There are two possible ways, I suppose, to react to this story of rapid and ironic success for
someone - say, me - who is in exactly the same state of desperation
with his media job search as the writer of the piece. One would be to
be inspired that someone out there has actually been successful at
putting the HR bots behind them and getting a cool job. The other would
be to react with the gnashing of the teeth, clawing out of the eyes
etc., reasoning that this particular blog-stunt, now that it's been
done, can't possibly be duplicated and the fact that someone's already
pulled it off in fact lessens the chances out there for the rest of us
schlubs who are back to trying to get beyond the cold, inscrutable HR
bots (and I truly believe that humans are not involved in the initial
stages of Bertelsmann's process) to at least be rejected by the actual
humans that at least theoretically exist somewhere within Random
House's organization.
And a word about Random House. It should be no surprise to anyone who's
had the misfortune of dealing with their alienating, cold, impersonal,
detached, future-techno-dystopia job application process that Mr.
Mohney mentions them in the article. See, Random House, like Bookspan
and many others, is a subdivision of the German media megalith
Bertelsmann, a company that owns virtually everything that could
reasonably be described to be a part of the media including any ideas
you ever came up with in the shower for a cool movie in any and all
current and future media.
Bertelsmann companies can't merely post their job openings like other
companies, by posting them to a job board with a contact e-mail and fax
number for you to send your resume and cover letter to.
My God no! That would be too intimate, too personal, too . .
. well, almost human. It might even give the applicant the sense that
somewhere, at some point, a real live human being is involved in the job
application process.
In order to apply for a job with any Bertelsmann company you
first must set up an account with a bit of proprietary software, which, it goes
without saying, is called by an acronym: the PCP, for personal career planner.
You see, you’re not merely thinking about getting an obscure 9-to-5 job with a
German media conglomerate because you have bills to pay, you’re planning a
career by God! So, first you have to jump through the hoops of setting up an
account, probably the fifth time that day you’ve given your personal information
on the internet, and then you can look at the job listings etc. But the real
fun begins when you apply for a job. You don’t merely send your cover letter
and resume to some e-mail, not even one as impersonal as, say, [email protected]. Instead, you click on
the “apply” link and the PCP sends you through the process of filling out a
form. (Preparing you for your life of form-filling-out if you should actually
get the job no doubt.) So, once you’ve pasted your cover letter into the tiny
little box, attached your resume etc., you’re ready to apply.
This is where things truly start to seem like some nightmare
out of, I don’t know, Kafka? Philip K. Dick? Once you’ve finalized your
application you then become acquainted with the hellish “4 triangle” system. On
one page of your PCP are listed all the jobs you’ve
applied for. Next to each one are four sideways triangles, which are either
grey or orange. There is a legend to interpret them at the top. Note that
having two orange triangles is called, I kid you not, “processing”. Not
“reviewing”, or anything that might make it seem like someone is looking at
your stuff, but “processing”. Once you apply you get a form letter which sounds
like it was written by a machine. Other than that your only feedback comes from
watching the triangles. And how do you find out you didn’t get an interview.
Why, by seeing you have three orange triangles, or “criteria not met”. After
that, you can eat a food pellet, take some pills for eight hours of sleep and
wake up refreshed for a challenging day of form-filling-out and
triangle-watching the next day.
Karl Marx talked about alienation from labor. I’m not sure
anyone predicted people being alienated from simply applying for jobs. God
Bless you Chris Mohney. I too understand the desperation that leads a man to start a stunt blog.