If your job search is has resulted in nothing buy silent rejections and you’ve been out of work a while, don’t take it too personally. Most human resource departments have changed: the days are gone when resumes are responded to by employees. In the past are the days of even giving a polite “no thank you”.
HR departments are busy
HR people who don’t respond aren’t unsympathetic to your situation, they are just overwhelmed with theirs, as stated in a poll done by the Human Resource Management. These past few years, HR departments have been downsizing and having layoffs of their own. According to SHRM, since 2007 the average HR department has decreased from 13 to 9.2 employees. This means the average workload for any HR worker has increased by nearly 30 percent from the days when a written response to resumes was expected.
Those who work for HR know what it’s like
Many HR workers know exactly what job-hunters are going through. SHRM discovered in another survey that of the 85 percent of job losses from layoffs, 47 percent looked for work from six to twelve months while 27 percent looked for over a year. The HR workers that found positions in 2009, 49 percent said they didn’t even like their new job as much as they liked their old one. When you add pay cuts to the mix, chances are good that HR people are better candidates off payday loans than they were before.
HR department considered a ‘black hole’ for resumes.
Given such a high level of job dissatisfaction, it’s safe to say that many HR personnel are overworked. The 14 million unemployed people looking for jobs is making businesses become inundated with resumes and applications. Your submission – however carefully you crafted it and whether or not the company solicited it – is buried in a pile somewhere, and HR personnel are hard-pressed to give it individual consideration. This same thing is said for most interview follow-ups. Job candidates today get as far as the interview stage, feel that things went well, and then never hear from the company again. It is discouraging and very possible inexcusable, yet it isn’t personal.
The HR department bypass
There is nothing wrong with knocking on the door in job hunting considering the record high unemployment rate. Try the back door after a little bit of research. For the job you want you should call the company or check the website for the hiring manager’s name and the department head’s name. Next, even if you have already sent your resume to the HR department, send it also to those people directly.
Your resumé is just a checklist for HR purposes
HR personnel sort through hundreds of applications and compare candidate qualifications to a checklist of job requirements. If all the boxes aren’t checked in about 10 seconds, your resume disappears forever. Doubtless, department heads and hiring managers are busy people, too, but they aren’t looking at stacks of resumés every day, and they may see things in your application that an HR person does not. Usually companies are looking for something in someone that can’t be found in a list of job requirements.
Make sure your resume gets into the right hands
- Be patient: Wait a few days after sending your resumé.
- You need to be brave and call the people you sent the resume to.
- You need to be confident and ask to schedule a meeting.
Aren’t you looking for a job? Without one, you can’t even get low interest loans. Give your hard-earned qualifications and job experience the recognition they deserve by getting your resumé into the right hands.
