So says David Rendall in his online manifesto, The Freak Factor: Discovering Uniqueness by Flaunting Weakness.
How do I love this man? Let me count the ways.
Ask A Manager wrote a nice post about rejection letters yesterday, and gives several examples of truly stupid ways that rejected applicants respond to them.
I still don’t like emailed rejection letters, though, and here’s why.
Email feels hasty and is too provocative
An email is too sudden and surprising. It even raises my hopes up, just a minute, when I first see it in my inbox… a request for more information, perhaps? The memo-like nature of email lacks a certain sense of closure, too. If it says “no,” is that REALLY their final answer??
Email also is more provocative than a letter, and therefore much more likely to invite a response from the recipient. As AAM points out, this is rarely a good thing.
Email shows how cheap you are
The cost of postage and paper may be rising, but it’s foolish to quibble over 45 cents when your company’s public image is on the line. Nor does it require much more staff time to use mail-merge to semi-personalize a form letter than it does to correctly enter a bunch of email addresses.
Job searches cost money, and they should. They are one of the most important thing any organization does. The real cost of job searches are retraining costs, particularly if a company did a poor job of hiring and retaining good employees to begin with. Appearances matter here, so don’t make your company look like it can’t even afford stamps, let alone decent salaries for its employees.
Email feels disrespectful
I am never hasty, cheap, or disrespectful when I apply for a job, and I think I deserve at least a tiny bit of time in return for my own investment. You asked for my application, after all, and your rejection is painful enough.
Bridges can burn in either direction: “Employ” is a transitive verb
I’ve been beating this point half to death lately, but I need to make it one more time. Ann Bares at Compensation Force has made it even better than I by pointing out that it is not the bad employees but the good ones who will leave a company if they are unhappy. The costs of a poorly-run job search will only multiply. To keep good employees, you need to attract them in the first place.
Word gets out. Just as employers and recruiters share information with each other, you can be sure that employees and job applicants do as well.
At least the best ones do, and those are the ones you want. Right?
I am willing to concede a few exceptions to my no-email rule. Among them:
Please send me a letter. I want to see it and touch it. I will know what it is right away, but I want to be able to decide when to open it, and how to digest it.
And then I want to be able to crumple it up with great flourish and throw it away.
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Related posts:
Employers: It’s Your Turn to be Fabulous
Un-Fabulous Employers: Asking for Too Much Upfront
Blind Box Ads: Bad-Ass, or just Bad?
I’ve developed a pretty keen sense of smell in my old age, and it’s nearly always “right on the nose.” Last year I turned down a management job at one company just months before the entire company went under; seven months ago I resigned my directorship of another and have watched them lose acres of ground since — as I’d warned them they would. Nor have the latter found anyone willing to be my replacement.
Many years ago, I ignored an “icky” smell at another job, until I had to leave that position when we moved to Canada. I later found out that my boss had sexually assaulted my predecessor.
My nose knows.
I don’t really want the news my nose is bringing me now, because it’s making me too picky. I need a job. I could persevere and take one of these stinky jobs anyway, but I already know the likely outcome: been there, done that. So for now, I’m sticking with the schnozz.
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Related posts:
Employers: It’s Your Turn to be Fabulous
Un-Fabulous Employers: Asking for Too Much Upfront
Blind Box Ads: Bad-Ass, or just Bad?
