Six months into a job search that I had classified as “failed,” I realized the truth: having “Harvard” on my resume wasn’t convincing potential employers of anything. Meanwhile, I wasn’t getting a chance to convince them of my qualifications in person.
The “Harvard Guide to Careers,” published by the university’s Office of Career Services, had made the whole job-search process seem so simple: First, mail a resume and cover letter. Second, if no one contacts you in about a week to schedule an interview, call the person to whom you sent your materials, ostensibly to inquire if they were received, but actually to angle for an interview. Third, go on the interview. Fourth, write a thank-you note. Repeat as necessary until employed.
Stalled on the 10th or 15th repetition of step one, I couldn’t help beginning to wonder if all the people who had teased me about majoring in folklore and mythology had been on to something. I’d been seeking a position as a clinical-research assistant in psychiatry, the job descriptions for which typically called for psychology majors who had already done research in the field. Apparently taking several psychology classes, chairing a campus mental-health awareness group and doing research on religious healing practices did not amount to the same thing.
I felt confident of this much: whatever further skills were necessary for psychiatry research I could pick up easily. In addition, I already understood a lot more about psychopathology than anyone could tell from my resume and cover letter. All I needed was for employers to meet me; I was sure they’d find me much more impressive in person than on paper.
What I didn’t know is that employers are now crafting their hiring processes so that they don’t have to get so much as a phone call from a job seeker, let alone meet her. Most of the jobs to which I applied were advertised on hospital or university Web sites. When I was lucky, the position description included at least the name and e-mail address of the hiring manager, and I could submit my resume and cover letter directly. More often, however, the “highly preferred” way to apply for the job was through the Web site itself, by filling in a form that destroyed the formatting of a resume and treated a cover letter as an afterthought. “To whom it may concern…” became the opening line of most of my cover letters, and each time I typed it I slipped deeper into the realization that it concerned no one other than me.
While I couldn’t say for certain what happened after I clicked submit, all the evidence I’d accumulated pointed to some variation of the following: before my application arrived at the computer screen of an anonymous human-resources recruiter, it was intercepted by a data extractor intended to draw out the vital information about my education and employment history. One Web site allowed me to preview how my profile would look when the extractor finally regurgitated it. It was not a reassuring sight. Though I’d adhered to the instructions about how to format my resume so it wouldn’t be mutilated, the extractor still managed to confuse my bachelor’s degree for an associate’s. Worse yet, the rigid resume structure didn’t provide me with even one line to mention my extracurricular experiences, which had a far greater impact on my career goals than any summer job I’d held.
Even if an extractor didn’t hack up my qualifications, the recruiter who next handled my application didn’t do much to increase my chances of getting an interview. With too little time to consider any one resume carefully, she would simply pass on the profiles of candidates who met the exact criteria in the listing. And without any contact information for that recruiter, often without even a clue as to which research group had posted the job I was interested in, I couldn’t send any e-mails or make any calls to convince someone that I was worth an interview.
I never expected the job offers to pour in just because I have a Harvard degree. Some of my Harvard friends were just as unemployed as I was, after all, and I gather that Harvard grads are hardly alone in this tough economy. What I did expect, however, was that my knowledge, commitment and enthusiasm–in short, who I am in real life, not how I appeared in a bunch of scroll-down boxes–would land me a job. And three days ago, it finally did. But with so much lost in translation to bits and bytes, I found that it took a while for employers to figure out who I really am. And it took even longer for one to hire me.
