vs. commission sales role – draw is 30K a year, no cap on commission). In reviewing resumes I responded to 60 people that I was interested and would like to talk to them about their background and to call me (with a direct phone number) at their convenience. Of those 60, I had 12 call me. Of those 12, I eliminated 6 in the initial phone screen. Of the remaining 6, I scheduled them all to come in and to a face to face. 3 of them had criminal backgrounds so bad that I could not overlook them in the hiring process. (child abuse, felony theft, and case of child sexual misconduct). So that now leaves me with 3 candidates out of the original 123. Of those three, I brought two back for a working interview, and yes we paid them for their work. This is to see if they like the atmosphere, the team, the job, and to see what we do for a day. One of them flat out told us he was waiting for another offer to come in and he called to tell us he was taking that role the next day, and we did ultimately hire the last person.
I suppose like everything else, there are HR managers and departments you should avoid like the plague and there are candidates that need to be calssified as No Interest, ever.
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