Ghosting candidates? SHAME on YOU.
I have always been vocal about the lack of humane practices in the entire HR industry, covering from recruitment to lack of feedback, from bullying to burnout.
A couple of months ago, I met with the owners of a Greek startup. They were proud of conducting interviews and how fast they share feedback with candidates. They were MAJOR liars. I know of at least one case where a candidate spent about six hours in interviews only to be completely ghosted by the very same people.
This is not the only example of –what I consider– cruel practices adopted by companies. However this time I decided to post a poll on our nonprofit page, Cosmoleadership — the Global Association of Leadership. The statement was “When you are ghosted by a company and you never hear from them after one or more interviews” and the possible answers “You post a negative review”, “You stop recommending them”, “You will reapply in the future” or “Other”.
Unlike other polls posted by us, this only received 119 votes. However, 64% agreed that they will stop recommending the company. 15% will post a negative review on employer websites, 8% gave their own ideas, such as “I will not reapply but I won’t post a review either” or “I did not post negative review as such but I made comment under their post on how fantastic culture they have in their company.”
What I literally find fascinating is that 13% would reapply to the same company. I absolutely respect and support their decision but I fail to understand it. If you’ve spent time, energy and potentially money for interviewing and they completely ignored you, why do you still want to join them? It reminds me of that cliché people say “Ignore them till they want you”.
I just want to send a shout-out to all the companies out there. You’re not only hurting candidates by ghosting them. You’re hurting your brand as well. People won’t recommend you and they may even stop using your products altogether if you treat candidates and staff like trash.
