The young clerk says to his supervisor: "I am intelligent and I am willing to go through this pile of responses, but please give me some guidance? How do I approach this task? How do I go about selecting the better replies?"
The clerk will then be given a list of criteria to help identify the most qualified among the 300 responses. The number of criteria will vary. Some ads will list only five or six requisites, while others have as many as fifteen or twenty. Consider this example of a short ad:
Property Management Executive
National real estate company seeking a mature professional for a
Vice President position to oversee a multi-state residential portfolio.
Must possess strong leadership and marketing skills, strong track record in all aspects of property management essential.
Must be willing to relocate.
Excellent compensation/benefit package. Please send resume, including salary history to:
Box WN 9837, The Wall Street Journal
This ad includes the following criteria: (Note that some criteria are stated directly in ads while other criteria are suggested, or implied. For example, "Experience as a company officer" is not expressly stated, but strongly suggested by the wording of the ad.
A. Experience with a national real estate company
B. A mature professional
C. Experience as company officer
D. Able to oversee multi-state residential portfolio
E. Must have strong leadership skills
F. Must have strong marketing skills
G. Proven track record essential in all facets of property management
H. Must be willing to relocate
How your letter is handled depends on how well it fits those criteria. You must understand how those criteria are determined, and to do that you must first understand how a typical executive job ad is created.
The ad was not written the day before it appeared, or even the week before. It was probably written over the course of several weeks. Following is an example of how another ad might come about.
The Manufacturing Manager has decided they need to replace the present Production Manager who is not performing satisfactorily. He has several discussions with his boss regarding the kind of person they need and finally gets permission to start search, which might include running an ad. Now the problem is discussed with the Human Resources Manager who instructs an assistant to write a draft of an ad.
The draft of the ad is reviewed by everyone concerned with the hiring decision. Changes are suggested Just as a book goes through several drafts before it finally gets into print. Every word and phrase is carefully considered along with what should be underlined or appear in bold face or capital letters. Defining the position is a major decision even though the job might be described as "lower" or "middle" management. The salary might only be in the $40,000 range, but the expectation that the person will be with the company for ten years, plus considering fringe costs, pushes the magnitude of the decision up into the $500,000 range.
You must assume the people who put the ad together were intelligent, and you must also assume every word in the ad was put there deliberately as a way of communicating to job candidates exactly what the company is looking for in applicants for the job.
Therefore, your first task, when considering the advisability of answering an ad, is to analyze it just as carefully as the people did in writing it. You should create a list of criteria which must correspond to the list of criteria given to the young clerk for the weeding-out process.
Without this careful analysis you won't get past the first examination stage of the ad contest. You must match your reply to the criteria set forth in the ad. Remember, in this contest, winning first prize means getting the job interview that 290 other respondents will fail to get. Only those who get an interview will have a chance at the Grand Prize, which is the JOB.
Once the young clerk has the list of criteria for weeding out winners and losers from the stack of letters and resumes, is it time to go to work sorting responses? Not yet. The clerk must also be told of any criteria which could not be put into the ad. Some of these are the unpleasant biases we live with. They don't want a woman. They don't want a man. They don't want a person from certain minority ethnic groups, or anyone who lives outside a particular geographic area. There is also the common age prejudice--they don't want anyone under twenty-five, or anyone over forty. And the young clerk might also be instructed to eliminate any applicant if the reply isn't neat, or if it contains misspelled words or bad grammar.
The young clerk will still need to know how to attack the huge pile of responses and actually carry out the screening process. Instructions will vary, but most of the time it will be something like this: "Make three piles. An A pile, a B pile, and a C pile. Go through the responses and match them against the criteria we gave you. Those ten to fifteen replies best matching the criteria, go into the A pile. The next best ten to fifteen replies go into the B pile. The rest of them - between 270 and 280 - go into the C pile."
Please don't ask an employer: "How big is your A pile?" He will look at you as if you were crazy. He probably doesn't use the same terms, but whatever his method of weeding out, it is only common sense to want to turn those 300 responses into a small number of hot prospects (the A pile), a good backup pile in case none of the hot prospects work out (the B pile), and then the C pile, containing the rest of the replies.
Probably 75 percent of the time, the company will find the right person for the job among the ten to fifteen responses falling into the A pile. After all, these are the replies that apparently match the company's criteria. If any of these applicants are impressive during interviews, one of them will get the job. But, suppose they don't? Sometimes all of these hot prospects wash out during the interview stage. Perhaps one or two of the better candidates have accepted positions elsewhere. In anticipation of that possibility, there is the B pile containing the next most desirable candidates, and 20 percent of the time the successful candidate will be found there. What about the remaining five percent of the time when the advertiser goes through the A and B piles and comes up empty? Does he tackle the C pile? No, he reruns the ad. The C pile is the discard pile.
When a company runs an ad for a managerial position and gets 300 replies, they are not interested in hiring number 39 or number 53 on the list. They have pride in their organization and want top quality executives. They are in business to make money. They want winners. Whenever you see an ad for a previously advertised position reappear 30 or 40 or 60 days later, you know the probable reason--they didn't find the person they wanted in the A or B piles.
Obviously, the words of wisdom on how to answer job ads are: Stay out of the C pile. If you stay out of the C pile consistently, you will be called in for many interviews.
Avoiding the C Pile
How do you stay out of the C pile? First, by discarding ads you should not answer. Probably every reader has responded to ads that should not have been answered. If you don't have the qualifications they are looking for, there will be at least twenty or thirty respondents who do. When you answer the wrong ads, you are wasting your time and money and getting your hopes up for nothing.
If you follow advice given here, you may not answer as many ads, but those you do answer will be answered properly and your ratio of responses will improve tremendously.
The first thing to do when you find an exciting ad is to read the ad carefully. Then, read the ad again. Spend time analyzing every phrase and word in the ad to determine if you should answer it. You will end up discarding a lot of ads, but those ads you do answer will offer you a decent chance of getting job interviews.
How do you analyze a job ad? First, read it word by word and write down a list of the criteria specified in the ad. Then, take a lined sheet of paper and set up a form similar to the example that follows. Note that you want to list the criteria mentioned in the ad and also criteria that are implied. These implied criteria are the characteristics that are implicit to the nature of the job.
For example, an ad for a manufacturing manager may not mention every single responsibility of the position, but it can be implied that the selected candidate is expected to have knowledge of warehousing, inventory controls, shipping and receiving, and plant layout. These criteria are all part of any manufacturing manager's job.
Following is a copy of another ad that appeared in The Wall Street Journal.
VICE PRESIDENT - MANUFACTURING
Building Products Division of Fortune 500 Company requires an experienced manager to plan, direct, coordinate and lead the manufacturing, purchasing, production scheduling and material control functions of an expanding organization.
Recent experience with high volume light metal and plastic forming and fabrication, precision woodworking and specially molding processes required.
Must be familiar with modern production and material control systems. Track record of cost reduction and productivity improvement necessary. Excellent compensation package. Southern California location. Send resume and salary history in complete confidence to:
Box WHZ 576, The Wall Street Journal
This ad appears to be pointed directly at you. Your temptation is to put paper in the typewriter and start formulating a reply. But, now you know better. First, you will spend half an hour (or whatever time it takes) to list all of the criteria spelled out in the ad. Your list should look something like this:
A. Knowledge of building products industry
B. Planning experience
C. Able to direct, coordinate, lead manufacturing operations
D. Knowledge of purchasing function
E. Knowledge of production scheduling
F. Knowledge of material control function
G. Experience with an expanding operation
H. Recent experience with high volume light metals
I. Recent experience with plastic forming and fabrication
J. Recent experience with precision woodworking
K. Recent experience with specialty molding processes
L. Must be familiar with modern production methods
M. Must be familiar with modern material control systems
N. Must have record of cost reduction and prod, improvement
In addition to the above requirements specified in the ad, you might add a few implied criteria. For example, you might see an ad that sounds interesting but doesn't list many requirements. The advertiser doesn't elaborate and only calls for Production Manager, or Controller, or Chemical Engineer with little additional information. In that case, you have to put yourself in the place of the employer and analyze the implied criteria. If the ad is looking for a salesman, you can assume some implied criteria are: willingness to travel, experience in making cold calls, good appearance, and so forth. If they are looking for a Controller, they don't have to specify that candidates must know budgeting procedures, or how to prepare financial statements. These implied criteria can be mentioned in your response. Some implied criteria in our ad for a Manufacturing, Vice President might be:
0. Knowledge of warehouse management
P. Understanding of inventory control procedures
Q. Knowledge of shipping and receiving functions
R. Ability to organize efficient plant layout
Now you have identified all the criteria called for in the ad. The next step is to place a check mark after each criterion you meet. Assume you have checked every item, so you have everything they are asking for. Should you reply? Of course! You can now start drafting your letter. Most ads for executives will have ten to fifteen criteria. Some may have as few as six or seven, while others will have as many as eighteen or twenty. If you match all the criteria for any job, of course you should answer that ad. You have everything they want. That ad has your name written all over it.
What if you are missing only one of the criteria? You satisfy eleven out of twelve, or nine out often, or seventeen out of eighteen. Then you should answer the ad, unless the missing criterion is critical, a must for the job. If the ad says: "Must have a degree in Psychology," and you don't have one, you are wasting your time by replying.
Sometimes an ad will say: "Food retailing experience desired" or "Preference given to candidates with industry experience." You can tell by the wording those criteria are not musts. If one of the criteria you are missing falls into this category it may not keep you from favorable consideration.
If you are missing two non-critical criteria, you are on the borderline. If you feel lucky and have the time, as do most job hunters, take a shot. The most you lose is your time and the cost of a postage stamp.
What if you are missing three non-critical criteria? In such cases, forget it. You will be wasting your time, effort and postage in answering, because out of 300 respondents, there are bound to be at least 30 people more closely qualified for the position than you.
