The Job Search Treadmill

So, I've been at the Job Search for more than a few months now, and the experience has been eye opening. Mostly, it has not been about actually getting a job, but mastering the techniques of getting a job. Those techniques are varied, complex and seemingly inexhaustible, as are the battalions of experts, websites and virtual entities who materialize out of thin air - Star Trek like - one millisecond after you post your first on-line resume. Let's call them the Job Search Community.

They're enough to drive you crazy.

As if seeking a job wasn't boring enough in the past, now, it is time consuming as well. According to the Job Search Community, no longer will a firm handshake, a confident manner and a provable curriculum vitae even get you in the door, much less get you the job. Oh no; it takes much more than that.

To get a great job, you must first have the perfect resume. According to the experts, your resume should not recite your accomplishments, but should convey to a harried Screener - in ten seconds or less - how you are going to be valuable to him (Or her - a rigorous Gender Consciousness is mandatory for the enlightened Job Seeker). You must never provide references, because that is so 80s, but you must have tons of certifications so as to demonstrate that you are a constant and perhaps even habitual - if not obsessive - self improver; the inherent contradiction of course being that in not providing references but stuffing your Resume Reviewer so full of certs he resembles Al Gore after one of his numerous Cheese Cake Consolation Binges directly after the 2000 Election Debacle, that you risk the appearance of inconsistency.

You must be a member of several networking websites, because the easier you make it for a prospective employer to find you, the better. Howsoever, you must be diligent in not posting anything inappropriate on those websites so as to give the Reviewer pause, nor must there be any inconsistencies between the profiles on those websites. Remember, the clock is ticking, and there is nothing so precious as the time of a Reviewer, except perhaps her sensibilities, and were she to browse your Facebook profile and find out that you are really, really, really into Japanese Anime, it's Game Over, Man. Game Effing Over.

Unless of course you're going for a job writing code for "World Of Warcraft, Part VII", in which case it is a prerequisite. But I digress.

As if that is all not enough, you must have snappy Duds, excellent grooming and white teeth, but not go over board on any one of those. Underdress and you're pictured as a slob; overdress and you'll intimidate the chieftains who decide your fate. Bad hair and teeth? Get thee to a street corner. Hair and/or teeth too perfect, and you run the risk of being tagged as frivolous, self-absorbed, or both. Your height will matter immensely, but should never be used as an excuse. Your age will likely be an issue, but not to worry, there are a Google of techniques for overcoming this obstacle. Bothered with cold sweaty hands? That first hand shake is critical but, not to worry, there are mind control techniques - and if necessary prescription drugs - that can take care of that too.

In the interview, you must be brief, yet detailed; assertive, but deferential; informative, but not garrulous. Make eye contact, but not so much that the Interviewer thinks you are coming on to her (or him), much less leave the impression that you think you are better than them, or, worse still, a threat to take over their job. For the sake of this point in the narrative, I'm assuming that you're interviewing with your eventual boss and not the HR screener. Nobody wants their job, but more about that later.

Finally, presiding over the array of documents, objects, props, clothes, accoutrement, concepts, strategies, techniques, cosmetics, gestures, narrative and minor surgical procedures all essential to your survival in the Job Market is your "Brand", an overarching Gestalt that must integrate everything else into a perfect whole, that, were it to be inconsistent in any one respect, would doom you forever to an endless succession of First Interviews, assuming you ever got that far.

What the hell is going on in Today's job market, and is all this truly necessary? For starters, why would employers intentionally hire anybody with a perfect resume? Wouldn't you logically assume that Perfect Resume Person was: a) lying beyond your capacity to prove otherwise, or, b) spending a lot of productive work time (on their current employer's dime) improving their resume credentials, or c) both?

And what about all of the body language, tics, cues and other insignifica you need to master in order to put your interlocutors at ease, all while conveying exactly what they want to hear? The manic pursuit of the Perfected Interview Technique must necessarily be a distraction from accumulating the things an Employer actually wants: competence in your profession and a demonstrated work ethic.

Don't get me wrong: you've got to be able to prove your bona fides, and your resume should make sense. You shouldn't dress like a dork, or ogle your interviewer's cleavage, assuming she has been so infelicitous as to have worn something low cut. By the way, that generally only happens in the Radio business anymore, every other respectable profession outside of TV cop shows generally having banned provocative clothing. There's something of an irony in that, seeing as how Radio is an audible medium as opposed to visual, but there you have it: Women in radio dress like hookers and talk like dock workers. Randy, profane Dock Workers on the make. The men are basically the same, minus the cleavage.

To my friends in the Radio business, don't ever change.

Having gone through the inventory of paranoia-inspiring obstacles inherent in a job search, there's a certain irony to the fact that various and sundry of the Human Resources trade may have - based on that last paragraph - put a large black dot next to my name, later to be digitized, downloaded and cross-referenced against a mammoth database that all of them share with each other (not that they would ever admit it). This database would then forever relegate me to the legions of the unhireable; kind of like Nixon's enemies list of Prominent Democrats, or the Clinton's enemies list of Prominent Republicans, only ubiquitous in its accessibility.

The whole point of speculating on whether or not such a list exists is to address the underlying paranoia that fuels the Recruitment process. Expose one flaw, or leave one stone unturned in your pursuit of Candidate perfection, and you're screwed. It doesn't work that way.

To those of us seeking employment, let me avail you of the one certainty that I have about the hiring process: every single HR person I have ever socialized with, known professionally or even just met casually has been a Party Animal. Male or female - and prisoners of political correctness by their Job Description - just get them on the outside of a couple of Margaritas after work or the ubiquitous HR seminar, and they are not only monopolizing the Karaoke machine, they are complaining about how constrictive their clothing is, and doesn't that decorative fountain out in front of the Hotel look inviting? Your fast-living, hard-drinking Sales Professional and your six-a-day Red Bull-fueled Engineer have nothing on the typical Director of HR. Must be that rigorous appropriateness they maintain between 7:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. that justifies cutting loose during Happy Hour.

Bottom line, the people giving jobs are human beings, just like those that are seeking jobs. Interviewers may on occasion throw you a curve with the ultimate Gotcha question - a foolproof one sentence Polygraph designed to unmask your deficiencies - but for the most part, they're looking for honesty, competence and hard work, and not necessarily in that order.

Keep it simple and real. You'll end up being true to yourself and your future employer. You will also cease to drive yourself crazy.

As to that Black List, I'd like to believe that - if it exists - it would only restrict my opportunities in the Radio business.