If I Read The Phrase “Competitive Salary” Once More…
I will do absolutely nothing, including not applying for the job
I’m currently in the job market and I haven’t been here for some time.
The last time I was here, there were no robots reading CVs, no video CVs and when people posted a job, they told you upfront what you were going to get paid for it.
I get the thing with the robot CVs. I don’t like it, but I get it.
Companies are now inundated with so many CVs that it would be impossible for a real person to read them all, longlist and shortlist them. So the algorithms read for keywords from the job description and match up how many of the same keywords you’ve used in your CV.
That means that you have to make a new CV for every job you want to apply for and re-write things in bizarrely specific ways so that you can get your CV through the robot round and hope that whatever real person that does finally read it, doesn’t think your odd phrasing means that you’re bonkers.
And repeat.
Up to ten times a day according to one piece of advice I read.
Alright, so I’m prepared to curate my CV to fit the job description. But I point blank refuse to apply for a job where the salary is not stated. I encourage you all to do the same.
If I even see the phrase “competitive salary” I click off the ad right away.
Why?
Because I am not going to waste my time and effort reading the company website, personalising my CV, writing a unique cover letter and whatever other nonsense they ask me to do (so far I’ve had to answer job scenario questions, film myself talking about a subject for 60 seconds, answer informal calls and complete a psychological test before any actual interview) just for them to turn round and tell me that the salary is about £10,000 less than what I can actually live on.
Because the problem with the phrase “competitive salary” is that it leaves you asking the question: competitive with what?
Competitive with your previous salary?
Or competitive with the other salaries that they pay in their company?
Or competitive with other similar roles in similar companies?
Which of these three would be the fairest? How, unless I have some insider contact within the company, am I going to know the middle one? And if every company lists “competitive salaries” on their job ads, how am I going to know the last one?
Then there’s the issue that, for me, “competitive salary” is just bullshit for “the least we can get away with paying you.”
I know what I need to be able to afford to pay the mortgage, the bills etc, but as I am currently taking a career shift, I don’t fully know what I should be paid.
So if they ask me what I’d like to be paid, there’s a risk that I’m either going to go absurdly high, or absurdly low.
If I go absurdly high, they will laugh in my face, and if I go absurdly low, it will show that I don’t value myself which potentially means that they won’t value me either.
I could, like many other women, end up being paid much less than another colleague for the exact same job.
I just want to be paid what the job is worth, and that, in my opinion, is up to them to decide and up to me to accept it or not.
