Apparently employment testing is all the rage again. At least now I don’t have to schlep to the employment agency and spend hours testing only to be told that they have nothing for me, now they can email me a link, I can sit right at my own desk and spend hours testing only to never hear another word from the agency. SO much more efficient. (And I don’t have to get all dressed up and look fab only to be told “I only work with people under size 10” (that was an actual verbatim quote from a staffing agency worker)).
There are three agencies now that have sent me testing and then I never hear from them again. I score in the high 90%’s on all of the tests, so I don’t think that I am not scoring well enough for them to be interested. I suspect that they have some sort of quota to fulfill, so they scan the job boards, pick some names and contact people. They don’t actually intend to HELP any of these people, they just contact them so that they can report that they’ve contacted “X” number of people this week so that they can keep their jobs.
And while I know it does me ABSOLUTELY no good to be upset about it, I find it unimaginably RUDE to send someone a bunch of tests, which they have to take the time to complete and then you can’t even send a FORM E-MAIL in response? Seriously? And headhunters… you send me reams of forms to fill out and allegedly submit me for positions and then I never hear another peep? Not even a FORM E-MAIL that says “Our client thinks you suck” or something? Or “Our client received your resume and was so insulted that we had recommended you that they sent a personal representative to expel flatulence in our faces directly”… I dunno… I don’t necessarily need the TRUTH but I need some sort of response. To this end, I send e-mails approximately every other day until I get SOME sort of response. If they were fool enough to provide a fax number, I’ll fax them, too. I can deal with rejection but I WILL NOT BE IGNORED.
Because, here’s the thing… I didn’t contact these people first. They initiated the contact. If I had initiated the contact and they didn’t respond, it would be different. But I LOATHE rudeness and no, my persistence is NOT being rude. Job seekers are told by “career experts” to be persistent. I am not abusive in my correspondence. I am not abrasive. I am not whiny. I am not petulant. I am professionally following up on a contact made. I expect that the people I am contacting will be professional enough to respond, even if by a form e-mail. I am not rubbish that you can simply discard.