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Thursday, June 7 & Friday June 8 (email / letter combo; just to make sure I got the message)
Dear Dr. Bison,
We regret to inform you that you were not selected from an ENORMOUS and HIGHLY TALENTED pool of applicants for an interview for [JOB DR. BISON DID NOT APPLY FOR] at *SHITTY R3 INSTITUTION*.
Sincerely,
Incompetent HR Boob
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Saturday, June 9
Dear Incompetent HR Boob,
What the fuck is this shit? I hereby decline your job offer. Now you are as confused as I am.
Sincerely, fuck you.
Dr. Bison
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Monday, June 11
Dear Dr. Bison,
We regret to inform you that [JOB DR. BISON APPLIED TO IN SEPTEMBER] has been filled. We simply could not interview every qualified candidate, due to an ENORMOUS and HIGHLY TALENTED pool of applicants.
Sincerely,
Dr. Doody-Head, Jr.
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Monday, June 11
Dear Dr. Doody-Head, Jr.
SHIT! I held out sincere hope for NINE FUCKING MONTHS only for you finally to crush my dream of working at your poopy R2. When I saw your email, I first thought it might be an invitation for an early July interview, followed by you hiring me and giving me exactly a week to get my affairs in order before classes started.
Sincerely and fuck you,
Dr. Bison
Perhaps HR Boob had one too many liquid lunches.
ReplyDeleteHoly crap! You got a written response! Wait a minute ... what does that say about me?
ReplyDeleteIt's never the job seekers fault for not getting a timely rejection letter. It's more a sign of the level of professionalism of the HR department and/or search committee.
DeleteI already know of one job rejection I won't be getting a letter for. The search was closed due to budget cuts, which I guess included not sending out a rejection letter. Thanks academic job wiki!
Dear search committees, I used to have a real job where I did the hiring. If you hire me, I'll show you how to use mail merge to send out these emails in about 2 hours.
I share a similar experience. It's very weird. I get rejections from a certain community college district for a job I applied for over seven years ago that is apparently ongoing or never CLOSED. When I contacted them about this, they told me that I've been put into their database for ten years and will remain there (active, apparently). I have even told them that I am happily employed elsewhere and am not seeking a job with them anymore. They don't care. So every year, a letter arrives telling me I've not gotten a job I never applied for. Again. It's good for my self of steam.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I hear that. Although at this point I just laugh at these things. The email was odd enough, but for the actual letter to show up the next day, for a job I never applied for was the height of comedy.
DeleteOK, "poopy R2" made me laugh. Thanks, Bison, and sorry you have to deal with this ... poop.
ReplyDeleteHeh. I feel like it's the best metaphor for the job market right now. These things just add to the misery. I think the market conditions may contribute to even worse treatment of applicants then in past years. In fact, I've seen it first hand on my campus interviews. To preview my future blog post, at my meeting with the dean, she basically told me, "I'm not really going to negotiate salary with you. If you even get an offer, and you like it, well, there are dozens of other candidates behind you."
DeleteI had already signed my new postdoc contract though, so I cared less and less about things as the day went on.
Sorry, that should be, '...and you don't like it.'
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
Delete"I'm not really going to negotiate salary with you. If you even get an offer, and you like it, well, there are dozens of other candidates behind you."
DeleteI was given this more than once. It never came from an institution that made an offer. If they're sincere about wanting to hire you, the human response would be to at least go through the motions of wanting to hire you.
But then, some deans show no shortage of inhuman behavior. In every case in which I got a blatant "take it or leave it" attitude, looking back later, I could say, "Thanks goodness I didn't get THAT job," as they turned out to be woeful places to work.
Besides, salary isn't really what you want to negotiate in a new, t-t science faculty job, anyway. It's always notoriously low, often lower than what you make as a postdoc. What you want to negotiate for is more startup funding, laboratory space, computers and other resources, and especially time off teaching so you can get some applications for external funding written, during your first year or two.
Any sane, competent dean should be able to see the value in this, although there's no shortage of the other kinds. The point of this exercise isn't to for deans to get their jollies by seeing how much stress new faculty can be made to take. It's to see how to help them succeed, to the benefit of the university and its students, given resources that are always finite.
Hang in there, Bison!
I don't know why it came up, really. I never asked about salary. The Dean just launched into it. I was trying to be professional and not discuss it unless an offer actually arose.
DeleteThe search was either a sham or if an outside candidate does get the job offer, they are going to have some tenured faculty already upset with them upon arrival.
My record is getting a rejection letter three -years- after I sent in the application. I hate this treatment: whenever I get it, I have to fight hard to resist the temptation to write back to say, "Don't strain yourselves..."
ReplyDeleteAlso, how did that HR boob get your address, if you hadn't even applied?
I had applied to a job at that university last year and gotten a rejection letter. I guess my address and email were still bouncing around the HR system.
DeleteThis ought to stop. Has anyone used the word "harrassment" with these people?
DeleteOooops. That reminds me, I didn't send out FOAD letters to the applicants who didn't make the cut in our last search....my bad.
ReplyDelete