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370 points surprisetalk | 5 comments | | HN request time: 0.772s | source
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jp57 ◴[] No.45065311[source]
One great piece of advice an informal mentor gave me long ago is that there is no information in a rejection.

That is to say that you cannot draw any conclusions about yourself or your interviewing technique or your skills or anything from the single accept==0 bit that you typically get back. There are so many reasons that a candidate might get rejected that have nothing to do with one's individual performance in the interview or application process.

Having been on the hiring side of the interview table now many more times than on the seeking side, I can say that this is totally true.

One of the biggest misconceptions I see from job seekers, especially younger ones, is to equate a job interview to a test at school, assuming that there is some objective bar and if you pass it then you must be hired. It's simply not true. Frequently more than one good applicant applies for a single open role, and the hiring team has to choose among them. In that case, you could "pass" and still not get the job and the only reason is that the hiring team liked someone else better.

I can only think of one instance where we had two great candidates for one role and management found a way to open another role so we could hire both. In a few other cases, we had people whom we liked but didn't choose and we forwarded their resumes to other teams who had open roles we thought would fit, but most of the time it's just, "sorry."

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1. dheera ◴[] No.45066984[source]
It has none of the actionable information that people want in a good feedback message:

- What did I do wrong during the interviews

- What did I do that you weren't happy with

- Why was I not liked enough to be accept==1

If there is even a bit of information on these things, there are actionable things that can be done for the next interview (with any company).

2. Bootvis ◴[] No.45067642[source]
The point is that bit of information doesn’t tell you anything about yourself and your own skills and intrinsic value. You could be there best hire to date but someone even better than you shows up, or the bosses nephew or funding went away, etc. All events outside of your control.
3. kelnos ◴[] No.45068710[source]
I don't love the boring, uselessly pedantic takes some people have on what is otherwise truly good advice.

Give it a rest, please.

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4. jp57 ◴[] No.45068869[source]
LOL. People who think "try-hard" is bad need not apply. Nobody owes you anything, least of all a job, man.
5. westmeal ◴[] No.45069226[source]
Where do you think you are? 90% of the posts are exactly that.