You walk to the mailbox. You find a letter. It appears to be from a company with which you have sought employment.
The envelope is very small. A tri-folded piece of paper is inside. You read the text on the paper with dread.
"You were an excellent candidate," it says. "The competion was stiff and we had a very difficult time making a decision. However, we regret to inform you that we have selected another candidate."
Rejection letters are a joke. As somebody involved in a job search right now, I am well aware that there is no shortage of hiring managers out there who are armed and ready with this sort of note.
I know that other members of ASU's Class of 2005 are finding themselves in the same boat. Er, make that a cruise ship. So one must learn to laugh about it. What follows is a copy of the rejection letter I would really like to receive someday.
Dear Applicant,
We at The Soullesse Corporation would like to extend our thanks to you for applying for the Claims Adjuster I position with our company.
However, we regret to inform you that we have already filled the position after selecting another candidate. You demonstrated exceptional knowledge of the business and of our company culture. We would like to state our appreciation for your solid efforts and excellent level of professionalism.
There was a lot of competition for a single position, and you showed a lot of promise for future employment success in the field. We encourage you to apply again.
But there are a few more points we would like to share, just for your own future reference.
First and foremost, about 224 people applied for the same job. What makes you any better than those sheep? Why don't you just get down on your hands and knees and start to "baaah"?
The fact is, that suit you were wearing was terribly out of style. We can't believe your white socks were showing under your pants when you sat down. No employee of ours allows whitey bear to play peek-a-boo. And those shoes - gasp - were so 2004. It's 2005. Get with the program.
Also, your handshake was unbelievably weak. A baby could have squeezed the heck out of your hand. Plus, when your sweaty little fingers gripped ours, we had to grab a towel. No client of ours is going to want to deal with you.
Following along that line, your slight tendency to slutter and the fact that you were slouching in your chair mean that you will only slack off on your job. We can't have any of that. We need confident candidates who will make us look good.
Oh, and your hair. We saw split ends aplenty on your head and we can't have any of that when you go before our board of directors. Well, OK, we doubt a Claims Adjuster I will ever go before the board of directors, but you never know.
Finally, there was an odd little typo in your application packet. You left out one of the Ls in "public relations" in your cover letter, and it wasn't the L in "relations." Needless to say, mangled words like that don't reflect well on our company.
So you might think we're a bunch of bogus fools, but we're trying to pick the one candidate out of the flock who has all the qualifications and presents themselves in a polished manner.
Granted, a well-trained chimpanzee could do this job and you would have to be that dumb to be able to deal with our finicky department manager. But our candidates should not only do our filing and answer our phones, but also look confident and hot while they're doing it.
Never mind you, you style-challenged fool, who will stumble about aimlessly in life with no chance for success.
Truth be known, the competition was only so-so and we could tell in the few minutes we had to spend with you that you weren't the greatest candidate. We mean, you're smart and all, but "Napoleon Dynamite" is only charming in the movies - not in real corporate life. We're just trying to make you feel better or at least soften the blow, because who knows? One man's trash is another man's treasure, right?
We hope you have a little bit of self-esteem left and that you won't get all wacky on us when you've had time to let our rejection sink in.
Have a nice day,
Dram A. Queen
Human Resources Director
The Soullesse Corporation
Nicole Saidi is a journalism and geography senior currently in the process of collecting rejection letters. OK, so that's the excuse she's been using. Express your opinion or send her a job offer she can't refuse at nicole.saidi@asu.edu.
