Unemployment News…The Good, The Bad, and Reality!

Let’s start with the good news first. Wall Street analysts and jobs forecasters were (pleasantly) surprised by the government’s official job’s report released yesterday, which indicated that the American economy created an estimated 236,000 jobs last month. These numbers were a surprise to analysts because “they expected hiring to downshift in early 2013 because of ongoing U.S. budget disputes, the onset of higher tax rates and the looming threat of federal spending cuts that took effect in March” (“U.S. Economy Adds 236,000 Jobs In February”). According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the biggest increases in hiring occurred in professional services (73,000), construction (48,000), health care (32,000) and retail (24,000). On the surface, this is good news, as it infuses those seeking jobs a level of hope that employers are actually picking up the pace in hiring, and that they might actually land a much-coveted job in this still tough economy. However, these numbers provide a cautionary tale of how facts, figures, and semantics can often obscure the reality for—for example—job hunters on the ground.
Yesterday’s government jobs’ numbers routinely reflect a complicated mix of official projections, estimations, and tangible numbers that are calculated (from the Bureau of Labor Statistics) to reach such conclusions. And despite calls from conspiratorial quarters which suggest that presidential administrations can actually fudge the numbers to their political benefit, the government uses the same criteria for assessing projected jobs numbers that they've been using since the 1940s. Today’s revealed 7.7% unemployment rate represents the aggregate the 12 million people who are known to be actively looking for work, but cannot any. This is what the government refers to as the “official” unemployment rate known as the U-3 rate. However, many Americans who struggle to find work know that there is a different reality other than the “reality” monthly official government numbers represent (I allude to this point in some part on one of my sister blogs, “Employers…Shut Up And Listen”). Take the hiring process. More and more employers are employing the practice of many multiple interviews in order to fill limited slots with qualified job candidates. One former human resources insider reveals that the well-known and increasingly used practice is known as “chasing that purple squirrel…a human resources term for an impossibly qualified job applicant” (See: “With Positions to Fill, Employers Waiting For Perfection”). And with the current economy representing an employers’ market,

But there’s also little pressure to hire right now, so long as candidates are abundant and existing staff members are afraid to refuse the extra workload created by an unfilled position. Employers can keep dragging out the hiring process until they’re more confident about their business — or at least until they find the superstar candidate.

Much in the way of the current hiring process seems to be more of a drain on employers’ resources than a legitimate screening process for a legitimate job applicant. One out-of-work video editor recalled the hurdles that he had to circumvent 8- and 9- round job interviews for a position which precisely matched his skills and experience. The applicant had

taken several video-editing tests, which he says he aced. But he has also been subjected to a battery of personality and psychological exams, a spelling quiz and even a math test (including a question that began, to the best of his recollection, “If John is on a train traveling from New York at 40 miles per hour, and Susie is on a train from Boston...”). He passed the math test with a 90 percent score.

This stringing-along-the-applicant process (with no call-backs) contributes to job searchers in many instances finally giving up looking for work. The unemployment rate that includes these disgruntled job searchers as well as those part-time workers looking for full-time work is what’s known in government circles as the U-6 rate. This rate is said to represent the true unemployment rate as it reflects the 8 million more individuals from these latter categories. Factoring in these job seekers that employers’ hiring practices dissuade means that the actual unemployment rate is an estimated 14.3%, as opposed to the 7.7% reported yesterday (See: Bureau of Labor Statistics website for rates that include these numbers).

The upshot is that the government’s reported numbers—particularly in the case of employment—should be taken with a little scrutiny, and great deal of due diligence on the part of the American citizen in order to sort the fact behind them. In many cases, there are statistics, and there is a level of inconsistent reality on the ground which tends to render such figures almost abstract. Shrinking unemployment numbers are good, but too many employers are making it too hard for job seekers to find work. According to a survey from Manpower, some 3 million jobs go unfilled from any given year-to-year because of employer’s inability to find qualified individuals. But such a figure seems to stand in contrast to the reality when employers are requiring qualified candidates to return for multiple rounds of interviews, only not to be offered a position; clearly many job applicants have the skills employers are seeking if employers are requiring job seekers to spent so much of their precious time and expense (such as high gasoline costs) to jump through hoops. The video editor who went through the multi, multiple-round interviews calculates that the three positions he applied for cost him $520.36 in parking fees, two parking tickets, gas and trips to Starbucks while waiting for his interviews. Clearly employers don’t take such details into consideration when requiring job applicants to go through such rigors for a coveted position.
What's more, data from Glassdoor.com, a site that collects information on hiring at different companies, shows that the average duration of the interview process at other major companies like Starbucks, General Mills and Southwest Airlines has roughly doubled in the last couple of years.  So it's not just high-tech, specialized employers who are requiring more in the way of excessive prospect weeding-out.

Another disproven aspect of the unemployment numbers is the notion that infusing American businesses with more tax-breaks in order to spur both growth and hiring is a non-factor. According to most recent figures, American companies are sitting on trillions of dollars of cash reserves, many of them holding back on hiring new workers until the economy stabilizes to a satisfying level (“The $5 Trillion Stash: U.S. Corporations' Money Hoard Is Bigger Than the GDP of Germany”). If companies are not reinvesting their already ample case reserves into growth and hiring, there is no rational expectation that an infusion of more cash reserves in the way of (more) tax breaks would spur them to do the same. Such thinking almost defies common sense.

When it comes to the monthly employment numbers, Americans should—as they should any other statistic from the government, the various political parties, and employers themselves—take the time to look below the partisan hype and promotion of “great times” or “doom-n-gloom.”  Solutions are simple; implementing them is a matter of will and clear thinking, not policy.

See also:  "A Criticism of Employers in America," "Employers…Shut Up And Listen!," and "Employers…Shut Up And Listen, Too!").

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A Criticism of Employers in America - Conclusion

When it comes to the tradition of employer hiring practices in America, there is probably no one reading this that hasn’t been labeled overqualified at some time during their lives. Granted there is some understandable reasoning from the employer’s perspective in this occasional practice, the fact remains that it insults the intelligence as well as creates an unnecessary roadblock in the path of someone seeking a job, a career, or simply a means to survive; people still need to eat, abundant experience and/or education achievement notwithstanding. The resulting logic of being tagged “overqualified” is that perhaps if a job candidate were capable of either dumbing themselves down, suppressing their ambitions, or hiding their education achievements, it would make them more employable.
When all is said and done, American employers need to abandon that logically-devoid dingy called blind adherence and try hopping aboard the good ship Reality. Just because you are unwilling to turn away from the old ways does not by any means mean that they are working. Expecting job hunters in this Save-Every-Buck-I-Can economy to travel excessive distances—on their own dimes—on the off-chance that they may actually be selected for employment is hardly realistic. This economy is affecting everyone…if employees and job hunters have to adapt, so must employers. Just because the current economic reality favors employers doesn’t mean common sense should be abandoned. They should really consider telephone interviews. Unless the prerequisite for a potential job includes sexual favors on the couch in the interviewer’s office, there is nothing that can be done in person that can’t be done over the telephone (and yes, I know that makes entirely too much sense, but then I find most decision-makers lack the critical thinking skills they are often looking for in employees). Insofar as "determining whether a potential candidate has the skills we need," that's what resumes and supporting references checks are for. Interviewing charm can be manufactured, so it behooves an interviewer to be more objective in their assessments of a potential employee.
Also, keep in mind that just because a job candidate has a loose thread on a button or scratches their head is no indication that they will potentially bankrupt an employer’s company. Too many individuals who believe that they are working in the best interests of their companies are way too judgmental. Not everyone is a salesperson, or possesses a salesperson’s persuasiveness, even as it relates to trying to get a prospective employer to consider them for a position. It doesn’t mean they lack confidence…it just means that people are different. Even more so, many lack the insight to “see” the outside-the-box thinker that many employers are often looking for, often mistaking plain-spokeness, uncommon beliefs, or a high-level of self-confidence and intelligence—all traits of self-motivated and innovative thinkers—as not being a “fit for our company.” The scenario is analogous to one of those Hollywood movies where a sophisticated thief has broken into a high-security museum, and is preparing to steal the Crown Jewels or some such item. He/She cannot see the infrared security beams until they adopt the special goggles that allow them to see the beams crisscrossing around the item. Well, looking for an innovative, outside-the-box thinker who could help an employer meet their goals is a lot like those movies. One cannot “see” an innovative person unless using innovative insight (or their old eyes as it were). In simplest terms, it takes a thief to catch a thief. Maybe American employers would be more successful if they would concentrate more on substantive attributes of potential employees, such as academic performance, personal adversities overcome (which demonstrates many positive traits), experiences and references, and leave the “behavior” observations to those more trained to observe such. Furthermore, tests that would actually measure potential job performance as it relates to whatever particular type of job being applied for (and not something that “demonstrates” aptitude or is done simple to “weed out” other similarly qualified individuals) would go a long way toward finding the right individual for an employer.
And lastly, employers could stand to be a little…no, a lot more professional in their dealings with job hunters. The American job hunter’s time is just as valuable as anyone else’s, and the time it takes to put together and send a resume or other job inquiry should be reciprocated; employers owe people interested in working for them the courtesy of response to inquiries, even if it is just a form response such as an automatic reply e-mail. It’s gotten so that those seeking work have become more professional in their endeavors than employers.
It’s understandable that for many American employers, good employers are hard to find, but not quality employees. If more time and effort were actually invested in seeing good potential employees instead of looking for them, perhaps American employers wouldn’t be in the same boat as we consumers and (ex-)employees, looking to survive in an economic downturn that is hurting employee and employer alike. Remember, it was who many chief employers decided to choose to employ that was in part, the cause of this economic downturn.

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A Criticism of Employers in America - Part 2

Continued from Part 1


What in particular is beyond reason about the way by which American employers tend to choose and hire prospective employers is that during these unprecedented economic times, everyone has been forced to change the way they conduct business as usual, EXCEPT in regards to hiring practices. Many departments of the various levels of government around the nation as well as many private-sector employers have gone to (and continue) a 4-day work week in order to save on operating expenses and to help their own employees cope with exceedingly high cost of gasoline and the prohibitive cost of commuting to and from work. Transportation (of products) has become more expensive. Consumers have had to become innovative in their household-related cost-cutting measures in order to survive the rising cost of products and services in these lean economic times. Banks have cut back on credit and tightened their loan standards. But for some inane reason, the human resource departments of employers seem to think that they alone are exempt from the need to change in order to adapt to the shifting economic realities. They still use the model of hiring the best interviewer rather than the most intelligent, most experienced, most outside-the-box thinker (In 95% of cases, the ability to “interview” is a “skill” separate from the individual requirements of most job opportunities; one has nothing to do with the other, but most employers fail to notice this). The problem is lies with the competence of the choosing mechanism that employers use.
I can recall some time ago applying for a position as a delivery driver for one of the major soft drink giants. I knew that the local bottling company for this company only hired through an online resume system, a system administered by an outside company not affiliated with the soft drink giant, but contracted by the soft drink company in order to find “compatible” prospective employers. I obtained the fax number for the company’s local bottling office and faxed in my resume along with a brief cover letter, hoping that this would give me an edge on any competitors for one of several positions. Given the area I was living in, I was certain that my college degree, honors distinctions, spotless driving record/CDL, well-honed resume, and my lack of substance abuse or a criminal record—all I noted in my cover letter—would make me a shoe in for the company. Sure enough, the manager of the local office suggested that I go immediately to their online resume system and apply. I was contacted by the same manager, who was at a loss as to why my resume had not showed up on their radar as it were. What happened was that I was found “not to have been compatible” as a prospective employee based on my answers to the resume system’s question and answer section. You know the types of pointless questions that are intended to divine who you "really" are: Do you love your mother? Do you believe that most people are dishonest at some point time in their lives? And so on.
Such questions would not have revealed that I had every intention to show up early and work late at every opportunity in order to rise through the ranks of the company and acquire a semblance of job security (the company has boasted that they have never had any mass lay-off at any point in their entire history). Such tools do not reveal individual ambition, do not reveal the personal motivations that a prospective employee would have for working hard (such as having to feed and provide for a family) and securing something of a secure financial future. It didn’t matter that I had no criminal history, had never even touched alcohol or taken in any type of foreign substance, that I was motivated (in part) to have a steady income so that I could pay down my student loans, that I was looking to rise through a company’s ranks and become a reliable employee, or that I had a history of volunteering hundreds of hours for social and poltical causes…all that mattered was my ability to answer questions correctly.
Such tools and their obvious and inherent weaknesses are directly in-line with human resource personnel who work on behalf of their employers to find decent and successful employees. But the problem with their lofty goal is not in trying to achieve the goal itself; the problem is the criteria they use select employees. As you may have guessed, I myself have been told once or twice that I “didn’t interview well,” despite my ability to articulate myself, my intelligence, and my various related experiences (to which again, I ask, what does that have to do with the price of tea in China insofar as the particular positions?). What I take issue with are those individuals, who’s backgrounds and/or education are in human resources, that tend to over analyze a prospective employee to the point where every fidget or untimely clearing of the throat becomes symbolic of some presumed negative attribute that may interfere with their ability to carry out job duties. In the worse instances, individuals are judged to not "fit" into a particular employer's company simply by virtue of harsh and unfair judgements of their apparent personalities. And this particular assessment would probably have merit if interviewers, as employees themselves, would recognize the fact that their personalities are not representative of every employees' personality; just because a candidate did not personably appeal to a single interviewer does not mean that that the job candidate would not in fact be loved by someone else within the same company. Putting too much faith on their training and their “abilities,” these individuals forget that they are not psychologists, psychoanalysts, or even in most cases trained observers of human behavior…they are people like you and I…people who bring their personal and cultural biases to the office. They are individuals, many with “professional” flaws themselves, not oracles or seers! And employers (as well as the individuals themselves) need to remember that.

To Be Concluded...

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A Criticism of Employers in America - Part 1

A couple of year ago, during a time when I was looking for work, I applied for a position located literally on the other side of the state of Michigan—a near 4 hours and close to 300 miles from where I lived. Between my own particular experience and the position’s duties and minimum education requirements, I felt that I was a lock for the position; it was a potential fit-like-a-glove match. The person overseeing the recruitment of potential candidates for this position must have thought so too, as I received an invite for an interview only one day after e-mailing my resume and cover letter to the appropriate personnel department. But my lack of positive results from the pitiful few interviews that I had gotten up to that point, the then-prohibitive expense of traveling so far on near $4.00 a gallon gasoline at the time had gotten me to think that I simply couldn’t afford what was something of a gamble with the limited financial resources I had at the time. Armed with this reality, I called and inquired about the possibility of a telephone interview in lieu of gambling with resources I could ill-afford to lose. The response that I received was “A telephone interview isn’t practical.” Needless to say, I was kind of taken aback; record-high gasoline, a 4 hours drive, and a day off from my part-time job…all on a gamble for a position that I may or may not get? ‘Impractical’ for whom?
This particular experience into the world of job hunting, as well as actually standing back and objectively observing how American employers seek potential employees taught me that America’s employees deserve whatever harsh fates await them in these unprecedented troubled economic times. Why do I say this? Because American businesses and organizations possess a remarkable inability to adapt their hiring practices to the new (and harsh) economic realities of global competition from workers in foreign nations, most of whom possess a level of productivity and a work ethic that dwarfs what we like to think of as “unparalleled” American output. So for the blindly patriotic or unyielding among you reading this, and who cannot think past old paradigms—even at the expense of embracing the illogical and senseless—you may want to stop reading at this point. But for those of you open and wise enough to release your death grips on traditional (but meritless) practices and consider valid cynicism toward current hiring practices in America, by all means, continue to enlighten yourselves.
Jumping right in, I am astonished at the way by which America’s employers blindly perpetuate hiring practices, which make little or no sense whatsoever, without dedicating even a nanosecond of thought to questioning their validity—the most obvious being the jump-through-the-hoop performance we call the “job interview.”
To start, this particular ritual is nothing more than a personality assessment as well as a lying contest—or is a reasonable person supposed to believe that every person applying for a job is everything he/she says that they are? According to a 2005 study in the Journal of Basic and Applied Psychology, “60 percent of people had lied at least once during [a] 10-minute conversation.” What’s more, other similar research found that “extroverts tend to lie more than introverts…especially in a job interview situation.” With such being the case, it’s not surprising that a interview “offers success only slightly better than flipping a coin—52%” when it comes to their generally accepted (bus obviously mistaken) “accuracy” of finding a potentially successful employee. It speaks volumes then that, all other factors being equal, employers tend to hire the person who is the better performer rather than the one who is actually more competent.
To this effect, too much weight is given to “great answers” during a job interview, to which I find myself asking, what do ‘great answers’ have to do with the price of tea in China? Just because someone is able to spin a yarn, how does this translate into competence or potential successful employment? Call me stupid, but I simply do not see the connection. I mean, is this why so many recent immigrants from South of the Border are hired for a growing number of American jobs…because of their “perfect command” of the English language and their sophisticated interviewing skills…or is it because most know that they as a group are capable of outworking most Americans? I mean, if I were a candidate for a position as a janitor or window washer (or any other position), how does “how well” I answer pointless question assure the interviewer that I won’t sweep dirt under the carpets or leave streaks on the windows? A fact of life, especially given such precarious economic times, is that everyone lies, including our parents and best friends. Throw into the mix the immediate economic needs of job candidates and the requirement that they have to literally sing for their suppers, and you develop a clear understanding of why America is the nexus of the current worldwide economic turmoil; the “best and the brightest,” especially where Wall Street and the economic community in general are concerned, are most often chosen from among those who are able to sing their own praises the most effectively, and not necessarily the most competent, most innovative thinkers. How else can anyone explain why someone with superior academic credentials, self-confidence, and experience is turned down for an employment opportunity when compared to other candidates for a given position of lesser attributes? And with so many American employers all-too willing and/or eager to favor image over substance, some job candidates are resorting to facelifts and other forms of reconstructive surgery in order to gain favor with a prospective employer via “that extra edge.”


To Be Continued...

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