You are not entitled to a job...
aka Cyn's rant about job-seeking idiots.
I will be the first to admit that when it comes to some aspects of the retail work force, I am considered "old-fashioned." I believe that if you are working front of house, on stage, whatever you call it, that you are keep personal conversation to a minimum, avoid discussing internal business where customers can overhear, and that you maintain an open and friendly demeanor at all times- even if you're doing busy work because no one has walked in the store two hours. I do not ever think it is appropriate to lean on a counter, take off your shoes, or ignore other customers for your friends/relations. I feel that if you work in an environment that has hardline specced personal sales goes as a corporate policy, that you should work your ass off to meet those goals and not snipe sales out from under people who did work their ass off.
I believe that when you go out to look for a job, you dress up. I don't care if you're just picking up applications. You dress well. I can make allowances for a nice pair of dress jeans with a business casual top when picking up apps, because some places allow dress jeans as working attire now. I believe that you dress in business professional attire for an interview. I don't care if you're interviewing at freaking McDonald's- wear office-appropriate attire. You damn sure don't wear jeans, flip flops, and a sleeveless tops. Yes, you look cute, and your clothes are actually nice clothes for an afternoon out. But they are not interview appropriate clothes.
It's sad that all of the above is considered old-fashioned or conservative beliefs.
Everyday right now I have people come in looking for applications. I have had people pick up apps in everything from three-piece suits to ripped, dirty jeans. I have had people who otherwise are appropriately dressed ruin their chances when they open their mouth and say, "yeah, I just want a job." Recently, I assisted with seasonal interviews. There were some good candidates, including one we hated to turn down; however, she was simply physically incapable of meeting the job requirements. We also had one no-show (who made a point of mentioning on her app that she had 26 years of retail exp, BTW), one late (who got us mixed up with another candle store and was on the wrong side of the mall), and the aforementioned jeans/sleeveless/flip flop combo. What makes matters worse is that almost everyone under the age of 35-40 that comes in to apply for a job? They seem to think that they are entitled to a job. They give off the vibe that they don't care what job they get as long as it pays them something and doesn't make them work too hard. When someone says, "I just really want a cashier job," or "Selling candles can't be that hard," I want to smack them.
Begin sidebar rant/ Retail is hard work. It is only slightly elevated above the levels of hell that includes such jobs as food service, convince stores/gas stations, and custodial. It is not an easy job. People who do not or have never worked these jobs form the instant opinion that you are obvious an idiot or a loser because you can't do better than sales. Never mind that if no one worked in sales, if no one worked as cooks or servers, or at gas stations, or cleaned toilets, these snooty housewives and professional folk would be most put out. /end sidebar rant,
You are not guaranteed a job just because you are a warm body and it's coming up on the holiday season. I would rather work by myself for a few hours on Black Friday then hire someone who gives off the impression that they don't care. If you can't sell yourself to me, why the hell would I think you could sell my company's products?
You want to me to hire you? Wait, I'm not the SM. Let me rephrase- you want me to call you back for an interview, then deem you passable to move up to the SM for consideration? It really isn't that hard, even with my standards. Just do the following:
1) Come to pick up your application dressed well. Business casual at the very least. Ask to speak to the manager on duty, introduce yourself by name, initiate a handshake, and then ask if we are accepting application (hint: Most places always are. Companies look for good people all year round. If you blow the manager out of the water on an interview, a company will find a place for you.). Smile, be confident. Get the name of the manager who gives you the application, and thank them for their time. Hint: when we see you walk in with a stack of apps in your hand, we know you're desperate for a job and applying everywhere. Bring a folder, nice tote, or something else to keep all your apps together and hidden from view.
Why you should do the above: People can rant and rave all they want about how stupid it is to judge a person by their appearance, but you know what? We do. The amount of care a person puts into their physical appearance almost always directly correlates to the their work ethic. Are there exceptions? Yes. But let me tell you a secret: six times out of ten, we decide if we will call you back for an interview based on our interactions with you when you pick up and drop off your application. Nine times out of ten, we have decided if we will consider you for hire you after the first five minutes of an interview. You have a handful of minutes to impress us. Your application, your experience, your availability? It is only a third of what we consider when looking at apps. Unless you just seriously blow us away with your sparkling personality- or you were shopping and we asked you to fill out an app after a conversation- we aren't going to call you back if you turn in an app in a T-shirt and jeans. Remember, if you can't sell yourself, why should we trust you to sell for us?
Giving your name, getting ours, and thanking us is very very important. We are more likely to connect you with your app later if you tell us your name. If you get our name, you can ask for the same manager when you drop off, or paperclip a note to you application (attention X, thanks for your consideration). This gets the application in the hands of the manager you actually interacted with and increases your call back chances. We get literally hundreds of application during September and October; if you can't make us remember you, even if you are otherwise a good candidate, you're likely to get overlooked.
2) Return your application promptly, preferably the same day and to the same manager. Don't fill the application out in the store. This is the pet peeve of almost every manger I know. We hate when people borrow our pens and take up our counter space to fill out an application. Take the application and fill it out elsewhere. Do not, under any circumstances, interrupt us if we are obviously busy with a customer. You are not more important than our sales. Again, be polite, be confident, and thank us for the consideration.
3) If you don't hear from us within a week, it is perfectly acceptable to stop in or call back, ask for the manger you interacted with, and mention that you are , you put in an application X date and you were just checking back to see if there were any positions actually open at the moment. We will tell you (if we haven't all ready) if we are hiring, what we are hiring for, and an expected time that we will be interviewing candidates. If we are not actively hiring, it is also perfectly acceptable to call back or stop in once every month or so to see if we that has changed. It doesn't hurt to keep yourself and your initial good impression at the top of our minds.
However, keep in mind that if we are actively hiring and you are one of our candidates, we will contact you. Do not call and harass us the day after you drop off your app. Do not call and harass us every week for the next six weeks. Making a nuisance of yourself will undo any good impression you may have made.
4) If you are called back for an interview allow yourself enough time to arrive for your interview five-ten minutes early. You may have to wait for the interviewing manager to be able to take you. That is okay. We prefer you to be slightly early, because how you behave while you wait/react to waiting tells us a lot about you. No, I'm not just making that up. It's one of the interviewing techniques they teach us. However, do not show up thirty minutes or an hour early and then hang out in our store, waiting on us and giving us nervous glances. We have a schedule for a reason, and that reason is not to accommodate you.
Project confidence. Keep your body posture and vocal tone upbeat and open. Dress business casual to business professional. Do not wear jeans. Don't where sleeveless tops or low-cut tops that flash your bra if seen from the right angle. Keep your make-up, perfume, and jewelry tasteful and understated (there are some exceptions here: if you apply at say, Hot Topic, looking edgy might improve your chances. They wouldn't if I were interviewing you. But that brings me to...).
5) Do some research. Even if you are desperate for a job, you need to be able to answer the "why apply at X company" question with something other than "I need a job." Understand what they sell, what their demographic is, and what their overall brand vibe stands for. YC for example, is a conservative, luxury consumable. We do not allow visible tattoos, body jewelry in anything but the ears (and no more than two earrings per, at that), extreme hair color, etc. If you show up looking like you'd make a grandmother twitch, even if you are otherwise professionally dressed, we aren't going to ask you about if you can conform to dress code. We just won't hire you. And that tongue piercing? Yeah, if we see it during the interview, or can tell it affects your speech? Not happening.
Note: I personally don't have problems with the above personal styling choices. I don't care for facial piercings, but eh, YMMV. However, unless a store's demographic is tweens to twentysomethings, they aren't appropriate "attire" for a front of house associate. Facial piercings and tattoos are still considered "intimidating" to the average middle-class individual and will overshadow the product in the customer's mind.
6) You will be asked questions. Do not answer them in yes or no format. Remember, you are selling yourself. You want to be picked over the twenty other people being interviewed that week. Be prepared to answer questions such as: What experience do you have working with the public? How do you feel about personal sales goals? How do you feel about utilizing aggressive sales techniques? Do you prefer to work as an individual or as part of a team? Are you interested in advancement opportunities? What did you like best and least about your last job? What are your three strengths and weaknesses? What can you bring to the company? et al.
It's okay to think about your answers, but never say, "I don't know."
7) Thank the interviewing manager. It is okay to do a followup call after a week if you haven't heard anything. If you haven't heard anything? We probably went with another candidate. Another little secret: we can't for legal reasons tell you exactly why we didn't hire you, so we will normally say we filled all our position based on better availability or more experience. But sometimes, if you're polite, and you had an otherwise decent interview? If you speak to the interviewing manager later and ask what you could have done differently in the interview to possibly get hired, he or she might tell you.
A job is a privilege, not a right. If you project an air of indifference or entitlement when you apply, if you don't care enough to put forth your best effort, why should I care that you've got two kids at home, late rent, a junker car, and medical bills? If you can't at least pretend to care about the application process, why would I even think about trusting you to sell my product?
tl;dr People need to be taught how to firking apply for jobs in person. I don't care how much places are going to online apps. So long as we have service jobs, people skills are still a requirement, and being able to sell yourself to a prospective employer is important.
I will be the first to admit that when it comes to some aspects of the retail work force, I am considered "old-fashioned." I believe that if you are working front of house, on stage, whatever you call it, that you are keep personal conversation to a minimum, avoid discussing internal business where customers can overhear, and that you maintain an open and friendly demeanor at all times- even if you're doing busy work because no one has walked in the store two hours. I do not ever think it is appropriate to lean on a counter, take off your shoes, or ignore other customers for your friends/relations. I feel that if you work in an environment that has hardline specced personal sales goes as a corporate policy, that you should work your ass off to meet those goals and not snipe sales out from under people who did work their ass off.
I believe that when you go out to look for a job, you dress up. I don't care if you're just picking up applications. You dress well. I can make allowances for a nice pair of dress jeans with a business casual top when picking up apps, because some places allow dress jeans as working attire now. I believe that you dress in business professional attire for an interview. I don't care if you're interviewing at freaking McDonald's- wear office-appropriate attire. You damn sure don't wear jeans, flip flops, and a sleeveless tops. Yes, you look cute, and your clothes are actually nice clothes for an afternoon out. But they are not interview appropriate clothes.
It's sad that all of the above is considered old-fashioned or conservative beliefs.
Everyday right now I have people come in looking for applications. I have had people pick up apps in everything from three-piece suits to ripped, dirty jeans. I have had people who otherwise are appropriately dressed ruin their chances when they open their mouth and say, "yeah, I just want a job." Recently, I assisted with seasonal interviews. There were some good candidates, including one we hated to turn down; however, she was simply physically incapable of meeting the job requirements. We also had one no-show (who made a point of mentioning on her app that she had 26 years of retail exp, BTW), one late (who got us mixed up with another candle store and was on the wrong side of the mall), and the aforementioned jeans/sleeveless/flip flop combo. What makes matters worse is that almost everyone under the age of 35-40 that comes in to apply for a job? They seem to think that they are entitled to a job. They give off the vibe that they don't care what job they get as long as it pays them something and doesn't make them work too hard. When someone says, "I just really want a cashier job," or "Selling candles can't be that hard," I want to smack them.
Begin sidebar rant/ Retail is hard work. It is only slightly elevated above the levels of hell that includes such jobs as food service, convince stores/gas stations, and custodial. It is not an easy job. People who do not or have never worked these jobs form the instant opinion that you are obvious an idiot or a loser because you can't do better than sales. Never mind that if no one worked in sales, if no one worked as cooks or servers, or at gas stations, or cleaned toilets, these snooty housewives and professional folk would be most put out. /end sidebar rant,
You are not guaranteed a job just because you are a warm body and it's coming up on the holiday season. I would rather work by myself for a few hours on Black Friday then hire someone who gives off the impression that they don't care. If you can't sell yourself to me, why the hell would I think you could sell my company's products?
You want to me to hire you? Wait, I'm not the SM. Let me rephrase- you want me to call you back for an interview, then deem you passable to move up to the SM for consideration? It really isn't that hard, even with my standards. Just do the following:
1) Come to pick up your application dressed well. Business casual at the very least. Ask to speak to the manager on duty, introduce yourself by name, initiate a handshake, and then ask if we are accepting application (hint: Most places always are. Companies look for good people all year round. If you blow the manager out of the water on an interview, a company will find a place for you.). Smile, be confident. Get the name of the manager who gives you the application, and thank them for their time. Hint: when we see you walk in with a stack of apps in your hand, we know you're desperate for a job and applying everywhere. Bring a folder, nice tote, or something else to keep all your apps together and hidden from view.
Why you should do the above: People can rant and rave all they want about how stupid it is to judge a person by their appearance, but you know what? We do. The amount of care a person puts into their physical appearance almost always directly correlates to the their work ethic. Are there exceptions? Yes. But let me tell you a secret: six times out of ten, we decide if we will call you back for an interview based on our interactions with you when you pick up and drop off your application. Nine times out of ten, we have decided if we will consider you for hire you after the first five minutes of an interview. You have a handful of minutes to impress us. Your application, your experience, your availability? It is only a third of what we consider when looking at apps. Unless you just seriously blow us away with your sparkling personality- or you were shopping and we asked you to fill out an app after a conversation- we aren't going to call you back if you turn in an app in a T-shirt and jeans. Remember, if you can't sell yourself, why should we trust you to sell for us?
Giving your name, getting ours, and thanking us is very very important. We are more likely to connect you with your app later if you tell us your name. If you get our name, you can ask for the same manager when you drop off, or paperclip a note to you application (attention X, thanks for your consideration). This gets the application in the hands of the manager you actually interacted with and increases your call back chances. We get literally hundreds of application during September and October; if you can't make us remember you, even if you are otherwise a good candidate, you're likely to get overlooked.
2) Return your application promptly, preferably the same day and to the same manager. Don't fill the application out in the store. This is the pet peeve of almost every manger I know. We hate when people borrow our pens and take up our counter space to fill out an application. Take the application and fill it out elsewhere. Do not, under any circumstances, interrupt us if we are obviously busy with a customer. You are not more important than our sales. Again, be polite, be confident, and thank us for the consideration.
3) If you don't hear from us within a week, it is perfectly acceptable to stop in or call back, ask for the manger you interacted with, and mention that you are , you put in an application X date and you were just checking back to see if there were any positions actually open at the moment. We will tell you (if we haven't all ready) if we are hiring, what we are hiring for, and an expected time that we will be interviewing candidates. If we are not actively hiring, it is also perfectly acceptable to call back or stop in once every month or so to see if we that has changed. It doesn't hurt to keep yourself and your initial good impression at the top of our minds.
However, keep in mind that if we are actively hiring and you are one of our candidates, we will contact you. Do not call and harass us the day after you drop off your app. Do not call and harass us every week for the next six weeks. Making a nuisance of yourself will undo any good impression you may have made.
4) If you are called back for an interview allow yourself enough time to arrive for your interview five-ten minutes early. You may have to wait for the interviewing manager to be able to take you. That is okay. We prefer you to be slightly early, because how you behave while you wait/react to waiting tells us a lot about you. No, I'm not just making that up. It's one of the interviewing techniques they teach us. However, do not show up thirty minutes or an hour early and then hang out in our store, waiting on us and giving us nervous glances. We have a schedule for a reason, and that reason is not to accommodate you.
Project confidence. Keep your body posture and vocal tone upbeat and open. Dress business casual to business professional. Do not wear jeans. Don't where sleeveless tops or low-cut tops that flash your bra if seen from the right angle. Keep your make-up, perfume, and jewelry tasteful and understated (there are some exceptions here: if you apply at say, Hot Topic, looking edgy might improve your chances. They wouldn't if I were interviewing you. But that brings me to...).
5) Do some research. Even if you are desperate for a job, you need to be able to answer the "why apply at X company" question with something other than "I need a job." Understand what they sell, what their demographic is, and what their overall brand vibe stands for. YC for example, is a conservative, luxury consumable. We do not allow visible tattoos, body jewelry in anything but the ears (and no more than two earrings per, at that), extreme hair color, etc. If you show up looking like you'd make a grandmother twitch, even if you are otherwise professionally dressed, we aren't going to ask you about if you can conform to dress code. We just won't hire you. And that tongue piercing? Yeah, if we see it during the interview, or can tell it affects your speech? Not happening.
Note: I personally don't have problems with the above personal styling choices. I don't care for facial piercings, but eh, YMMV. However, unless a store's demographic is tweens to twentysomethings, they aren't appropriate "attire" for a front of house associate. Facial piercings and tattoos are still considered "intimidating" to the average middle-class individual and will overshadow the product in the customer's mind.
6) You will be asked questions. Do not answer them in yes or no format. Remember, you are selling yourself. You want to be picked over the twenty other people being interviewed that week. Be prepared to answer questions such as: What experience do you have working with the public? How do you feel about personal sales goals? How do you feel about utilizing aggressive sales techniques? Do you prefer to work as an individual or as part of a team? Are you interested in advancement opportunities? What did you like best and least about your last job? What are your three strengths and weaknesses? What can you bring to the company? et al.
It's okay to think about your answers, but never say, "I don't know."
7) Thank the interviewing manager. It is okay to do a followup call after a week if you haven't heard anything. If you haven't heard anything? We probably went with another candidate. Another little secret: we can't for legal reasons tell you exactly why we didn't hire you, so we will normally say we filled all our position based on better availability or more experience. But sometimes, if you're polite, and you had an otherwise decent interview? If you speak to the interviewing manager later and ask what you could have done differently in the interview to possibly get hired, he or she might tell you.
A job is a privilege, not a right. If you project an air of indifference or entitlement when you apply, if you don't care enough to put forth your best effort, why should I care that you've got two kids at home, late rent, a junker car, and medical bills? If you can't at least pretend to care about the application process, why would I even think about trusting you to sell my product?
tl;dr People need to be taught how to firking apply for jobs in person. I don't care how much places are going to online apps. So long as we have service jobs, people skills are still a requirement, and being able to sell yourself to a prospective employer is important.