Recruitment, can't believe how hard it is!

[Sunnydawn]

I read and hear so much about people wanting flexible working, and how so many people are stuck in dead end jobs, or on zero hours contracts.

But, I am involved in recruitment for two jobs right now, one a professional job in a lovely environment, as a part time job share. The other, a part time, flexible, admin job, again in a lovely office, with training and a good career if you want it.

And no decent applicants! No applicants for the first. Loads who have applied for the latter, but ecan't even attempt the basics forvan interview or trial (ie. turning up in time, dressing half smart, answer a phone).

Frankly, I despair. What are people doing? Where are they working/wanting to work?

These are different places, by the way, so it's not the particular environment.

Venus - I try to be. Maybe it's because I'm a woman - and have first hand experience of an interviewer looking at my wedding ring, looking at the year of my qualifications and working out my age. Then them casually trying to work in conversational questions to identify whether I have kids, or to guess whether I am a 'maternity risk'. Maybe it's because I have worked my way up. I dropped out of my degree so I got to management level by starting at the bottom and working my way up, so I know what it's like on the floor and in the teams.

My boss isn't quite as flexible or understanding with me and my peers. But he'll eventually retire or move on and gradually, people like that will be replaced with more people like us. I will be hard on you if I think you're taking the piss, or not giving me your best. But if you keep your side of the bargain up, then I will fight HR to get you sponsorship for professional qualifications if that's what you want to do. Or push them to agree your flexible working because I can accommodate it because I know that I can rely on you regardless of whether you're doing 25 hours a week or 40. I'll go to bat for you at the annual pay committees to get you a pay rise and a bonus when you've done a good job. And I'll put my hand in my pocket and get the bacon butties in on a Friday as well

We spend a lot of time at work, so it's important to be happy. I've had managers who have made me dread doing to work so much that I have spent Sundays in tears at the thought of going back. I promised myself I would try my hardest not to be that kind of boss when I started managing people.

Societally (is that a word? Probably not but never mind!), I can't help but think that we have created a lot of the problems we're seeing now. It's utterly unreasonable to expect someone on a zero hours contract - or worse on an unpaid 'internship' - to give the same kind of commitment and dedication that you would expect from a salaried employee with a decent remuneration package. I don't know what the answer is. But something is broken.

I think in some ways that the minimum wage actually hasn't helped with some of those issues. I'm not saying I oppose the minimum wage or think people should be paid a button a day - before anyone jumps on me. I understand why we have it. But in terms of how people feel about their role and how much progression there is, I think it has created some issues.

It feels to me like it's had the effect - especially as it increases -of really bunching together the 'lower end' of the jobs market. Jobs which would have previously been at the bottom end have moved up in wage, but those a step or two above haven't really - they've just got caught in an ever expanding pool of "minimum wage/pays above minimum wage" jobs. I think, personally, that it's made it harder for people to feel like they are progressing and it also seems to be a bit of a mental barrier - why should I do X,Y and Z when I'm only paid MW. It also causes roles and grades to have ever decreasing pay gaps so it can seem "not worth it" to do the qualification to move up if the pay rise ends up only being £1 per hour.

I suspect it has contributed to the rise of unpaid internships too.

Graphista - it was bookkeeping....

Paul you sound lovely. Id work for you :)

*BugsyStar30
*
I've got kids but have made it clear on applications that I'm not governed by school hours or anything. Still nothing.

Ummm, does that mean you are mentioning your children on your cv? Otherwise, I can't quite work out how/where you manage to weave in your hourly availability on such a doc - surely that sort of thing is for interview time when you can be a real human, not words on paper?

^ Sorry - for "cv", read "application" in my previous post.

Paul you sound like the fab boss I mentioned. When I first got the job I was 'warned' she was overly tough and unfair by more than one person, my experience with her was she knew exactly who the piss takers were (the ones that didn't start a minute before 8 and wouldn't work a minute past 4.30, took long boozy lunches, frequently took fri/mon off 'sick', did the bare minimum work wise, if they made mistakes instead of owning up and resolving tried to cover up or worse pass blame to others). They got away with NOTHING conversely those of us that worked hard, put in extra hours if we could, were honest and professional, she went to bat for us EVERY time. I collapsed 2 weeks into the job and ended up in hospital for a couple weeks the timing couldn't have been worse. I was worried sick. When I went back to work she reassured me, made me promise if I felt at all unwell to let her know and not to overdo it. When she caught another (lazy, unprofessional and rude to clients) employee making a snide comment about me having weeks off so soon into a new job she immediately pulled them in and put them straight and they apologised to me. She also used to get cakes in every Friday . I had to leave that job due to then husband being posted (army) I was in bits leaving.

Lashes, OK bookkeeping rarely offered as an at home job. Pay etc good?

Gosh Yello - that's a really ageist statement! I've only got one GCSE because I did it for fun as an adult. When I did my O levels and A levels and degree MS excel didn't exist

Ah it wasn't meant to be! Just hard to imagine a world pre computer :-)

Although also hard to think someone could have been in continuous office based employment and not have had to get to grips with MS office?

The partners at work lie to tell us they used to do everything on paper and carry around big boxes of files. The new grads are always very perplexed by that.

ShotsFired - sorry I didn't make it clear what I meant. Obviously I don't mention having children on my CV - with many jobs you have to fill in an application firm as well as send in your CV and this often means ticking boxes to show what your availability would be. I try to be as flexible as I can with hours available but this still doesn't seem to make a difference!

Ha, Yello,

I used to work in the finance department of a top 4 bank. When I started in 1988 the accounts for our particular area were still done on a big piece of double entry paper folded over with LITERALLY a few envelopes the boss had scribbled his adjustments down on tucked inside...

Some industries took quite a while to catch up with technology. Not for lack of wanting to, but when you have millions of legacy customers/systems/processes, it's hugely expensive and time-consuming to move all of that on to a computer/single system etc. I'm 38 and still remember using one of those automated adding up machines for accounts - the ones that produced a till receipt for you at the end. We also used to use paper files and some of them were huge. That carried on until 2009!

I think businesses need to be much clearer about what they want. There have been a few posts from people talking about having to jump through interview hoops for a position that has been clearly earmarked for an internal candidate. It's unfair and unprofessional to behave that way - honestly it would put me off working for that firm, but if you're job hunting with no current employment, then you can't afford to be so choosy. I think some firms do take advantage of that desperation.

There are very few good quality recruiters out there. Most of the ones I have dealt with will lie about experience, or edit the CV so that key points are missing. One candidate I interviewed could barely speak English. Lovely lady and very highly qualified in the field, but the job specified that an excellent standard of written and spoken English was required, as the role would involve managing other people and also producing reports for senior management. It was terribly embarrassing and I ripped strips off the recruiter as this poor woman had brought her own copy of her - unedited - CV with her, which bore no resemblance to what the recruiter had sent me. A waste of my time and hers.

I'd like to see more open days for vacancies, where you bring groups of people in for a half day. A firm I used to work for did this and it was an excellent way of recruiting people. Giving them a chance to perform rather than sitting in an artificial interview environment - which is stressful for all concerned!

PaulDacres, you sound lovely. When did professional, consciencious managers like you become the exception rather than the norm?

You've got a good point about "open days," if what you're thinking of is the assessment centre. My first, brilliant, employer wouldn't let people get involved in recruitment and selection unless they had at least undertaken the open learning module on it. One of the things I clearly remember is that there is some good evidence which suggests that interviewing alone is a very poor method of selecting the right candidate for a vacancy; its efficacy is actually on a par with handwriting analysis, and barely above pot luck. That's why many larger employers, particularly those with big intakes of recruits who by nature are long-term investments (graduates, the disciplined services and so on), tend to use multi-faceted assessment days so that as well as one-to-one interviews they also do group discussions, presentations, analytical exercises, and so on. Some even hold residential centres over several days and deliberately allow candidates to get pissed to see how they behave under the influence, treat restaurant staff, and so on. In my experience, it's one of the few areas where HR can actually add something that hiring managers would otherwise miss.

Unfortunately, the history of post-WW2 Britain is a familiar litany of poor management, suspicion of professional management as a discipline in its own right, and missed opportunities.

The wages and everything, I find this all quite hard to believe that people aren't fighting over this. Only way it would make sense is if you are in a very very jobs rich area. A retail minimum wage job with as 20 hour contract had 120 applications here last week. Its crazy.

As for not turning up to interviews and such...I may be able to shed some light on some of this. My partner was unemployed last year for a couple of months and was contionually threatened that if he did not apply for unsuitable jobs his JSA would be sanctioned. I do not mean unsuitable as in min wage or something he didn't want to do. I mean unsuitable as in do not have the basic qualifications. Do not drive when the ad specifically requests a driver. He was basically encouraged to waste both the interviewer and his own time when he knew he had no chance. At one stage he was told that a 'white lie' would be fine...and as such add some qualifications and experience that he didn't have to his CV as 'they don't get checked in many jobs anyway'

Anyway, he applied for every position in our local area (local meaning within about an hour travel away) that was not 0 hours or self employed (which doesn't work with a family to support). This worked out at a pathetic 1-0 jobs per week on average. None of which even replies to him most of the time. I expect as they had so many applicants. Anyway, once the advisor told him to alter his CV to include whatever qualifications the job required (regardless of if he had them) he finally got a reply and an invitation to interview. During the call he was told again that his own driving license was required and that he must have proof of his experience (which he didn't have) and felt very put on the spot about this. Called his advisor who told him if he did not attend the interview he would be sanctioned. Now, he didn't just not go. He did call the company back and tell them what was going on and that he did not actually have the experience and license. He was so embarrassed. But he felt this was the answer rather than turn up and potentially get a job that he was not qualified for and (I thought it was, not totally sure) committing fraud too?! The company said if they were contacted by the jobcentre they would say they withdrew the interview offer. So he then had to lie to the jobcentre saying this and came under suspicion there. I don't know if they ever did contact the company or not. And luckily he found a job that he was actually qualified for a couple of weeks after this by sheer luck (a friends employer searching for a position...word of mouth, like most jobs are these days)

I went off on a tangent a bit there, but just wanted to explain what jobseekers are expected to do these days under threat of having no income at all. This was last year, its probably worse now. I know it was an attractive prospect to him to just not turn up rather than have an awkward conversation about how he had purposely lied.

I do understand that people come under that sort of pressure and it's undoubtedly behind a lot of it, it's just also incredibly frustrating when you're trying to find staff and it's like wading through treacle.

Oh, he was also advised to not mention he was badly dyslexic. For jobs requiring a lot of reading and writing.

Why do employers rule out "over-qualified" people?

Obviously this is not the case for professional roles, but before I had the kids I applied for a job at Wetherspoons after having 10 years bar experience (running bars, along with normal bar staff experience too) and I was turned down and the person interviewing me told me that they like to train up their staff as they find people with experience are set in their ways and its hard to get them out of habits they have picked up over the years. Not sure if that was just the local Wetherspoons or everywhere. I found it all weird and told her so, as I had clearly stated on my application that I had a lot of experience, so why invite me for an interview to start with :S

They don't employ over qualified people because you might show them up for the lack of skills that they are missing and you might end up with their job.

I could hardly keep a straight face last week when I went for an interview, complete pillock of a hiring manager and great HR lady.
i do know more than HM and could do her job but I also know she's only getting £7,000 a year more which is nothing once you take off tax, NI and she's getting a great deal more hassle for the money. Will be interesting to see if she offers me the role, who could make her life 100% easier or a grad who she will spend a lot of time and energy on and therefore make work for herself and maybe miss her targets

Years ago I worked for a lovely recruitment agency, did loads of jobs for them which eventually led to a perm job. Just googled them and they still exist! prospect-us.co.uk
Don't know if they are still as lovely as they were 15 years ago mind.

To the people moaning about not receiving good quality applicants, why don't you advertise on mumsnet jobs? There is clearly an underutilised army of bright, talented women on here.

Ah yes, those that invite you in for interview then reject you for something that was obvious from your CV… irritating at best.

On overqualification, I suspect that there's a lot of prejudice out there in respect of formal qualifications, in the same way that there is about schools and universities. Take it from someone privately educated with Russell Group and Ivy League degrees who regularly comes up against public sector socialist warriors who love power but don't understand accountability - there is as much inverse snobbery in Britain as there is the more traditional kind. The nebulous concept of "qualification by experience" seems relatively unique to the UK, it always appears in person specs where there is an internal candidate without the paperwork lined up, and it always trumps any kind of independent accreditation.

Even where people aren't consciously prejudiced they can feel very threatened by someone who they suspect might do their own job better than them if given half a chance. So they don't give them any chance.

Whispering - I do all those things now in my job, six years experience, I'm bloody good. Looking for a role with just a bit of development potential as exhausted every avenue here, can't even get an interview.

Thought there must be loads of competition for that sort of job, starting to think maybe my CV is just crap. But don't really know where to turn.

Even where people aren't consciously prejudiced they can feel very threatened by someone who they suspect might do their own job better than them if given half a chance. So they don't give them any chance

I had an interview ( via an agency who had clearly failed to understand how to match my experience to requests from clients) a few months ago with someone who said my CV showed I was competent and experienced and could probably do his job as well as the one advertised as he was "just a bank manager" ha ha haaaar, how we laughed! It was totally true though. I didn't get the job.

I'm a bit stuck that way at the moment oxbridge/second degree ex teacher, but only wanting part time job. I'm not qualified for anything professional part time so will be looking at low wage jobs.... Yet they will presumably rather someone young /full of beans/ wonder why someone with my qualifications wants a basic job!

I think you need to explain why in a covering letter tbh. For us it's nothing to do with snobbery but the practicality of not wanting to recruit someone who is really looking for something entirely different and so won't be likely to stay.

TreehouseTales. Aim higher, the shitty part time jobs are more trouble than they are worth. And tbh you probably won't get one. It's a waste if your energy, get on LinkedIn, use your networks and something enjoyable will crop up.

I've prepped for an interview before - which involved delivering a 20 minute presentation plus pack, so it was quite a lot of work - which also involved a 90 minute grilling from the Head of Dept.

Only to be told that I was a great candidate but that they wouldn't make an offer because I didn't have X experience. This was completely apparent from my CV, so why the hell ask me in for an interview? In that instance I was so pissed off I went back to the company directly and gave them feedback about how unhappy I was to have had my time wasted. I did get an apology but it was so frustrating.

Clearly we all need to set our own business up and work with each other