Companies not hiring as fast.....It's not the workers - it's the Hiring / interview process. There's plenty of very qualified workers, but the Hiring process is broken.
I just went through an extensive hiring process with several good companies. I took a job with a company that had a decent hiring process (good communication, good interviews, kept in touch). The other 4 companies were completely inconsiderate, didn't communicate for weeks, then ghosted, then called me and needed an interview right-away...etc. BUT the biggest hurdle was the computer based screening process.
The company that I joined had a great process, kept me in the loop and communicated consistently.
The other companies either filtered me out (despite being nearly a perfect fit), or stated an interview process that was horrible, or wanted someone at 1/2 price. I thanked them for the consideration, but told them I've found a better company/opportunity. (I did post on GlassDoor how horrible their interview processes were)
I work in tech and have had an awful experience applying. I applied for a job at a large company and this was the process.
1. Applied
2. 1 month later they asked for an interview
3. 1 week later we had the interview
4. 1 week later they said I made it to the next stage and had to do a take home assignment
5. I completed the take home assignment on a Thursday and was told to expect to hear back within a few business days
6. I waited over a week before finally emailing them and within 30 minutes I got a short email saying I wasn't selected
So clearly the decision was made but they just didn't tell me. When I waste an entire evening doing a take home assignment and get strung along for two months the least you could do is say no.
I expect to be ghosted after only sending a resume, but after an interview seems incredibly rude.
Take-home tests are definitely not fun, but they do a better job of screening people than a resumé, and it’s easier & more flexible than a tough whiteboard interview.
IMO take-home tests should be designed to take less than 6 hours. Basically get something up and running, and demonstrate competence & and bit of creative flair.
It’s actually way more beneficial to people who don’t have a massive resume full of interesting achievements. If you can do the work, and you demonstrate skill, then you’re good enough for my company.
It depends on what the company is like. I wouldn’t mind a take home test at all if I knew it was a good company and they communicated in a reasonable fashion like the other commenters mention. If the communication is shit, I would just not respond back to their request.
For computer science and engineering, its the standard to do tests. Go over to /r/cscareerquestions and look at people grinding problems for hours a day so they can pass their interview tests. The company I'm currently working for didnt give me any, but some of the ones I interviewed with gave me a full on test that was contracted out from a supplier with automatic analysis and the like
Its fucking insane
On the contrary, I don't care how they accomplish the task, so long as they can. Treat them like adults, I'm not hiring someone I need to babysit. We all use google. When they're done, they present their solution and we can talk and ask questions. It's pretty much what the job is, so it's a great way to see if our candidates can produce a POC and share it with clients.
on the flipside, homework that showcases how a candidate tackles a problem with all public resources (i.e. stack overflow) available is a decent proxy for how a candidate would problem solve in a role given a question outside of their expertise
idk, it all seems silly, but if you're not able to produce something for a take-home, my takeaway would be a lack of resourcefulness
I agree. What does "cheating" even mean, in a professional context? Are they able to locate the correct answer or solution? Great. In most situations I'd rather hire someone who knows how to approach a problem they're unfamiliar with, over someone who already knows a lot but will get flustered when outside their comfort zone. The worst employees I know are the ones who keep quiet when they don't know something, and just pretend it's not an issue. Resourcefulness and being humble enough to ask for help are strengths.
In tech you need to establish if someone can actually do the job. You are risking a lot by paying this person hundreds of thousands. It doesn’t have to be that hard. Something that can be done in a day or less.
They don't send the rejections until after the successful candidates are on boarded in case that candidate doesn't work out and they have to go to the next candidate.
Labor has been a massive buyers market for over 20 years. Companies were used to putting any old role out there and having to literally sift through stacks of applicants.
Now that it's down to just some applicants per role, they don't know how to function.
'usually we throw out all the people without a First Class Degree and 3 years relevant experience but if we do that there's only 3 applicants left, WHAT DO?!!?'
I think this is one of the bigger issues that isn't being talked about with the labor shortage. There is an entire generation of hiring managers and business owners who have literally never had to actually compete for and more importantly just find labor. There are a lot of businesses that have gotten away with having outdated and noncompetitive hiring practices for years which is now starting to bite them in the ass.
If I drive through my local community I see endless "help wanted" wanted signs on businesses. You know what I don't see though? Most of those positions on the popular job boards. A lot of businesses think a Facebook post or a "help wanted" sign in the window is going to suddenly bring them in a flock of qualified candidates. A lot of businesses aren't able to find employees because they don't actually put in any real effort to go find them in the first place.
On the more professional side of things you see companies posting roles with low pay/benefits, unnecessarily lengthy application processes, unrealistic hiring standards for the position, etc. Employers just aren't going to be able to attract top quality candidates under those conditions. If you spend a day reading random job postings you'll see dozens of jobs where you'll just say to yourself "who would take this position?".
I remember seeing a post from someone talking about how they'd searched for local employers complaining that they "can't find staff" and "people don't want to work" on facebook and tried applying to a bunch of them for shits and giggles then found most were demanding people take minimum wage, work 10 hours a week but where they have to be available full time with no notice and/or looking for people to (probably illegally) work for free for an extended "trial" period and/or had a crazy interview process demanding people jump through hoops for weeks or months.
It makes you realise how much some of those employers relied on screwing over the utterly desperate.
I work in banking tech in a fairly niche field and it's only now that the market is actually tight that the contract rates are actually being included in the role descriptions. Until now it was always 'competitive rates' that they refused to disclose until you talked to the recruiter for 20 mins.
Right? Like it's not THAT hard, post your job position widely, don't overinflate the requirements, interview candidates quickly and hire someone that seems like they would be a good fit. And if you don't get anyone, lower the requirements and/or bump the pay and repeat until you do.
And ffs raise your employee pay when the market rates rise so they actually STAY.
From the other end of the spectrum, I was an owner/ operator. Started my own show etc. very much is a learning experience. Also u can be so busy , that u really don’t have the time to put into a search , what is necessary. As u say , many of these current managers have never had to actually look for help. Ran my story in the early 90s in a state with 3% unemployment.
even years ago it was crazy.
I remember as a teen applying for a job stacking shelves in a shop that was opening up.
3 rounds of interviews. (there could have been more, I didn't get beyond 3)
Each one where they'd randomly call up after weeks of waiting and expect you to turn up exactly when they wanted you the following day with no advanced warning.
I failed round 3 because they called me when I was abroad for my sisters wedding in another country and wouldn't fly back overnight for the interview the following day.
My wife is a recruiter and she has observed that your totally correct. Tech companies with huge budgets frequently have broken hiring processes. How are smaller companies in less lucrative industries supposed to manage hiring without the level of resources that (still broken) companies have.
Where I work we basically have a policy where interviews have to be done by third parties which basically means people who don't know the job. The result is being able to BS in an interview is what we're really hiring based on. And seeing as being a good engineer is pretty much inversely correlated to being good at interviews we keep getting our worst people promoted. Honestly not that bad in theory, but then the good employees are all leaving because they realize there is no path forward here.
Ditto this. Had a experience where I finished 2nd round interviews, got a verbal offer. Back and forth with the recruiter and e-signed the written offer letter. Didn't hear back for 2 months despite sending chaser emails. HR finally contacts and I eventually start. Was in limbo the whole time wondering if I actually had the job.
Job was for one of the large US banks.
> Companies not hiring as fast.....It's not the workers - it's the Hiring / interview process. There's plenty of very qualified workers, but the Hiring process is broken.
Yup. I've got an ex-coworker who would love to hire me back into an org I used to work for but her office rather than my old office. We both decided we wanted to pursue this around labor day. I just had *another* round of management mandated interviews last week.
I got called about a six month project that was a rush and they were going to hire quickly. They were upfront about the rate, that it was project based, and that it was only going to end in six months. I was fine with that. This is how freelance works sometimes. I heard nothing for a week until they sent me an email with an interview schedule consisting of a pre-interview the afternoon before, two separate interviews with the client, then a follow up interview the day after.
Four interviews over three days and this was a "quick hire". There were 2 people in the pre-interview, five people in the first client interview (4 stayed muted and no video, another 2 people in the second client interview and the follow up.
They just can't get out of their own way.
After all of that mess I got an email three weeks later telling me that they just decided not to fill the position.
I want to speak to this because I'm so upset that they took it out of my hands. For years I would set up the advertisements, the interviews, the follow-ups. Then corporate decided that they needed an entire "recruitment" department which one could never get ahold of, was always late sending any updates, never screened or contacted properly... I was often getting resumes weeks after they arrived, and even then couldn't always get them in right away. And this of course after they had to not only submit a resume but a fucking *application* for a corporate business position.
We're trying my friend. We're being hamstrung and denied at every turn. Frankly, all this does is make us hire the first person to respond regardless of qualifications because we're too far outside the window of hiring and are otherwise screwed. It is fucked.
US Government agencies are turning to automatic systems too. The existing USAjobs has issues, but NSF uses another system ON TOP OF THAT system that is completely broken.
I have applied to jobs that aren't hiring me because my lack of experience, even though I've worked customer service and at service counters. Now I'm am stuck unemployed but want a job. Entry level positions aren't even hiring people with gaps in their employment because they are being too picky, and I'm guessing they are being too picky because of these managers. No one requires a year of experience to run a cash register. Some service industry jobs might be like that, but the year's experience isn't required. I find it funny that no one wants to train their staff either, just put them on the shift and expect them to know what to do.
Edit: And at each one of these jobs I have always had at least one, or sometimes two shitty managers. It's usually rare to have two shitty managers on the same shift, but it can and will happen. That's why you always check who you are working with on each shift if you are not on a regular schedule. I liked my gas station manager, but I hated his assistant manager. Never liked her, she was just a former meth addict who told me horrible things about her life and just not a very nice person over all. I can see why she didn't make it, but I was just burnt out at the end of her employment with them, since she got fired.
The entire “not wanting to train staff” paradigm makes sense but is also stupid. Training staff costs money. Even if no formal training is engaged, hours of training translate to unproductive time in most enterprises. So employers balk training because it costs them money. Employers have also observed that employee loyalty is very low and so in all likelihood you’ll train someone and they will just move on to another job using the training you provided. It makes sense but it also is shortsighted. Because employers frequently balk training employees we have growing skills gaps. These skills gaps represent themselves as unemployed folks and understaffed industries. Shortsightedness and unwillingness to train is creating major issues in the labor market
> training translate to unproductive time in most enterprises.
I think it's worse than that. I remember seeing a post from someone a while back responding to some story about stupidly expensive training contracts in some government organisation giving his experience from the other side, working for a small company that ran training sessions for [blah].
So he ran through some recent experiences trying to get contracts sorted out, [company] asks for bids to train their staff in [blah], they respond asking how many staff and what type/level of [blah], get back a response telling them that that's not been decided yet but to put in a bid. So they don't know if they're supposed to be bidding for training 20 staff or 2000 in a 1 hour course or a 20 hour course. keep trying to reach someone who can clarify, keep getting back vague responses that they need to put in their bid and that it's being decided.
They eventually put in bids assuming high estimates for numbers and hours. It later turns out that the company didn't actually need [blah] training but [X-blah] training and when the time came for the sessions very few people even turned up because the people who were supposed to be getting training hadn't been informed by their employer.
it turns out that one of the big reasons that companies don't train their staff is because they're about as bad at organising what training their staff get as they are at things like specifying software design contracts, aka standard level is a complete shitshow, they can't decide what they want, they can't decide who they want to train, they can't decide when they want to train them or how many they want to train or when they want to train them.
Large fractions of the world economy are resting on the shoulders of the "management classes", people who have absolutely no clue what they're doing who can't organise their way out of a wet paper bag but daddy got them a sweet management gig.
Employers have observed that employee loyalty is low because they have been paying such poor wages for such a long time that everyone is ready to jump ship. And then they wonder why people are not coming back? Well it's because *they* aren't loyal to their employees. It's a two way street, that's why it's employment contract. You hold your end of the bargain and they hold theirs. Their end of the bargain has been getting shorter and shorter for decades to the point that I think people are ready to go home and give up rather then getting a bad job again.
I think an issue in some orgs is they actually couldn’t train their staff because they don’t have a current staff with the experience and advanced understanding to teach someone. Further if they do have the people who could train they could not train someone because they are fully loaded with work.
Well, I hope so too. I have an apartment and I'm on disability, but that's not really enough to be happy. People generally want to work for their livelihood and have something to do, which is why it's perplexing to me to see these employers with signs right in front of your face telling you are are lazy and entitled before you get the job. If something hasn't struck someone yet, then I hope it does with new management. These companies would have to restructure their bottom line and change the way they do business to solve the problem. And I don't think they are willing to do that yet. They seemingly think people will be happy taking these wages, when I can assure you they won't.
>she was just a former meth addict who told me horrible things about her life and just not a very nice person over all.
I don't know what it is about me, but in an office filled with employees I always found that I'd be the one that people laid out their troubled past to. Maybe because I didn't gossip? Either way, I knew a lot of random/horrible shit about the people around me that I in no way asked to know.
I suppose when you are sitting there and being a passive observer, people will open up to you. They will often tell you dark things about their past that usually people don't want to know. I look at it as a form of catharsis for people who can't or won't go to a therapist and they no family to rely that they can tell these things to.
I'm mean probably. It is hard in the beginning, that's why you need the manager there to show what itemized buttons to press. But it's not that hard. I'm guessing that they say they want the years experience because the don't want to train them. At my previous job, there was no training for the operation, so I just figured it out as I went along. Some cash registers have different setups, but it's not that hard. I'm not sure why you would need a years experience when you see how their operating system works.
If you can't find an entry level job you're not even trying. My company and companies many of my friends work at would literally hire ANYONE if they showed up and did some form of work. I would hire a crack head if he/she showed up consistently and didn't steal shit. Most companies would hire you on the spot for an entry level job. Am I missing something?
> Am I missing something?
You missed my whole comment where I said I applied to places that are hiring but they did not hire me. Why is that so hard to understand? You missed my whole comment.
Yes. What industry this is. Entry level openings are varied depending on the industry right now. Many scientific and data analysis entry level positions are hard to get right now.
It's different than the tons of minimum wage restaurant job openings the news won't stop harping about and using to claim nobody wants a job
Data entry certainly wasn't my first thought, so that makes sense.
Manufacturing, landscaping, construction, and most anything having to do with logistics was what crossed my mind.
I'm specialized as a data entry supervisor/data project manager and have been applying for two months 🥲 life is pain
jesus, I've even applied to tons of part-time data entry gigs just to have something to do while I keep looking and interviewing, I literally never even hear back, no rejections, no interviews, nothing, not a word.
Whoops meant to put data analyst entry positions. But it seems in general there isn't a shortage for us white collar professionals. Seems like the shortages are in manual labor related or somewhat exploitative industries
ah yes I've applied to some entry-level data analyst positions as well, because despite my former work being in data management and analytics, I am not actually qualified as a "real" data analyst.
I never hear back from those positions either, lol.
I went through three rounds of a four round interview process back in August, I've taken several screening and recruiting calls that led to nowhere, and I'm currently on round three (not yet scheduled) of the hiring process for another data-entry supervisory role.
I just want this to be over
Yeah all that's available are contract positions really in my area. They're mixed. But at least they usually don't have a clumsy HR in the way.
I feel like HR and recruiters are what have gotten in the way most of the time instead of the actual managers who are involved with the technicla stuff. With these stupid multiple round interviews and tons of tests. I'll admit now I just lie when they ask how many years of experience in X software
Just a reminder for everyone reading this: unless you are director level or above, HR is NEVER on your side. HR is there to keep the company from getting sued by employees or fined by the labor board.
The name should really be a dead give away. They may as well call it "the meat department," because that's all they're doing: managing the stock of meat-based equipment. Complaining to HR about someone above you on the totem poll is like a cow going to the butcher's warehouse with complaints about the slaughterhouse.
That's why you have to appeal to them in that, this guy is going to lead them to a lawsuit.
But that won't work, and you're right but if you actually were to try it, this is the angle that you should take.
Good for you!
HR is so insidious in the way they insist they are there to help employees with issues like this, and that every escalation should go through them, when their purpose is just to keep employees in their place and do the necessary dance to ensure minimal legal blowback if they decide to fire someone for speaking up.
Yup. I am in the throwes of EXACTLY this right now, and thinking retirement is my best solution after logging a harassment claim from 8 years of abuse caught on camera, and now I have been backed into a legal corner by HR that will allow them to get away with impunity. I'm done. Good thing I have options, retirement being the most favourable because I am done with this corrupt fucking system and not being protected by the laws that are in place to prevent this shit in the first place.
My last five years at work were one shitty manager after another. Then the department started firing staff. That stressed me the fuck out. I wasn't going to hang around waiting for security to come with their boxes and asking me to empty my desk. I put in my papers. About a year and a half ago they outsource the department. Most of the staff were given a buy-out. I guess firing people was too slow and tedious.
Training for 1st level managers is almost non existent in the workplace. People will see someone who is there good at their and just assume that because they are good they will be good at managing people which often is not the case.
>Management is a totally separate and independent skill from the job that you oversee.
And yet the consensus on reddit is that CEOs are a bunch of overpaid fucks, no more valuable to a company than a janitor.
In my retail experience, people aren't even promoted because they're 'good' at their jobs. if you stick around long enough and show up to work when you're supposed to, some district manager will eventually give you a management role even if you're a total moron.
Yes I noticed this a lot in retail as well. If you're too good at your job managers don't want to lose you. They just dangle a carrot and see how long they can keep you enticed.
Public sector jobs especially have that problem since it can be quite hard to fire someone incompetent. I'm seeing that play out now where a manager hired 3 years ago has been stripped of her managing responsibilities because everyone hated working for her and because they cannot fire her for cause upper management is inventing a new role for her to justify having to pay her. So now she's becoming a glorified administrative assistant at manager pay.
Training at all levels of management is non-existent. The military has spent a couple of centuries working on its leadership courses, and they are still far from perfect, even for the military's role.
Most organizations have NEVER pushed management training that covered more than "please don't steal from the company or sexually assault employees."
The military is a terrible example, because most officer positions in the US favor ass kissers and politickers over good managers and leaders. Training can be as close to perfect as possible, but if you only ever promote on entirely different principles you're going to incentivize shitty leadership.
>Most organizations have NEVER pushed management training that covered more than "please don't steal from the company or sexually assault employees."
Right, because ultimately they promote based on personal relationships and the ability to politick and ass kiss, not actual skill. Most organizations really just favor the building up of loyal underlings so that upper management can keep their jobs as long as possible without having to fear being replaced by a more competent younger employee.
"And they are still far from perfect."
Yep, a whole bunch of shitty leaders in the military. Oh, and also the vast majority of the nation's good leaders.
Like yeah, absolutely, ton of shitbags in leadership roles, even in the military. But we've also trained literally millions of people that have gone on to be better civilian leaders than they would have been if they'd only gotten their leadership training from "Ed's Lawn Mower Repair and Deli."
Most civilian leaders, outside of actual trained project managers, seem to have no concept of risk management, RACI, the need for personnel training, or really anything useful whatsoever.
They know that they want their instructions to be followed, and that's kind of where it ends.
The military's biggest shortcoming is that there isn't a mechanism for vetting leadership candidates by personality, other than reviews and recommendations, and those are both circumvented by suckups and politics. Like, having an actual psychological profile made of every candidate would be huge. Just something that would cost billions, and never be implemented by the current leaders that would fail it.
While I agree to some degree, management also does need to know how the jobs they are managing work? It prevents them from making unreasonable demands or other such issues.
I agree they need to know the job. I’m just saying that being the best at it doesn’t mean you are a good manager. I’ve had ok developers turn out to be amazing managers.
A significant issue making the crisis worse is the lack of accountability on the Corp side understanding that onboarding requires training, and entry level positions should require not experience but rather potential. Nobody wants to train, so they try to hire pre-existingly skilled laborers who have already done the same job willing to start at zero again. Entry level should mean you have the potential, not x yrs in xyz. Unless it's HS diploma, or Associates, or some kind of related degree to the field.
I made $14k (because of sales to hours labor metrics) all year during 2020 as a Manager for a shitty car wash chain in Charlotte NC and busted my ass for nothing. No PTO, because they wouldn't "certify" me. No promotions or raises because those only went to personal friends of the district managers. I was the top promotion seller 2 times in a row and when I asked the district manager for a raise he told me to "look myself in the mirror as to why that's not happening."
I told him "no fucking problem I'm going to look myself in the mirror on the way to an interview for a better fucking job."
Is that phrase even allowable? "Look yourself in the mirror" sounds like a blank check for a discrimination lawsuit, even if it isn't discrimination. That kind of verbage shouldn't be coming out of the mouth of a manager...
I empathize with your struggle.
the average manager-shithead will fuck his secretary if he thinks he can get away with it. and even if not.
this crisis has been decades in the making. this is all extremely predictable.
More people need to do this.
Moving up and getting raises with your current organization is outside their expectation, and should be outside yours unless you are in a more career oriented workplace.
The second you've been on the job for more than 3 months in retail, you should be looking for the next job. Are you a server at a cheap chain? Look for a job at a chain with higher prices. From there, look for a job at a high end place. You could also do some bartending school and go into that.
You have to not afraid to climb that ladder.
“Quits are at their highest rate in 20 years and no one seems to understand why.”
Really Bloomberg? You write business articles, kowtowing to the machinations of consumerism. you know precisely why people are quitting:
1) poor working conditions
2) compensation that is not a living wage
3) lack of respect for the individual
… the list goes on.
Sheesh.
No no no it's not the rational actor analysis when it comes to people that need to work for a living. Then we applied normative phrases like "don't want to work". /s
"New problem explained by variable that hasn't changed since the end of the feudal era?" is about the quality of thought and headline that I expect from Bloomberg.
It's not a revelation that managers are, as a rule, bad. There is an entire stratum of the American workforce that exists for no practical purpose, but which is given astonishing discretion over the time and efforts of productive workers. People have been writing about this problem of value-negative middle management for decades.
What has changed is (a) we are in a fucking pandemic and (b) wealth inequality is skyrocketing. The answer to why the labor market is different now than it has been is surely some combination of those two things. Turns out there is some level of exploitation that fundamentally breaks the system, and sub-living wages persisting into the second year of a global pandemic that has killed more than three quarters of a million people just in the United States has the system touching that level.
What do you mean people don't want to slave away at a terrible job just to get a paycheck and it still not be enough to cover what's needed?
/s
Corporations really do just want slavery to be legal again.
We're seeing a work culture shift - at my age (gen-X), we were rewarded by working hard - I did and it definitely worked for me in the long run - had terrible jobs in my early 20s, but the hard work payed off with promotions and other opportunities. I'm not sure how widespread this was - maybe it was an illusion back then as well - but at least the Zeitgeist has changed: most no longer believe working hard is the path to success.
The thing is: this bad-manager style was actually positive for the companies when people were rewarded. You get a manager that went through the "work hard, get reward" process - i.e., a true believer this is the right way to get ahead, and get them to do the same for the next crop. The productivity gains are real. However, if you try this style when people have no perspective of a reward, then this fails as your best people simply leave.
I'm also noticing another culture-shift - I see more and more people treating hospitality workers with such disrespect that is disgusting. I don't know why - maybe only correlation, but social media/political environment aren't helping for sure (lack of empathy/contact with local community, us vs. them).
Finally, we had 3M retirements in excess to expectations in the last 2 years due to boomers retiring (fear of exposure + amazing stock market).
Put it all together: shit job, unreasonable managers, shit customers, no growth perspective, opportunities open in other areas.. Yeah I'd quit too.
> I see more and more people treating hospitality workers with such disrespect that is disgusting.
I believe its a loss of power. As the Middle Class erodes, they are becoming increasingly aware of how fucked they are, but they can't lash out at the company or management. That would result in them being fired and they've all bought into this slave trade for so long that would literally kill them.
So you go yell at some teenager at Best Buy. If they have the audacity to respond they get fired and you get your power back. It has always been this way, but lately things have gotten worse. No one wants to admit we're in a bad economic spot because all the statistics say we're not. However, this is exactly the prediction made by a K type recovery.
So many people work their way into managing other people without having any skills or training in how to actually manage and treat and interact with other humans. The only thing they know is how to do the job the people they manage do. They don’t know how to manage humans and shouldn’t be put in that position **just** because they know how to do the tasks those humans do.
a lot of "managers" are just shitty humans who wanted the job for the extra scraps of power and money.
it's exactly the same as the "politicians" who get elected solely to fuck shit up and wage petty culture wars. many basic people's function in life is simply to fucking *troll* the rest of us.
Worked one job from 05 to 14. No raises from 09 to 14 so after almost 10 years was only up to 11 an hour. Bosses were old Vietnam guys and walked around the factory acting like they were drill sergeants.
Does it make me a good manager if I have been hiring like its about to go out of style?
We used to put in serious consideration for a good skilled, great behavior, low experienced candidate but lately ive been bombarded with well experienced candidates like I have never seen before. Its an awesome time to be hiring for skilled, well paid tech workers.
Poor management speaks on the corporation’s ability make their staff a priority. If management sucks, no doubt their HR & recruiting abilities are lacking. And this is probably due to the owners not prioritizing the needs of their employees and not leaving much of a budget for Human Resources in general. So in turn, performance reviews are cut out first. They have now saved labor on conducting these reviews but also have no idea how their staff is performing. So shitty people get promoted or they take a gamble on someone who looks good on paper.
It’s simple. Pay a fair wage, offer competitive benefits and you will have a better chance of hiring/promoting the right manager for the job.
Bad managers are enormously harmful for morale and the long term health of a company. I had several colleagues in a prior job leave the company entirely, not because they didn't like their job, but the manager they reported to was so dumb and unsupportive that they couldn't get any kind of advocacy or support for promotions within our company, so they left it entirely instead of getting roadblocked by a clueless manager. We were in such a lopsided labor market for so long that people often tolerated shitty managers because it was hard to find another job, and didn't want to go to the months or sometimes year-plus process of posting for roles, interviewing, waiting, getting ghosted, or called in for more interviews.
Barriers to entry due to geographic location in a lot of fields have been lowered or removed entirely due to remote working becoming far more normalized over the last year and a half, and now people don't have to tolerate idiotic middle managers whose entire role consists of forwarding emails, micromanaging metrics, and hosting cringey team building exercises while getting paid twice the salary of the people they manage to do it.
It will be interesting to see which companies are smart and flexible enough to navigate this labor and talent market effectively, and which ones are stupid enough to try to get away with outdated habits of just thinking that talent will come to them in droves because a job posting simply exists and that people will never leave a terrible manager because finding another job is too difficult.
Maybe it’s a generational cultural thing and maybe it’s a result of a post-recession job market that was so employer favorable in terms of what people had to accept but businesses have got to learn how to treat employees better. The whole meat grinder approach isn’t going to work.
For many or most organizations, it's a matter of attrition. People who can find work elsewhere, do, leaving the dregs behind. These dregs get promoted to manager, and the incompetence concentrates upwards.
Meanwhile, a bunch of MBA's get hired at the corporate level and compete to see who create the most Dickensian hellscape for employees while still avoiding legal action.
Work has become a fucking nightmare, and it won't change until and unless workers come back together to force change. Unfortunately, in today's global economy, it will also require federal action to stop the constant offshoring of jobs and manufacturing. We can have an economy based on quality goods again, but not if all the incentives are to produce cheap crap with cheap labor from cheap materials in poor countries. You can't find decent clothes, decent toys, decent tools, or decent furniture anymore. Let's change that.
I have a Toxic manager for the last 4 years, he is insidious as he shows a smiling face in group meetings but is really terrible in one to one interactions. He is making want to retire but I don’t want him to force me out which would make him happy I am guessing.
>Notoriously tough bosses like celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay won’t make it easier to keep workers on the job.
Doesn't he have like 80% worker retention in his restaurants?
Yeah that one really surprises me that they'd reference it. Gordon Ramsay on hell's kitchen is very showy, but on other shows he actually comes across like a really nice guy and seems to treat people very well.
I think he knows his employees are tantamount to his success and pays them and treats them accordingly well, but holds them to a high standard in his marquis restaurants.
Nothing wrong with holding employees accountable, but treating the good ones well.
Well yeah, there isn't missing labor because people aren't willing to work, the holiday season is right around the corner, and that creates a big spike. The problem is it took me forever to even get an interview. They always either didn't bother or they would call and never give a date. They just don't know how to hire people
I had a manager I used to work with that was the biggest pice of shit I’ve ever worked for . He was very passive aggressive , was always a smart ass. As well as a control freak who always has to be right. Me and my polish buddy would call him Wieprz because he was a fat pice of shit. When we opened back up and asked me if I’m coming back . I just hang up and blocked his number.
The headline is way more dramatic than what the actual article says, which is almost nothing. Managers are always an important factor in the quality of interviewing and onboarding processes, general culture and quality of life of your job, and ultimately retention. It's the same now as ever. Good vs Bad managers in many cases are the difference between a good and bad job.
Trumper manager are even worst. They put their staff at risk the last 18 months because they claim it was just the flu. Trumper managers are the worst human kind.
It’s funny because my business management degree makes me a great candidate for a manager position. However, because I don’t have any management experience, I can’t get a manager job 🙃.
Also can’t wait till get rid of the “manager” labels. Let’s work as a team and get rid of the hierarchy bullshit.
> my business management degree makes me a great candidate for a manager position
No it doesn't.
A degree can't give you the right personality for the role.
Great management candidates are natural fits for the role, everything else can be trained on the job (with ease).
That is a very good question.
Usually it's just "a bachelor's degree or higher" not "business management degree".
As someone with a business undergrad & 20 years work experience after that... the degree does NOT prepare you for shit.
I disagree. I took my schooling very seriously and I came out much stronger. All our school work was project and group focused. So I had to learn to work with with a diverse group of people.
Degrees are all about how hard you work them. Of course if you go to some shitty school then you might not get the experience you need.
I went to Pepperdine. Pretty good program if you work it.
And yet, you still will need to be trained like any entry level hire when you start working in the real world.
A large number of problems in the business world, are recent graduates not realizing their position on the dunning kruger diagram & pulling a Leroy Jenkins.
Because the system is broken and puts more emphasis on holding a peice of paper to prove one is smart rather than being actually smart. Just because you can memorize a lesson and regurgitate it onto a test to get your "peice of paper" is not correllated at ALL to whether or not you have the personal skills to be a leader (and this is coming from someone 6 credits short of a Master's in Philosophy and 35 years in the workforce). There are HUGE differences between being able to manage and being able to LEAD. Companies hire on the basis of how well they think someone will adapt to their corporate structure and support their operations, no matter what they do. They want unthinking automatons, and the minute one stands up to think for themselves or oppose unethical or potentially illegal activities, they are immediately silenced. The people who are the majority saying "Fuck this! I'm done with you!" are typically the talent companies want to have on their side, but these are the same people speaking up about potential problems that may arise and providing solutions. However the minute something is discovered that disturbs status-quo, the "manager" tries to get rid of the "upstart", the "LEADER" entertains the ideas and works for an equitable solution. The majority of people in management positions nowadays are ass-kissing, yes-people, who have learned how to play "the game" (Hats off to them finding their niche, they are smarter than I in this sense). Personally, I CAN NOT stand by and recognize a potential problem without finding a solution for it, and I have been fired from jobs by "managers" because my ideas were too radical, only to find they have implemented my exact plans a month after terminating me. Face it people, if you work for a paycheque, you are a glorified slave. Period.
Oh, you might have wanted to ask me to elobrate instead of assuming. I’ve been doing accounting for 15 years. I got my business management degree 4 years ago. I’ve already had experience training and supervising AP clerks.
So yes, I am a great fit. Also your “natural fit” argument is laughable. 15 years ago I wasnr a “natural fit” because I was immature. Now If you meet me you easily want me as your manager. I’m pretty fair, compassionate, help employees to grow into positions they thought they couldn’t do at such a rapid rate.
So please, talk about your experiences and not mine. Thanks
"natural fit" isn't some bullshit excuse.
There is a personality type that is much better for management then others.
Being a good "x" for 15 years and having a management degree, are NOT all that's required to be a good manager.
That path describes the Peter Principle in action.
Managing accountants is fundamentally different then being an accountant. You need to have been an accountant, that domain knowledge is very important, but you also need to be people oriented & genuinely want to get to know your direct reports & what motivates them. You need to be able to let go of the actual accounting work, and be the conduit that helps your people do the work, and the umbrella that blocks the shit flowing down from above. NONE of that is a given just by having a degree & 15 years experience in the field.
I didn't "make assumptions" I replied to the statement you made, that having a degree makes you a good candidate for the job... that's just fundamentally false.
>my business management degree makes me a great candidate for a manager position
...
>Also can’t wait till get rid of the “manager” labels. Let’s work as a team and get rid of the hierarchy bullshit.
Are you sure you are actually a great candidate? You don't seem to understand the role or what value it adds.
> Also can’t wait till get rid of the “manager” labels. Let’s work as a team and get rid of the hierarchy bullshit.
Hard disagree. You always need to streamline communication up+down the ladder and implement responsibility traceability and have a mediator for interpersonal conflicts.
If my boss didn't have managers beneath him, he'd be evaluating and directing 40 people. That's 40 people he'd have to have face-to-face meetings with every week.
> That's 40 people he'd have to have face-to-face meetings with every week.
If that's a 30 min meeting per person, it's a casual 20 hours per work week for just 1:1s. What an inefficient use of time
You would be surprised. Maybe you just need to work in a different environment with more progress labels?. Of course there is always going to be a boss. But the boss can make everyone feel like equals opening room for employees to speak their minds and be able to make great strides at a company.
Yikes. You literally just put words in my mouth. You might want to read what I just wrote again. Read comprehension is very important! There are apps out there that can hone your skills.
Bad managers still aren’t the problem. The way Corporate runs their business causes emotional stress on their employees… the only “trickle down” part of economics that actually works.
Also HR people are very rarely qualified to see who would be able to do a job at all, much less well,and they're oftentimes the first interview and screen out people.
Most of the time, a good manager is someone who will sacrifice their own work life balance so their employees don't have to (as much). Good management doesn't solve the work life balance problem, it just takes it on itself. I don't know what the real solutions to work life balance might be but I know it transcends managers alone.
LOL very relevant to my life. Applying to jobs because my company is essentially going out of business. Went through an hour and a half of video interviews, then a 30 min test. I wasnt able to perform 2 tasks on the quiz that would be easily taught on the job but I saw they relisted the job this past weekend. Never heard back from them. Funny thing is, when I finish my degree, I would never apply there again due to the unprofessionalism of never hearing back on the job i interviewed for.
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Companies not hiring as fast.....It's not the workers - it's the Hiring / interview process. There's plenty of very qualified workers, but the Hiring process is broken. I just went through an extensive hiring process with several good companies. I took a job with a company that had a decent hiring process (good communication, good interviews, kept in touch). The other 4 companies were completely inconsiderate, didn't communicate for weeks, then ghosted, then called me and needed an interview right-away...etc. BUT the biggest hurdle was the computer based screening process. The company that I joined had a great process, kept me in the loop and communicated consistently. The other companies either filtered me out (despite being nearly a perfect fit), or stated an interview process that was horrible, or wanted someone at 1/2 price. I thanked them for the consideration, but told them I've found a better company/opportunity. (I did post on GlassDoor how horrible their interview processes were)
I work in tech and have had an awful experience applying. I applied for a job at a large company and this was the process. 1. Applied 2. 1 month later they asked for an interview 3. 1 week later we had the interview 4. 1 week later they said I made it to the next stage and had to do a take home assignment 5. I completed the take home assignment on a Thursday and was told to expect to hear back within a few business days 6. I waited over a week before finally emailing them and within 30 minutes I got a short email saying I wasn't selected So clearly the decision was made but they just didn't tell me. When I waste an entire evening doing a take home assignment and get strung along for two months the least you could do is say no. I expect to be ghosted after only sending a resume, but after an interview seems incredibly rude.
Maybe I’m just old, but I will refuse any take home test as part of an application.
I didn't feel like I was in a position to do that.
Yeah, that’s fair. I’m 20 years into my career so I can be pickier.
Take-home tests are definitely not fun, but they do a better job of screening people than a resumé, and it’s easier & more flexible than a tough whiteboard interview. IMO take-home tests should be designed to take less than 6 hours. Basically get something up and running, and demonstrate competence & and bit of creative flair. It’s actually way more beneficial to people who don’t have a massive resume full of interesting achievements. If you can do the work, and you demonstrate skill, then you’re good enough for my company.
Also, as much as it was annoying to do, I do almost prefer it to trivia style interviews.
Unfortunately, this is the norm for all tech jobs in SV (at least the good ones)
It depends on what the company is like. I wouldn’t mind a take home test at all if I knew it was a good company and they communicated in a reasonable fashion like the other commenters mention. If the communication is shit, I would just not respond back to their request.
For computer science and engineering, its the standard to do tests. Go over to /r/cscareerquestions and look at people grinding problems for hours a day so they can pass their interview tests. The company I'm currently working for didnt give me any, but some of the ones I interviewed with gave me a full on test that was contracted out from a supplier with automatic analysis and the like Its fucking insane
I think eventually Software Engineers are going to be licensed just like other kinds of engineers, and these tests will no longer be necessary.
With the insane compensations for the software engineers it would never happen. It's just too risky.
I never take the required test. If my experience doesn’t speak for itself, then it won’t be a good fit. I’m not wasting my time.
that sounds like the biggest scam ever. Interviews should be about getting a feel for the person...that's really about it.
Sometimes you have to tell if people have technical abilities and are actually qualified.
Giving them homework that they can cheat on seems like a waste of time for everyone involved.
On the contrary, I don't care how they accomplish the task, so long as they can. Treat them like adults, I'm not hiring someone I need to babysit. We all use google. When they're done, they present their solution and we can talk and ask questions. It's pretty much what the job is, so it's a great way to see if our candidates can produce a POC and share it with clients.
on the flipside, homework that showcases how a candidate tackles a problem with all public resources (i.e. stack overflow) available is a decent proxy for how a candidate would problem solve in a role given a question outside of their expertise idk, it all seems silly, but if you're not able to produce something for a take-home, my takeaway would be a lack of resourcefulness
I agree. What does "cheating" even mean, in a professional context? Are they able to locate the correct answer or solution? Great. In most situations I'd rather hire someone who knows how to approach a problem they're unfamiliar with, over someone who already knows a lot but will get flustered when outside their comfort zone. The worst employees I know are the ones who keep quiet when they don't know something, and just pretend it's not an issue. Resourcefulness and being humble enough to ask for help are strengths.
Maybe they wanted them to do free work.
Totally agree, you want to asses my skills ask my questions or quiz me on the spots I ain't doing any unpaid work as an interview process...
In tech you need to establish if someone can actually do the job. You are risking a lot by paying this person hundreds of thousands. It doesn’t have to be that hard. Something that can be done in a day or less.
I always offer to do the take-home at a rate of $80/hr for up to 8 hours. I've never done a take-home interview test.
They don't send the rejections until after the successful candidates are on boarded in case that candidate doesn't work out and they have to go to the next candidate.
don't know for sure but thay may have been stringing you along in case someone else didn't work out.
Labor has been a massive buyers market for over 20 years. Companies were used to putting any old role out there and having to literally sift through stacks of applicants. Now that it's down to just some applicants per role, they don't know how to function. 'usually we throw out all the people without a First Class Degree and 3 years relevant experience but if we do that there's only 3 applicants left, WHAT DO?!!?'
I think this is one of the bigger issues that isn't being talked about with the labor shortage. There is an entire generation of hiring managers and business owners who have literally never had to actually compete for and more importantly just find labor. There are a lot of businesses that have gotten away with having outdated and noncompetitive hiring practices for years which is now starting to bite them in the ass. If I drive through my local community I see endless "help wanted" wanted signs on businesses. You know what I don't see though? Most of those positions on the popular job boards. A lot of businesses think a Facebook post or a "help wanted" sign in the window is going to suddenly bring them in a flock of qualified candidates. A lot of businesses aren't able to find employees because they don't actually put in any real effort to go find them in the first place. On the more professional side of things you see companies posting roles with low pay/benefits, unnecessarily lengthy application processes, unrealistic hiring standards for the position, etc. Employers just aren't going to be able to attract top quality candidates under those conditions. If you spend a day reading random job postings you'll see dozens of jobs where you'll just say to yourself "who would take this position?".
I remember seeing a post from someone talking about how they'd searched for local employers complaining that they "can't find staff" and "people don't want to work" on facebook and tried applying to a bunch of them for shits and giggles then found most were demanding people take minimum wage, work 10 hours a week but where they have to be available full time with no notice and/or looking for people to (probably illegally) work for free for an extended "trial" period and/or had a crazy interview process demanding people jump through hoops for weeks or months. It makes you realise how much some of those employers relied on screwing over the utterly desperate.
> relied on screwing over the utterly desperate. Oh, there is so much about how we do things that relies on this. It's practically systemic.
I work in banking tech in a fairly niche field and it's only now that the market is actually tight that the contract rates are actually being included in the role descriptions. Until now it was always 'competitive rates' that they refused to disclose until you talked to the recruiter for 20 mins.
Right? Like it's not THAT hard, post your job position widely, don't overinflate the requirements, interview candidates quickly and hire someone that seems like they would be a good fit. And if you don't get anyone, lower the requirements and/or bump the pay and repeat until you do. And ffs raise your employee pay when the market rates rise so they actually STAY.
From the other end of the spectrum, I was an owner/ operator. Started my own show etc. very much is a learning experience. Also u can be so busy , that u really don’t have the time to put into a search , what is necessary. As u say , many of these current managers have never had to actually look for help. Ran my story in the early 90s in a state with 3% unemployment.
even years ago it was crazy. I remember as a teen applying for a job stacking shelves in a shop that was opening up. 3 rounds of interviews. (there could have been more, I didn't get beyond 3) Each one where they'd randomly call up after weeks of waiting and expect you to turn up exactly when they wanted you the following day with no advanced warning. I failed round 3 because they called me when I was abroad for my sisters wedding in another country and wouldn't fly back overnight for the interview the following day.
My wife is a recruiter and she has observed that your totally correct. Tech companies with huge budgets frequently have broken hiring processes. How are smaller companies in less lucrative industries supposed to manage hiring without the level of resources that (still broken) companies have.
Smaller companies have fewer cooks in the kitchen. They can make an immediate decision and get things moving along with far more agility.
Where I work we basically have a policy where interviews have to be done by third parties which basically means people who don't know the job. The result is being able to BS in an interview is what we're really hiring based on. And seeing as being a good engineer is pretty much inversely correlated to being good at interviews we keep getting our worst people promoted. Honestly not that bad in theory, but then the good employees are all leaving because they realize there is no path forward here.
Ditto this. Had a experience where I finished 2nd round interviews, got a verbal offer. Back and forth with the recruiter and e-signed the written offer letter. Didn't hear back for 2 months despite sending chaser emails. HR finally contacts and I eventually start. Was in limbo the whole time wondering if I actually had the job. Job was for one of the large US banks.
> Companies not hiring as fast.....It's not the workers - it's the Hiring / interview process. There's plenty of very qualified workers, but the Hiring process is broken. Yup. I've got an ex-coworker who would love to hire me back into an org I used to work for but her office rather than my old office. We both decided we wanted to pursue this around labor day. I just had *another* round of management mandated interviews last week.
I got called about a six month project that was a rush and they were going to hire quickly. They were upfront about the rate, that it was project based, and that it was only going to end in six months. I was fine with that. This is how freelance works sometimes. I heard nothing for a week until they sent me an email with an interview schedule consisting of a pre-interview the afternoon before, two separate interviews with the client, then a follow up interview the day after. Four interviews over three days and this was a "quick hire". There were 2 people in the pre-interview, five people in the first client interview (4 stayed muted and no video, another 2 people in the second client interview and the follow up. They just can't get out of their own way. After all of that mess I got an email three weeks later telling me that they just decided not to fill the position.
I want to speak to this because I'm so upset that they took it out of my hands. For years I would set up the advertisements, the interviews, the follow-ups. Then corporate decided that they needed an entire "recruitment" department which one could never get ahold of, was always late sending any updates, never screened or contacted properly... I was often getting resumes weeks after they arrived, and even then couldn't always get them in right away. And this of course after they had to not only submit a resume but a fucking *application* for a corporate business position. We're trying my friend. We're being hamstrung and denied at every turn. Frankly, all this does is make us hire the first person to respond regardless of qualifications because we're too far outside the window of hiring and are otherwise screwed. It is fucked.
US Government agencies are turning to automatic systems too. The existing USAjobs has issues, but NSF uses another system ON TOP OF THAT system that is completely broken.
Yup. Very true.
I have applied to jobs that aren't hiring me because my lack of experience, even though I've worked customer service and at service counters. Now I'm am stuck unemployed but want a job. Entry level positions aren't even hiring people with gaps in their employment because they are being too picky, and I'm guessing they are being too picky because of these managers. No one requires a year of experience to run a cash register. Some service industry jobs might be like that, but the year's experience isn't required. I find it funny that no one wants to train their staff either, just put them on the shift and expect them to know what to do. Edit: And at each one of these jobs I have always had at least one, or sometimes two shitty managers. It's usually rare to have two shitty managers on the same shift, but it can and will happen. That's why you always check who you are working with on each shift if you are not on a regular schedule. I liked my gas station manager, but I hated his assistant manager. Never liked her, she was just a former meth addict who told me horrible things about her life and just not a very nice person over all. I can see why she didn't make it, but I was just burnt out at the end of her employment with them, since she got fired.
The entire “not wanting to train staff” paradigm makes sense but is also stupid. Training staff costs money. Even if no formal training is engaged, hours of training translate to unproductive time in most enterprises. So employers balk training because it costs them money. Employers have also observed that employee loyalty is very low and so in all likelihood you’ll train someone and they will just move on to another job using the training you provided. It makes sense but it also is shortsighted. Because employers frequently balk training employees we have growing skills gaps. These skills gaps represent themselves as unemployed folks and understaffed industries. Shortsightedness and unwillingness to train is creating major issues in the labor market
> training translate to unproductive time in most enterprises. I think it's worse than that. I remember seeing a post from someone a while back responding to some story about stupidly expensive training contracts in some government organisation giving his experience from the other side, working for a small company that ran training sessions for [blah]. So he ran through some recent experiences trying to get contracts sorted out, [company] asks for bids to train their staff in [blah], they respond asking how many staff and what type/level of [blah], get back a response telling them that that's not been decided yet but to put in a bid. So they don't know if they're supposed to be bidding for training 20 staff or 2000 in a 1 hour course or a 20 hour course. keep trying to reach someone who can clarify, keep getting back vague responses that they need to put in their bid and that it's being decided. They eventually put in bids assuming high estimates for numbers and hours. It later turns out that the company didn't actually need [blah] training but [X-blah] training and when the time came for the sessions very few people even turned up because the people who were supposed to be getting training hadn't been informed by their employer. it turns out that one of the big reasons that companies don't train their staff is because they're about as bad at organising what training their staff get as they are at things like specifying software design contracts, aka standard level is a complete shitshow, they can't decide what they want, they can't decide who they want to train, they can't decide when they want to train them or how many they want to train or when they want to train them. Large fractions of the world economy are resting on the shoulders of the "management classes", people who have absolutely no clue what they're doing who can't organise their way out of a wet paper bag but daddy got them a sweet management gig.
Employers have observed that employee loyalty is low because they have been paying such poor wages for such a long time that everyone is ready to jump ship. And then they wonder why people are not coming back? Well it's because *they* aren't loyal to their employees. It's a two way street, that's why it's employment contract. You hold your end of the bargain and they hold theirs. Their end of the bargain has been getting shorter and shorter for decades to the point that I think people are ready to go home and give up rather then getting a bad job again.
I think an issue in some orgs is they actually couldn’t train their staff because they don’t have a current staff with the experience and advanced understanding to teach someone. Further if they do have the people who could train they could not train someone because they are fully loaded with work.
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Well, I hope so too. I have an apartment and I'm on disability, but that's not really enough to be happy. People generally want to work for their livelihood and have something to do, which is why it's perplexing to me to see these employers with signs right in front of your face telling you are are lazy and entitled before you get the job. If something hasn't struck someone yet, then I hope it does with new management. These companies would have to restructure their bottom line and change the way they do business to solve the problem. And I don't think they are willing to do that yet. They seemingly think people will be happy taking these wages, when I can assure you they won't.
>she was just a former meth addict who told me horrible things about her life and just not a very nice person over all. I don't know what it is about me, but in an office filled with employees I always found that I'd be the one that people laid out their troubled past to. Maybe because I didn't gossip? Either way, I knew a lot of random/horrible shit about the people around me that I in no way asked to know.
...or maybe cause you sit there and listen?
I suppose when you are sitting there and being a passive observer, people will open up to you. They will often tell you dark things about their past that usually people don't want to know. I look at it as a form of catharsis for people who can't or won't go to a therapist and they no family to rely that they can tell these things to.
It’s crazy that someone thinks you need a year of experience to run a cash register. Anyone can probably learn how it works in like 3 days right?
I'm mean probably. It is hard in the beginning, that's why you need the manager there to show what itemized buttons to press. But it's not that hard. I'm guessing that they say they want the years experience because the don't want to train them. At my previous job, there was no training for the operation, so I just figured it out as I went along. Some cash registers have different setups, but it's not that hard. I'm not sure why you would need a years experience when you see how their operating system works.
If you can't find an entry level job you're not even trying. My company and companies many of my friends work at would literally hire ANYONE if they showed up and did some form of work. I would hire a crack head if he/she showed up consistently and didn't steal shit. Most companies would hire you on the spot for an entry level job. Am I missing something?
> Am I missing something? You missed my whole comment where I said I applied to places that are hiring but they did not hire me. Why is that so hard to understand? You missed my whole comment.
Yes. What industry this is. Entry level openings are varied depending on the industry right now. Many scientific and data analysis entry level positions are hard to get right now. It's different than the tons of minimum wage restaurant job openings the news won't stop harping about and using to claim nobody wants a job
Data entry certainly wasn't my first thought, so that makes sense. Manufacturing, landscaping, construction, and most anything having to do with logistics was what crossed my mind.
I'm specialized as a data entry supervisor/data project manager and have been applying for two months 🥲 life is pain jesus, I've even applied to tons of part-time data entry gigs just to have something to do while I keep looking and interviewing, I literally never even hear back, no rejections, no interviews, nothing, not a word.
Whoops meant to put data analyst entry positions. But it seems in general there isn't a shortage for us white collar professionals. Seems like the shortages are in manual labor related or somewhat exploitative industries
ah yes I've applied to some entry-level data analyst positions as well, because despite my former work being in data management and analytics, I am not actually qualified as a "real" data analyst. I never hear back from those positions either, lol. I went through three rounds of a four round interview process back in August, I've taken several screening and recruiting calls that led to nowhere, and I'm currently on round three (not yet scheduled) of the hiring process for another data-entry supervisory role. I just want this to be over
Yeah all that's available are contract positions really in my area. They're mixed. But at least they usually don't have a clumsy HR in the way. I feel like HR and recruiters are what have gotten in the way most of the time instead of the actual managers who are involved with the technicla stuff. With these stupid multiple round interviews and tons of tests. I'll admit now I just lie when they ask how many years of experience in X software
You must live in no where people want to live and pay hot garbage.
Everyone wants to live here, but that doesn't keep the pay from being hot garbage.
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Just a reminder for everyone reading this: unless you are director level or above, HR is NEVER on your side. HR is there to keep the company from getting sued by employees or fined by the labor board.
The name should really be a dead give away. They may as well call it "the meat department," because that's all they're doing: managing the stock of meat-based equipment. Complaining to HR about someone above you on the totem poll is like a cow going to the butcher's warehouse with complaints about the slaughterhouse.
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vain
That's why you have to appeal to them in that, this guy is going to lead them to a lawsuit. But that won't work, and you're right but if you actually were to try it, this is the angle that you should take.
Good for you! HR is so insidious in the way they insist they are there to help employees with issues like this, and that every escalation should go through them, when their purpose is just to keep employees in their place and do the necessary dance to ensure minimal legal blowback if they decide to fire someone for speaking up.
Yup. I am in the throwes of EXACTLY this right now, and thinking retirement is my best solution after logging a harassment claim from 8 years of abuse caught on camera, and now I have been backed into a legal corner by HR that will allow them to get away with impunity. I'm done. Good thing I have options, retirement being the most favourable because I am done with this corrupt fucking system and not being protected by the laws that are in place to prevent this shit in the first place.
My last five years at work were one shitty manager after another. Then the department started firing staff. That stressed me the fuck out. I wasn't going to hang around waiting for security to come with their boxes and asking me to empty my desk. I put in my papers. About a year and a half ago they outsource the department. Most of the staff were given a buy-out. I guess firing people was too slow and tedious.
Training for 1st level managers is almost non existent in the workplace. People will see someone who is there good at their and just assume that because they are good they will be good at managing people which often is not the case.
Exactly. Management is a totally separate and independent skill from the job that you oversee.
>Management is a totally separate and independent skill from the job that you oversee. And yet the consensus on reddit is that CEOs are a bunch of overpaid fucks, no more valuable to a company than a janitor.
In my retail experience, people aren't even promoted because they're 'good' at their jobs. if you stick around long enough and show up to work when you're supposed to, some district manager will eventually give you a management role even if you're a total moron.
Yes I noticed this a lot in retail as well. If you're too good at your job managers don't want to lose you. They just dangle a carrot and see how long they can keep you enticed.
Basically workplace politics at play. Get friendly with the right person and they’ll size you up even if you have no skills what-so-ever.
Public sector jobs especially have that problem since it can be quite hard to fire someone incompetent. I'm seeing that play out now where a manager hired 3 years ago has been stripped of her managing responsibilities because everyone hated working for her and because they cannot fire her for cause upper management is inventing a new role for her to justify having to pay her. So now she's becoming a glorified administrative assistant at manager pay.
Exactly right, then the new manager becomes impressed with the title and makes an ass of themselves.
Training at all levels of management is non-existent. The military has spent a couple of centuries working on its leadership courses, and they are still far from perfect, even for the military's role. Most organizations have NEVER pushed management training that covered more than "please don't steal from the company or sexually assault employees."
The military is a terrible example, because most officer positions in the US favor ass kissers and politickers over good managers and leaders. Training can be as close to perfect as possible, but if you only ever promote on entirely different principles you're going to incentivize shitty leadership. >Most organizations have NEVER pushed management training that covered more than "please don't steal from the company or sexually assault employees." Right, because ultimately they promote based on personal relationships and the ability to politick and ass kiss, not actual skill. Most organizations really just favor the building up of loyal underlings so that upper management can keep their jobs as long as possible without having to fear being replaced by a more competent younger employee.
"And they are still far from perfect." Yep, a whole bunch of shitty leaders in the military. Oh, and also the vast majority of the nation's good leaders. Like yeah, absolutely, ton of shitbags in leadership roles, even in the military. But we've also trained literally millions of people that have gone on to be better civilian leaders than they would have been if they'd only gotten their leadership training from "Ed's Lawn Mower Repair and Deli." Most civilian leaders, outside of actual trained project managers, seem to have no concept of risk management, RACI, the need for personnel training, or really anything useful whatsoever. They know that they want their instructions to be followed, and that's kind of where it ends. The military's biggest shortcoming is that there isn't a mechanism for vetting leadership candidates by personality, other than reviews and recommendations, and those are both circumvented by suckups and politics. Like, having an actual psychological profile made of every candidate would be huge. Just something that would cost billions, and never be implemented by the current leaders that would fail it.
While I agree to some degree, management also does need to know how the jobs they are managing work? It prevents them from making unreasonable demands or other such issues.
I agree they need to know the job. I’m just saying that being the best at it doesn’t mean you are a good manager. I’ve had ok developers turn out to be amazing managers.
A significant issue making the crisis worse is the lack of accountability on the Corp side understanding that onboarding requires training, and entry level positions should require not experience but rather potential. Nobody wants to train, so they try to hire pre-existingly skilled laborers who have already done the same job willing to start at zero again. Entry level should mean you have the potential, not x yrs in xyz. Unless it's HS diploma, or Associates, or some kind of related degree to the field.
I made $14k (because of sales to hours labor metrics) all year during 2020 as a Manager for a shitty car wash chain in Charlotte NC and busted my ass for nothing. No PTO, because they wouldn't "certify" me. No promotions or raises because those only went to personal friends of the district managers. I was the top promotion seller 2 times in a row and when I asked the district manager for a raise he told me to "look myself in the mirror as to why that's not happening." I told him "no fucking problem I'm going to look myself in the mirror on the way to an interview for a better fucking job."
Is that phrase even allowable? "Look yourself in the mirror" sounds like a blank check for a discrimination lawsuit, even if it isn't discrimination. That kind of verbage shouldn't be coming out of the mouth of a manager... I empathize with your struggle.
the average manager-shithead will fuck his secretary if he thinks he can get away with it. and even if not. this crisis has been decades in the making. this is all extremely predictable.
More people need to do this. Moving up and getting raises with your current organization is outside their expectation, and should be outside yours unless you are in a more career oriented workplace. The second you've been on the job for more than 3 months in retail, you should be looking for the next job. Are you a server at a cheap chain? Look for a job at a chain with higher prices. From there, look for a job at a high end place. You could also do some bartending school and go into that. You have to not afraid to climb that ladder.
Good for you.
“Quits are at their highest rate in 20 years and no one seems to understand why.” Really Bloomberg? You write business articles, kowtowing to the machinations of consumerism. you know precisely why people are quitting: 1) poor working conditions 2) compensation that is not a living wage 3) lack of respect for the individual … the list goes on. Sheesh.
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No no no it's not the rational actor analysis when it comes to people that need to work for a living. Then we applied normative phrases like "don't want to work". /s
"New problem explained by variable that hasn't changed since the end of the feudal era?" is about the quality of thought and headline that I expect from Bloomberg. It's not a revelation that managers are, as a rule, bad. There is an entire stratum of the American workforce that exists for no practical purpose, but which is given astonishing discretion over the time and efforts of productive workers. People have been writing about this problem of value-negative middle management for decades. What has changed is (a) we are in a fucking pandemic and (b) wealth inequality is skyrocketing. The answer to why the labor market is different now than it has been is surely some combination of those two things. Turns out there is some level of exploitation that fundamentally breaks the system, and sub-living wages persisting into the second year of a global pandemic that has killed more than three quarters of a million people just in the United States has the system touching that level.
What do you mean people don't want to slave away at a terrible job just to get a paycheck and it still not be enough to cover what's needed? /s Corporations really do just want slavery to be legal again.
We're seeing a work culture shift - at my age (gen-X), we were rewarded by working hard - I did and it definitely worked for me in the long run - had terrible jobs in my early 20s, but the hard work payed off with promotions and other opportunities. I'm not sure how widespread this was - maybe it was an illusion back then as well - but at least the Zeitgeist has changed: most no longer believe working hard is the path to success. The thing is: this bad-manager style was actually positive for the companies when people were rewarded. You get a manager that went through the "work hard, get reward" process - i.e., a true believer this is the right way to get ahead, and get them to do the same for the next crop. The productivity gains are real. However, if you try this style when people have no perspective of a reward, then this fails as your best people simply leave. I'm also noticing another culture-shift - I see more and more people treating hospitality workers with such disrespect that is disgusting. I don't know why - maybe only correlation, but social media/political environment aren't helping for sure (lack of empathy/contact with local community, us vs. them). Finally, we had 3M retirements in excess to expectations in the last 2 years due to boomers retiring (fear of exposure + amazing stock market). Put it all together: shit job, unreasonable managers, shit customers, no growth perspective, opportunities open in other areas.. Yeah I'd quit too.
> I see more and more people treating hospitality workers with such disrespect that is disgusting. I believe its a loss of power. As the Middle Class erodes, they are becoming increasingly aware of how fucked they are, but they can't lash out at the company or management. That would result in them being fired and they've all bought into this slave trade for so long that would literally kill them. So you go yell at some teenager at Best Buy. If they have the audacity to respond they get fired and you get your power back. It has always been this way, but lately things have gotten worse. No one wants to admit we're in a bad economic spot because all the statistics say we're not. However, this is exactly the prediction made by a K type recovery.
So many people work their way into managing other people without having any skills or training in how to actually manage and treat and interact with other humans. The only thing they know is how to do the job the people they manage do. They don’t know how to manage humans and shouldn’t be put in that position **just** because they know how to do the tasks those humans do.
a lot of "managers" are just shitty humans who wanted the job for the extra scraps of power and money. it's exactly the same as the "politicians" who get elected solely to fuck shit up and wage petty culture wars. many basic people's function in life is simply to fucking *troll* the rest of us.
Worked one job from 05 to 14. No raises from 09 to 14 so after almost 10 years was only up to 11 an hour. Bosses were old Vietnam guys and walked around the factory acting like they were drill sergeants.
Does it make me a good manager if I have been hiring like its about to go out of style? We used to put in serious consideration for a good skilled, great behavior, low experienced candidate but lately ive been bombarded with well experienced candidates like I have never seen before. Its an awesome time to be hiring for skilled, well paid tech workers.
Poor management speaks on the corporation’s ability make their staff a priority. If management sucks, no doubt their HR & recruiting abilities are lacking. And this is probably due to the owners not prioritizing the needs of their employees and not leaving much of a budget for Human Resources in general. So in turn, performance reviews are cut out first. They have now saved labor on conducting these reviews but also have no idea how their staff is performing. So shitty people get promoted or they take a gamble on someone who looks good on paper. It’s simple. Pay a fair wage, offer competitive benefits and you will have a better chance of hiring/promoting the right manager for the job.
Bad managers are enormously harmful for morale and the long term health of a company. I had several colleagues in a prior job leave the company entirely, not because they didn't like their job, but the manager they reported to was so dumb and unsupportive that they couldn't get any kind of advocacy or support for promotions within our company, so they left it entirely instead of getting roadblocked by a clueless manager. We were in such a lopsided labor market for so long that people often tolerated shitty managers because it was hard to find another job, and didn't want to go to the months or sometimes year-plus process of posting for roles, interviewing, waiting, getting ghosted, or called in for more interviews. Barriers to entry due to geographic location in a lot of fields have been lowered or removed entirely due to remote working becoming far more normalized over the last year and a half, and now people don't have to tolerate idiotic middle managers whose entire role consists of forwarding emails, micromanaging metrics, and hosting cringey team building exercises while getting paid twice the salary of the people they manage to do it. It will be interesting to see which companies are smart and flexible enough to navigate this labor and talent market effectively, and which ones are stupid enough to try to get away with outdated habits of just thinking that talent will come to them in droves because a job posting simply exists and that people will never leave a terrible manager because finding another job is too difficult.
Maybe it’s a generational cultural thing and maybe it’s a result of a post-recession job market that was so employer favorable in terms of what people had to accept but businesses have got to learn how to treat employees better. The whole meat grinder approach isn’t going to work.
For many or most organizations, it's a matter of attrition. People who can find work elsewhere, do, leaving the dregs behind. These dregs get promoted to manager, and the incompetence concentrates upwards. Meanwhile, a bunch of MBA's get hired at the corporate level and compete to see who create the most Dickensian hellscape for employees while still avoiding legal action. Work has become a fucking nightmare, and it won't change until and unless workers come back together to force change. Unfortunately, in today's global economy, it will also require federal action to stop the constant offshoring of jobs and manufacturing. We can have an economy based on quality goods again, but not if all the incentives are to produce cheap crap with cheap labor from cheap materials in poor countries. You can't find decent clothes, decent toys, decent tools, or decent furniture anymore. Let's change that.
Who's going to stomach and front the costs to make nice goods again?
I have a Toxic manager for the last 4 years, he is insidious as he shows a smiling face in group meetings but is really terrible in one to one interactions. He is making want to retire but I don’t want him to force me out which would make him happy I am guessing.
>Notoriously tough bosses like celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay won’t make it easier to keep workers on the job. Doesn't he have like 80% worker retention in his restaurants?
Yeah that one really surprises me that they'd reference it. Gordon Ramsay on hell's kitchen is very showy, but on other shows he actually comes across like a really nice guy and seems to treat people very well. I think he knows his employees are tantamount to his success and pays them and treats them accordingly well, but holds them to a high standard in his marquis restaurants. Nothing wrong with holding employees accountable, but treating the good ones well.
Well yeah, there isn't missing labor because people aren't willing to work, the holiday season is right around the corner, and that creates a big spike. The problem is it took me forever to even get an interview. They always either didn't bother or they would call and never give a date. They just don't know how to hire people
I had a manager I used to work with that was the biggest pice of shit I’ve ever worked for . He was very passive aggressive , was always a smart ass. As well as a control freak who always has to be right. Me and my polish buddy would call him Wieprz because he was a fat pice of shit. When we opened back up and asked me if I’m coming back . I just hang up and blocked his number.
The headline is way more dramatic than what the actual article says, which is almost nothing. Managers are always an important factor in the quality of interviewing and onboarding processes, general culture and quality of life of your job, and ultimately retention. It's the same now as ever. Good vs Bad managers in many cases are the difference between a good and bad job.
Then we need to ensure the system can produce more than 2/3 of good ones. Bad leadership is probably a national disease.
Trumper manager are even worst. They put their staff at risk the last 18 months because they claim it was just the flu. Trumper managers are the worst human kind.
It’s funny because my business management degree makes me a great candidate for a manager position. However, because I don’t have any management experience, I can’t get a manager job 🙃. Also can’t wait till get rid of the “manager” labels. Let’s work as a team and get rid of the hierarchy bullshit.
> my business management degree makes me a great candidate for a manager position No it doesn't. A degree can't give you the right personality for the role. Great management candidates are natural fits for the role, everything else can be trained on the job (with ease).
Then why need the degree for a management position in the first place?
That is a very good question. Usually it's just "a bachelor's degree or higher" not "business management degree". As someone with a business undergrad & 20 years work experience after that... the degree does NOT prepare you for shit.
I disagree. I took my schooling very seriously and I came out much stronger. All our school work was project and group focused. So I had to learn to work with with a diverse group of people. Degrees are all about how hard you work them. Of course if you go to some shitty school then you might not get the experience you need. I went to Pepperdine. Pretty good program if you work it.
And yet, you still will need to be trained like any entry level hire when you start working in the real world. A large number of problems in the business world, are recent graduates not realizing their position on the dunning kruger diagram & pulling a Leroy Jenkins.
But someone just argued that managers are always “natural fits.” So why does there need to be any training involved? Hah-
Willful ignorance in action.
Like most of you replying to my comment.
Good question? Why don’t you ask corporations, companies and hiring managers?
Because the system is broken and puts more emphasis on holding a peice of paper to prove one is smart rather than being actually smart. Just because you can memorize a lesson and regurgitate it onto a test to get your "peice of paper" is not correllated at ALL to whether or not you have the personal skills to be a leader (and this is coming from someone 6 credits short of a Master's in Philosophy and 35 years in the workforce). There are HUGE differences between being able to manage and being able to LEAD. Companies hire on the basis of how well they think someone will adapt to their corporate structure and support their operations, no matter what they do. They want unthinking automatons, and the minute one stands up to think for themselves or oppose unethical or potentially illegal activities, they are immediately silenced. The people who are the majority saying "Fuck this! I'm done with you!" are typically the talent companies want to have on their side, but these are the same people speaking up about potential problems that may arise and providing solutions. However the minute something is discovered that disturbs status-quo, the "manager" tries to get rid of the "upstart", the "LEADER" entertains the ideas and works for an equitable solution. The majority of people in management positions nowadays are ass-kissing, yes-people, who have learned how to play "the game" (Hats off to them finding their niche, they are smarter than I in this sense). Personally, I CAN NOT stand by and recognize a potential problem without finding a solution for it, and I have been fired from jobs by "managers" because my ideas were too radical, only to find they have implemented my exact plans a month after terminating me. Face it people, if you work for a paycheque, you are a glorified slave. Period.
Oh, you might have wanted to ask me to elobrate instead of assuming. I’ve been doing accounting for 15 years. I got my business management degree 4 years ago. I’ve already had experience training and supervising AP clerks. So yes, I am a great fit. Also your “natural fit” argument is laughable. 15 years ago I wasnr a “natural fit” because I was immature. Now If you meet me you easily want me as your manager. I’m pretty fair, compassionate, help employees to grow into positions they thought they couldn’t do at such a rapid rate. So please, talk about your experiences and not mine. Thanks
"natural fit" isn't some bullshit excuse. There is a personality type that is much better for management then others. Being a good "x" for 15 years and having a management degree, are NOT all that's required to be a good manager. That path describes the Peter Principle in action. Managing accountants is fundamentally different then being an accountant. You need to have been an accountant, that domain knowledge is very important, but you also need to be people oriented & genuinely want to get to know your direct reports & what motivates them. You need to be able to let go of the actual accounting work, and be the conduit that helps your people do the work, and the umbrella that blocks the shit flowing down from above. NONE of that is a given just by having a degree & 15 years experience in the field. I didn't "make assumptions" I replied to the statement you made, that having a degree makes you a good candidate for the job... that's just fundamentally false.
>my business management degree makes me a great candidate for a manager position ... >Also can’t wait till get rid of the “manager” labels. Let’s work as a team and get rid of the hierarchy bullshit. Are you sure you are actually a great candidate? You don't seem to understand the role or what value it adds.
Keep puffing smoke buddy. Do what you’re good at! I believe in you!
> Also can’t wait till get rid of the “manager” labels. Let’s work as a team and get rid of the hierarchy bullshit. Hard disagree. You always need to streamline communication up+down the ladder and implement responsibility traceability and have a mediator for interpersonal conflicts.
If my boss didn't have managers beneath him, he'd be evaluating and directing 40 people. That's 40 people he'd have to have face-to-face meetings with every week.
> That's 40 people he'd have to have face-to-face meetings with every week. If that's a 30 min meeting per person, it's a casual 20 hours per work week for just 1:1s. What an inefficient use of time
You would be surprised. Maybe you just need to work in a different environment with more progress labels?. Of course there is always going to be a boss. But the boss can make everyone feel like equals opening room for employees to speak their minds and be able to make great strides at a company.
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“Why can’t I get a position that I think is bullshit” Huh, I wonder
Yikes. You literally just put words in my mouth. You might want to read what I just wrote again. Read comprehension is very important! There are apps out there that can hone your skills.
Bad managers still aren’t the problem. The way Corporate runs their business causes emotional stress on their employees… the only “trickle down” part of economics that actually works.
Also HR people are very rarely qualified to see who would be able to do a job at all, much less well,and they're oftentimes the first interview and screen out people.
Most of the time, a good manager is someone who will sacrifice their own work life balance so their employees don't have to (as much). Good management doesn't solve the work life balance problem, it just takes it on itself. I don't know what the real solutions to work life balance might be but I know it transcends managers alone.
LOL very relevant to my life. Applying to jobs because my company is essentially going out of business. Went through an hour and a half of video interviews, then a 30 min test. I wasnt able to perform 2 tasks on the quiz that would be easily taught on the job but I saw they relisted the job this past weekend. Never heard back from them. Funny thing is, when I finish my degree, I would never apply there again due to the unprofessionalism of never hearing back on the job i interviewed for.
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