I thought it would be fun to share some of the more absurd things that both candidates and clients have said to me.
No Words Can Explain
When I told a candidate about a potential job:
Do they have private offices? My lease is up soon and I may have to stay at work for a while.
Hubris
Said by an HR director at J. Walter Thompson when giving me a job order to replace a departing account person who was going to Margeotes, Fertitta, Weiss (one of the best and most successful of the small agencies in the 1990’s):
Imagine, leaving here to go to an agency whose name you cannot pronounce.
Unfortunately, she was serious.
Sore Loser
Said by a candidate who did not get a job after four weeks of intensive interviewing and going back too many times to count:
Well, I didn’t like them, anyway.
Sore Loser, Too
Said by a candidate who did not get a job at Chiat/Day in their earlier days:
I guess it is a good thing. I don’t look good in jeans.
Huh?
The reason given by an account supervisor who wanted to leave Chiat/Day after only a week (I had not placed her there):
I have to do my own Xeroxing.
She Doesn’t Get It
The entire email sent by a candidate who instead of returning my call to tell her about a potential opportunity wrote:
I no longer require your services.
An HR Director Who Didn’t Get It
The trouble with you recruiters is that you want feedback. I don’t have the time for that s%@t—
A Hiring Manager Who Didn’t Get It
Said after I sent three really great candidates:
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I don’t want to use you any more. You only send me two or three candidates and I need to interview at least 10 or 12 people.
Quantity over quality.
OMG!
When I first was recruiting in the 80s, I worked out of my living room. I was interviewing a woman while my wife was in the bedroom. I swear this is true.
What can I do to get you to get me a job? said she, as she was unbuttoning her blouse.
Well, it was the 80’s.
Get Over It
When I asked a candidate about a potential job, she asked me if a certain gentleman worked there. When I answered yes, she told me that he was an “ass” and she wouldn’t work at any company that would hire him. When I asked her why, she said, simply, “I was once engaged to him.”
I guess that is as good a reason as any for passing up an opportunity.
For Real?
The reason I use you is because you know the business. That saves us the trouble of writing job specs and descriptions.
Compliment yes. Direction no.
The Wife As Unseen Client
I can’t hire her. She is way too pretty. I will have to travel with her. If my wife ever met her, she would castrate me.
