For every 1 LLM applicant that this idea would deter, you would also deter 50 humans who simply don't feel like having to send a letter to apply to a job.
At this rate we just need the entire system to breakdown so we can rebuild it with some hard standards. I shouldn't need to reenter my information. Period.
They already do this, listen to the radio at off hours and there will be many job ads with instructions to apply via postal mail. Of course the reason isn't to deter LLMs it's to deter Americans so the employer can claim no Americans applied in their visa and green card filings.
As much hate as H1Bs get, I’ve worked at two large companies where the publicly posted salary range for H1B applications were consistently higher than my own. In all humility, I was more qualified and more experienced than required by the position.
Maybe there is a dearth of talent, maybe it’s about control, maybe is someone trying to get a friend hired. I don’t think it’s about the money.
After seeing the flood of resumes for application, I do think a small cost to apply wouldn't be a bad thing for either applicants or companies. I also realize that if someone is unemployed, getting them to pay money they don't have to find a new job is counterproductive.
However, when we wanted to hire a new Ops person at work, the flood of obviously not qualified at all applicants we got was insane.
There are a ton of fake jobs openings out there, or which sort of exist, but they aren't exactly eager to hire and haven't filled the role in nine months.
You'd have to pay with no guarantee anyone will even read it, which even at a fairly low cost rapidly becomes an issue when you might have to apply to a lot of jobs.
Making the employer also pay might help, but I suspect then the employers will just wander over to another jobs site that promises free listings.
Surely few people have a printer these days? I do (a color laser printer) but I'm a bit old school. And yes, my handwriting is, and always has been, dreadful.
And maybe employers/recruiters should be required to include a template (but .doc is not allowed) of what format they expect, disclose if they will be OCR-ing it and with which tool/LLM, will they read it or feed it to an AI etc.
As someone who is currently looking for a job, I don't like this idea.
All this does is increase the effort and barrier to entry to apply for a job. This is not a good thing. Applying to jobs is already time consuming as it is; nobody wants more hoops to jump through.
I understand that recruiters/hiring managers/whatever get a lot of junk applications, but frankly, it is your job to sort through them. You are paid to do this.
Could the hiring/job seeking process be better? Yes, absolutely. Currently, it's terrible, and almost everyone involved is making it worse. But the solution is not mailing job applications.
This is beneficial to both parties, it's not just to throw spikes on the road for applicants without care.
The less nonsensical applications they get, the more time they can give your application.
> I understand that recruiters/hiring managers/whatever get a lot of junk applications, but frankly, it is your job to sort through them. You are paid to do this.
Indeed they are, and that is what they're doing by asking for a written application.
I like this as an optional "this will be read and considered by a human" guarantee added to a job posting. That way, you can still get the reach of digital submissions but the benefits of this approach.
The barrier of entry has gone up from nearly nothing to signing up (and presumably paying for) your service. This is a significant increase, which will simnifically decrease BS applications.
Reminds me of how it was common in France until pretty recently for employers to use graphology (pseudoscience) analysis of candidate's handwritten letters to assess personality traits etc. When I was looking for work there I was lucky that the tech sector was already a abandoning the practice.
Introducing JobbyPasta, the service that will hand-complete and mail in job applications for a small fee of $9.99 per application. Add on a transcription of your cover letter for an additional $4.99, or have us generate one (with your approval) and transcribe it for $7.99.
Have a lot of applications to send out? Subscribe to us monthly for $34.99/mo (billed annually).
I feel like this is already addressed in the "Aha! But you see..." section. There is nothing that one can't poke holes in, but if the holes are not big enough, the proposal is still sound.
I'd really like a rejection physical letter back saying thankyou for application but no thanks signed by a human. I put some effort in to applying, they could at least exert some effort coming back, rather than simply ghosting. A reasonable barrier to bots collecting CV's.
In Germany it used to be that in some places, not only you were expected to have a proper application folder with various sections for the various kinds of material (CV, application letter, recomendantions, certificates, photo), they would post it back if refused.
This stopped being a thing about 15 years ago though.
I still have some of those applications in a box somewhere.
>I'd really like a rejection physical letter back saying thankyou for application but no thanks signed by a human
If you want personalized human rejection letters to come back to you, then the hiring process would have to be equally friction based: i.e. mailing in notarized copies of documents and interviewing in person, for it to scale and not overwhelm a company's resources.
>I put some effort in to applying
Yeah but so did hundreds of other people. This worked in the world of 20+ years ago, but it doesn't scale anymore in the era of online applications where every job posting gets hundreds of applications within a week.
It doesn't matter if you put in more work in your application than the other 200 candidates who are doing "spray and pray", it's too much noise for humans to swift through with without some automated screening that might just as well drop you through the net because it can't tell the amount of work you put in, you're just a number in a queue.
I think something like an escrowed fee that both the applicant and the employer pay would be a reasonable way to solve the spam and keep both parties honest. If either the applicant or the employer are unhappy with the process (resume doesn't match, employer ghosts) - the fee is sent to charity, otherwise the fee is returned to both parties.
And before the in-person interview, the applicant is required to produce a handwriting sample in front of the interviewer of random text, which is then compared against the mailed documents.
Instead, the approach that will continue increasing in dominance is hiring referrals and finding jobs through personal networks.
In a world that increasingly resembles The Library of Babel,
- the main way to know what's true is to tune into news sources you trust (monolithic old school media, or personality driven new-school media, social media, etc.),
- the main way to learn what to watch/listen/read is to take recommendations from people you trust, or received through channels you trust,
- the main way to hire or get hired is, increasingly, by exploiting a network of people you trust.
All of this compensates for ambient oversaturation by using the best available (and tunable!) desaturation filter: your trust network.
Unfortunately these have been bought up by billionaires that use them as play things to get richer.
>from people you trust,
In one particular area where they understand what is going on. I have lawyers I would trust with my life on legal matters, but should not be trusted around any digital device.
>y exploiting a network of people you trust.
agreed, but sucks for people that don't have that.
In my last job search, I sent out a few dozen resumes utilizing snail mail. It was from a job board that searched for job descriptions that only accepted applications through physical mail. There were some big tech companies I was able to apply to. Ultimately, I didn't get a role from snail mail but it was an interesting process. I would probably expose myself if I detailed the specific service I used, but you can lookup online tools where you upload a PDF and they print it out and send it to an address for like $1 each (more for certified, priority, etc.) and I confirmed it worked. I even had companies mail me back rejection letters, so that was a first.
Last job I hired for I required short video submission answering some basic questions. If you didn't submit a video you were automatically disqualified. The previous position we hired for had over 1,000 applicants this last position around 500.
It selects for the most telegenic applicants with the best video production (and best coaching, etc.) In-person interviews have analogous issues but are less susceptible to cheating on the questions.
49 comments
[ 16.4 ms ] story [ 202 ms ] threadMaybe there is a dearth of talent, maybe it’s about control, maybe is someone trying to get a friend hired. I don’t think it’s about the money.
However, when we wanted to hire a new Ops person at work, the flood of obviously not qualified at all applicants we got was insane.
You'd have to pay with no guarantee anyone will even read it, which even at a fairly low cost rapidly becomes an issue when you might have to apply to a lot of jobs.
Making the employer also pay might help, but I suspect then the employers will just wander over to another jobs site that promises free listings.
All this does is increase the effort and barrier to entry to apply for a job. This is not a good thing. Applying to jobs is already time consuming as it is; nobody wants more hoops to jump through.
I understand that recruiters/hiring managers/whatever get a lot of junk applications, but frankly, it is your job to sort through them. You are paid to do this.
Could the hiring/job seeking process be better? Yes, absolutely. Currently, it's terrible, and almost everyone involved is making it worse. But the solution is not mailing job applications.
The less nonsensical applications they get, the more time they can give your application.
> I understand that recruiters/hiring managers/whatever get a lot of junk applications, but frankly, it is your job to sort through them. You are paid to do this.
Indeed they are, and that is what they're doing by asking for a written application.
I'll just start a business that mails letters to companies for you.
Now, an APPLICATION FEE, that's interesting. Hmm.
Have a lot of applications to send out? Subscribe to us monthly for $34.99/mo (billed annually).
This stopped being a thing about 15 years ago though.
I still have some of those applications in a box somewhere.
If you want personalized human rejection letters to come back to you, then the hiring process would have to be equally friction based: i.e. mailing in notarized copies of documents and interviewing in person, for it to scale and not overwhelm a company's resources.
>I put some effort in to applying
Yeah but so did hundreds of other people. This worked in the world of 20+ years ago, but it doesn't scale anymore in the era of online applications where every job posting gets hundreds of applications within a week.
It doesn't matter if you put in more work in your application than the other 200 candidates who are doing "spray and pray", it's too much noise for humans to swift through with without some automated screening that might just as well drop you through the net because it can't tell the amount of work you put in, you're just a number in a queue.
Its all in the profile - and we can all just swipe left/right instead.
Dysfunctional FAANG seeks 10X prompt engineer in hyderabad
In a world that increasingly resembles The Library of Babel,
- the main way to know what's true is to tune into news sources you trust (monolithic old school media, or personality driven new-school media, social media, etc.),
- the main way to learn what to watch/listen/read is to take recommendations from people you trust, or received through channels you trust,
- the main way to hire or get hired is, increasingly, by exploiting a network of people you trust.
All of this compensates for ambient oversaturation by using the best available (and tunable!) desaturation filter: your trust network.
Unfortunately these have been bought up by billionaires that use them as play things to get richer.
>from people you trust,
In one particular area where they understand what is going on. I have lawyers I would trust with my life on legal matters, but should not be trusted around any digital device.
>y exploiting a network of people you trust.
agreed, but sucks for people that don't have that.