To think getting any job is really tough?

[Bluey124]

Even just getting through the initial process of applying. It's never just applying quickly. It's often a long application form often followed by another test such as numeracy or literacy. It's a wonder anyone gets employed at all.
Years ago it used to be much easier. I got jobs in my teens and twenties just by filling out a short paper application form, now, it's a different story....

It's very much a case of who you know in a lot of companies. As well as what you know obviously.

It’s even worse once you hit 50 plus.

@maddiemookins16mum oh dear hope not. I'm mid 50s and looking to change speciality (NHS nurse) as I really cannot imagine working in my current role at 60.

The money is on a par with entry-level admin jobs in the two nearest big towns,

Non management admin is often really poorly paid. I know a few companies that are all moaning they can't get staff for such positions - "we're paying the same as everyone else" they say ... none of them are paying enough for an adult to be able to support themselves. Which is £25k btw. Bugger the so called £10.90 living wage. You can't live off that, as a grown up.

There was a programme on R4 the other night about how businesses are "crying out" for workers, and how a huge chunk of the working-age public haven't returned to work since the pandemic.

All these big important business people were discussing how to recruit people from other countries to make up the shortfall, how to make the UK more attractive, make the immigration process easier, etc.

But dismantling the many absurd, off-putting hoops that exist in the job-hunting process didn't seem to cross their minds, nor for that matter did the idea of not paying absolute peanuts!

You look at some job ads, and it feels like they either want three highly specific PhDs with two decades in a very technical field and at least three interviews, all for what essentially boils down to a basic typing/data-entry office job, or (in public-facing roles) someone with a cheerful disposition to work in a "high-pressured" and "lively" business, meaning they ought to take a bunch of shit from the public and be grateful to be paid anything at all.

Try living in Cornwall where there's 100+ applicants per role and the role itself is £19500...

Especially for marketing / design / IT and digital marketing roles

People can bang on about the skills gap as much as they want. But if there's a skill gap in London or Leeds, it doesn't mean there's an abundance of vacancies and roles in places like Devon and Cornwall.

These threads come up again and again, and people always come on to say it's piss easy to get a job. But it seriously depends on where you are.

1 vacancy in Cornwall will be more difficult to get than the 1000 vacancies in London 😂 for example....

I think the application and interview process is fairly ridiculous at this stage.

Also, a lot of employers who complain they can't find staff don't want to accept that the problem is often that they only want people who have done the exact same job for a while and won't take on people with transferrable skills who might just need a bit of training, which is really lazy and rigid thinking.

Also they tend to exclude people because of their age or because they might have a few gaps on their CV or health conditions.

Basically many employers seem to want people under 30/35 top who have been in the same job for 5 years or more, have no family commitments, never take a day off sick and don't have any long term heath condition or disability. So of course their pool of candidate is going to be rather limited...

That said I also think it depends a lot on where you live. I have found new jobs really quickly recently but I am in London where there are many opportunities.

Im finding this hard the moment. I find an application form takes about 4-5 hours to complete, then if you get an interview there's all the prep (1-4 hours depending on what they need). I interviewed for a role last month and had to do a presentation, write a "business plan" and a 4 person interview panel. For a £26k senior admin job. That they gave to an internal candidate. Fuck off.

I applied for another one that said to apply via indeed so I did. Then they sent me an email asking me to complete their own application asking for the same information. I declined.

There are loads of totally remote jobs in marketing / design / IT though. Paid at far more then £20k.

I absolutely agree that there are regional
issues. But honestly I don’t think digital stuff is the sector where that’s a problem.

You will still probably need to go through some ridiculously convoluted process to get one of them: recruiter screen, initial interview, competency interview, cultural fit, 85 stages of presentation and portfolio review, a visit to the Aztec zone for a strength challenge, and so on.

But you won’t be limited to Cornwall’s local job market.

Its really industry dependent i think. I've had two interviews this week and neither have asked for my CV and both very informal, but I'm known in my industry and have a good reputation.
I think its much harder at entry level, NMW type jobs. A friend applied for an online order pickers job at Tesco and the interview turned out to be two hours long involving team building, shop floor demonstrations etc. Sainsbury's online application form is crazy unless they've changed it recently.
Then there's the lack of flexibility around interviews. I find it odd that interviewers are happy to employ people that would have to call in sick to their current job to attend. I'm interviewing for roles but luckily both interviewers have understood that I'm not willing to cancel appointments and seem unprofessional in my current role so have worked with me to find suitable times.

And this increasingly excludes neurodiverse people from the workplace because their disability prevents them from networking effectively. Being qualified and competent at the job is no longer sufficient, it’s all about who the employer wants to eat lunch with for the next five years.

Depends on what you’re going for. I signed up with an agency, took a temp to perm job, so easy a child could do it, although 8hrs on feet, £12.20 ph, more in fact as we’ve just had a raise. No interview, no cv.

Very true. The job market in London is totally different to the rest of the country - people are constantly changing jobs/coming and going, so there is lots to apply for. Elsewhere, there are fewer employers to begin with and opportunities are further reduced because people stay in the same roles for longer.

When could you ever do that? I have worked for nearly forty years and never found this to be the case. I started a new job in the summer after a bit of time off, I did some online applications but they were no more onerous than ever, generally uploaded a CV and attached a cover letter. In the end I walked into an agency on the high street, handed in my CV and I was working within a week.

When you are on the other side of the recruitment stuff, you do really see why there are different parts to the process though. Loads of the people you interview really won’t have the skills, experience or disposition for the job. And they’re the ones that got through a screening process to interview!

I’ve interviewed people who cannot outline the headline findings of the PhD they literally just finished (which matters a great deal for a job which listed the ability to communicate complex issues to non-expert audiences), people who genuinely don’t know some absolutely basic stuff (pretty alarmingly so in some cases) and in some cases people whose personal values are pretty terrifying (we’re talking in the realms of expressing actual racism and stuff 🤦🏻‍♀️).

Equally, we’ve all worked with people who most definitely should have been weeded out and not offered a job too. So that helps to underline why the processes do need to be fairly rigorous. And sometimes why the cultural fit stuff is especially important. I’ve interviewed at companies where I knew I wouldn’t consider taking the job because it became apparent that I would most definitely not be a good cultural fit there.

I’ve also left jobs because, frankly, they were awful places to work and the culture was just horrendous (right from the top!). I feel lucky that I’m in a position now
where professionally I can make these kind of choices because I’m beyond the needing to take any job I can stage.

My eldest son is at the trying to get started phase of jobs and it’s definitely really tough. There are loads of candidates for every job and he’s had some pretty dismal
experiences. He did have to quit a job because he genuinely felt unsafe working there - being expected to work with unsafe electrical equipment and to deal with aggressive, drunk customers without any security support. His employer won’t have improved anything - there are enough people who desperately need the work and don’t have the ability to quit and look
for something else.

The other issue is underemployment at that end of the market. Even when you get a job, they just don’t seem to offer full time hours. So many employers, it seems, would rather employ loads of people and give them too few hours than actually offer proper, full time jobs. The government unemployment figures like to hide this though by focusing on how many people have any kind of employment.

You appear to have been able to do in scooby doo episodes made in the 70s.

however, I’m not sure that’s the most reliable source for understanding the labour market. Or anything really. Even sandwich making in scooby doo is not really an accurate representation of what’s possible
in real life. 🤣

I agree here @Asparagoose my LinkedIn feed is full of cyber security, marketing and digital marketing people due to contacts I made at work and at University.

Every other photo on my feed is a golf selfie. Basically, men brown nosing with other men doing their fake LinkedIn business 😂

That sounds depressing.

My linked in feed is full of people demonstrating the worthy values and good work to make everything accessible to everyone and to care about all sorts of important stuff. I look at it and think: eurgh.

no golf though. Luckily.

@Oddsocks12 @SudocremOnEverything don't forget the oh so original stories of hiring someone with no skills because they're such an empathetic and forward thinking boss 🙄 If you don't already follow The State of LinkedIn on twitter you really should!

I think it depends on what field of employment you are looking for.

I’ve had 3 interviews in he last 20 months and got each job I interviewed for however I have heard of people having 2 interviews and a “test” to sit and they work in a different area .it’s as though some employers are wanting their candidates to jump hurdles hoping that only the strongest manages it.

my first application I had to send a video of me answering some questions they had set and hen I got an interview,

the second two jobs were for the same company and the application form was quite long aswell as the dreaded interview questions!

There's a lot of #bossbabes & #workingmum on mine too. Women getting awards at ceremonies that nobody has ever heard of or selfies at a work girls night out.

🥂 always a prosecco emoji in there too.... (must be a Cornwall thing!)

I love celebrating real promotions and real awards. Or the woman or man who has held down a job while studying only to graduate with a degree in architecture / law / teaching (especially if they also have caring responsibilities!)

Those are impressive! And I love those.

I'm definitely giving that Twitter account a follow 😂

Yeah, the employment process of graduate schemes has put me off from applying, and I am just over 25. I'm used to just doing an application form + interview. In contrast, these are wanting behavioural tests, then having to go to an assessment centre etc... which puts me off when I am probably not the worse candidate for the industry I want to go into.

Mmm, I'm torn on this one. A lot of what people describe as difficult job application processes sound very simple compared to what is standard in my former career, where you often submit pages and pages of work (including original documents and plans) before longlisting. I found it really ground me down, and it took an awful lot of time, too. I'd have much preferred a long application form and a couple of tests!

But it's not true that entry-level and low-paid jobs have all moved over to complicated application systems. I'm currently a bit over minimum wage doing semi-skilled manual work, and I got the job simply by walking in, asking if there was work, discussing the hours I wanted, and my boss said I could have a paid trial for a week then see where we were. That's how he employs pretty much everyone, and most people got their jobs by word of mouth.

@Oddsocks12 my industry is full of awards ceremonies its nuts. Half the year has us all patting each other on our backs for doing our jobs 😁