Don’t Call Us, We Won’t Call You

My only warning came roughly 24 hours in advance from a co-worker in another site.  She’d just been laid off and she was one of the best at her job that I had ever seen in over 7 years of working for the company.  I knew if they were willing to let her go then there would be nothing to prevent them from letting me go, as well.  With half a dozen sales contest wins under my belt, nurtured customer relationships, and multiple achievement awards, my productive run came to a screeching halt.

It took nearly a week to get out of having a semi-routine. Although my scheduled work hours varied day-to-day, the need not to live my personal life around them took some getting used to.  My new job was to apply for and learn about unemployment benefits and seek out a new boss.

The hiring process had certainly changed and it hit me hard. I was very accustomed to walking into an interview smiling and leaving as the new hire.  Getting an actual interview was, and still is, difficult to garner. The handful of potential employers that sat down with me only ended the conversation with a promise to call me back later.  I couldn’t fathom why no one was hiring me on the spot anymore.  Once I began attending workshops at the nearby career center I soon learned that this was the new norm. The last time I had a real honest-to-goodness job interview was in 2004 for a part-time seasonal gig at a chain housewares store.

Here it is, 20 months later and I’m still without a full-time job or even an offer after applying for about 185 positions at roughly 160 companies. My unemployment benefits are set to run out in March, a week after my birthday. Awesome.

My biggest pet peeve (for the moment) during this “transitional phase” is how poorly treated I, all of us, have been by retailers from whom we seek jobs, as well as how many managers are not qualified to conduct interviews and/or run a store.

Let this blog serve as a lesson to those of you who talk about how important customer service is, because you’re running your own customers out the door.

The first interview I landed was for a part-time seasonal job for a company that promises magic and happiness at every turn, one to whom I’ve forked over a few thousand dollars in my lifetime. After a group interview we were told to expect a call within a few days. I hadn’t heard back so I called the store, spoke to a woman of authority who said she was busy and would call me back in an hour. Several days later, I tried again and was informed they’d hired someone else. I can accept that but I can’t accept poor customer service. When you don’t return calls you’ve promised to make, that’s unacceptable customer service.  It was a good year before the retail part of the company ever saw my money again and even since then, it’s been very little in comparison to my normal shopping.

Another opportunity to hop back into the workforce came with an interview for a company with 3 separate chains of children’s clothing.  My application was picked up only a few hours after submitting it online, by a district manager who had a store manager call and schedule my appointment. I arrived to find that my interview was with a store manager who didn’t have the authority to hire anyone, wasn’t sure which chain her boss was hiring for and how many hours a week were required. She was wearing flip-flops in an upscale boutique. Next!

Sometimes I get phone calls as a way of screening applicants. Early on in my search I got a call back from a business that specializes in storage boxes of every size and shape. I applied for the advertised assistant manager position. The girl who called me was scheduling cashier applicants. Flustered and confused she said my application was in the wrong pile and somebody else would call me because she couldn’t schedule anything else. No one ever called. Instead, I received a pre-written e-mail from a man who wrote, “I enjoyed talking with you recently.”  It became evident that these folks didn’t know what they were doing, at all.

Finally, the crème de la crème of my experiences thus far. In an upscale, custom-tailoring, men’s suit store, I sat in the back with the manager for an hour, completely wasting my time. Rather than talking to me and looking at me, he spoke and stared at the wall 15 feet in front of him while I sat 4 feet diagonally to his left. Every so often, I’d lean forward and dramatically turn my head to look at wall. He never caught on. This questionable person of managerial skills also doodled all over the back of my application, drawing lines, arrows, boxes, and numbers in whole and fraction while trying to explain sales goals and commission for 30 minutes. An intelligent person could have done so in a few short sentences without arts & crafts time.

These are just a few of the experiences I have had during my search for new employment.

The outcome of meeting unprofessional middle management who don’t follow through and make or return calls as promised is that, with the one previously mentioned exception, I haven’t shopped any of their companies since.  I’m sure that I am not the only one who has rescinded from spending at businesses with whom I’ve had bad experiences. When the news reported that local sales were down and online sales had improved throughout the course of the year, it came as no surprise. Retailers did it to themselves.

Now if I could just find myself a full-time job within the next 2 months I could get back to being successful and learning new skills.