Comments | purchasemonkey: Applying for incredibly specific skill requirements job placement blues

purchasemonkey

Applying for incredibly specific skill requirements job placement blues

Jun 16, 2009 13:51

Sometimes I hate applying for work. Biotechnology job listing requirements are so ludicrously specific. I have eight years of experience in protein purification and column chromatography, for example, but not in running computer-controlled *H*PLC, only computer-controlled *F*PLC. The difference is minimal, but important. *H*PLC is a commonly- ( Read more... )

unemployment, whining

Comments 7

cerebralpaladin June 16 2009, 21:13:30 UTC

Oy. That's really annoying.

I assume that you're still applying for those jobs anyway? Often, "requirements" are more of guidelines than rules. But sometimes the people applying them are foolish.

Good luck.

kid_lit_fan June 16 2009, 23:17:32 UTC

I feel ya, homes, on a far less technical level.

The correct answer to "Have you used a HAL-9000 phone system within the past year?" is "No, but anyone with several braincells to rub together could learn the system within an hour!' Correct, but impolitic.

chrisfs June 16 2009, 23:26:10 UTC

I am tempted to say that sometimes the answer is simply to lie, if you think that you can figure it out rather quickly. For my current job, my experience with Access was cramming a book a few days before the interview and trying out examples on the computer (Microsoft Access being available on most PC )

tronpublic June 17 2009, 00:31:21 UTC

Ugh. Yeah. I hate that.

I don't think I've ever met all of the requirements for any job that I have applied for.

thistleingrey June 17 2009, 01:22:58 UTC

Yeah, me neither.

Forge ahead, or something!

terpsichoros June 17 2009, 02:08:14 UTC

The problem with "applying for jobs" is that the HR monkeys who process resumes don't know the similarities between HPLC and FPLC, and so will reject your application for having the wrong one. Your best bet is to find out the actual technical person who will manage you, and talk to that person (or even send a resume). They'll know that HPLC and FPLC are similar enough that you can learn the one you don't know, and they can tell HR to process your application.

Of course, this doesn't work as well if there are lots of unemployed people with HPLC experience looking for jobs.

My experience has been that I rarely (never? not sure) get an interview when it's an HR person screening resumes, but I get lots of interviews if I apply to hiring managers.