JUST SAY NO.

You know what’s one of the most annoying thing for a HR manager? It’s when a candidate sends you multiple emails in response to your job ad, each time shoving his or her resume in your face, practically on his or her knees begging you for at least “an interview at your convenience”, even though he or she is so blatantly obviously not the kid for the cut, then one day you finally have a matching opening for this candidate and you call him or her for interview and finally, perhaps more out of sympathy than good judgment, you make an offer to him or her, when suddenly all that singing-for-supper dies down and you are left going “halloooo….” to a hollow void left by the candidate who apparently has had a change of mind about working for you but has depleted of his or her stock of manners to actually tell you he or she has decided to reject your offer.

That’s right. The candidate has made you look stupid.

Here’s a word to the clueless (and to those who may just have committed the above HR capital offence). Let me tell you what the hiring process is not.

1. It is not easy. Filtering through sheaves of application forms and resumes is not like mengayak tepung. Filtering humans take up time and special skill to do it so as to avoid square pegging. A hiring mistake can cost the business much adverse repercussions later.
2. It is not something you can do while doing some other task. You need to focus and be meticulous in your candidate selection.
3. It is not cheap. Print ads, online job portal subscriptions and headhunting fees are very expensive, sometimes more expensive than a month of your take home pay.
4. It is not done by machines.

Number 4 is very important, hence why it is stated last.

So what can HR Managers do about this situation? Well, you can’t technically blacklist the candidate. Technically, the candidate is not wrong to reject you. But of course the fact that he or she rudely omitted to manifest to you his or her rejection makes you scream because you have done No. 1 -3 and he or she conveniently forgets No. 4.

Well, you can “grey-list” such offending candidates by pre-warning all your HR friends about him or her so that they won’t be made to look like suckers too. It’s not the same as “blacklisting” because other companies whose HR Managers are not in your circle or your Facebook list won’t know about it.

Other than that there’s nothing much else you can do. It’s not your fault anyway.

To all jobseekers out there, if you receive any offers which you have to reject, do have the courtesy to make a simple call or send a simple email to politely refuse the offer. Don’t leave the companies hanging in a limbo. It looks bad on you, and may cost you your future. It may also boomerang back to you one day when you have forgotten about it. It’s simple. Just like smoking, “katakan TAK NAK”.