The Online Job Application: Wasting More Time Than it Saves

If you've been searching for a job lately, you've probably run across those online job applications. "The On-line Job Application" by Steven Petersen is a great article about how to make the most of filling one out. However, filling one out may not be the most difficult part of applying for such a job.

Companies often don't even want your resume anymore. Instead, you fill in all of the information from your resume in a specific format. This often results in spending much more time applying to jobs. Rather than only having to write a cover letter specific to that job, you now have to type in all of your information and answer different questions for each job.

I recently applied to a retail job through an online job application. This was a job in a well known department store that has been around for a long time. If I expected any company to have their job application process together, it was this one. I start out by finding the job ad online. I notice that I need to click a button to apply online. First I type all of my information from my resume into the application. Well, actually, I had to leave a lot of stuff out. The online job application did not have enough room for all of my past jobs or enough room for all of my volunteer activities.

After filling out the basics, I notice that a series of questions comes next. First some multiple choice questions to get you started. These were very easy and you would have to be a complete idiot to answer them incorrectly. An example of such a question would be, "If you saw a co-worker stealing, you would: A. Pretend you didn't notice, B. Think it was okay to steal and start doing so yourself, C. Tell your manager immediately, or D. Tell other co-workers." Obviously, you are supposed to tell your manager if a co-worker is stealing. What would many people do? Probably just pretend they didn't notice. But most people know not to say something like that on a job application, even if it were true.

Once I had completed the multiple choice questions, a series of short answer questions came along. I figured that this was where they finally got to the questions asking if I was really qualified for this job. I was applying for a job as a sales associate in the fine jewelry department. I was hoping that I'd see some questions about my past experience in sales or my knowledge of jewelry and gemstones. Much to my disappointment, most of these questions also dealt with my ability not to cheat, lie, and steal. At least, my ability to write about not cheating, lying, or stealing. A few questions finally asked if I had any previous sales experience, how I dealt with different types of customers, and I think there might have been one question asking why I wanted to work with jewelry (but there wasn't a single question asking if I knew anything about jewelry).

Now I thought that I was done with the online part of this application and would soon receive a call asking me to come in for an interview. Much to my surprise, I was prompted at the end of the application to schedule an interview online. I wondered how they could do this so that they knew the jewelry department manager's schedule and would only schedule interviews at convenient times for the manager. I noticed that the earliest interview time was at 8am the next day. I was tempted to take that one, but knew that there was a lot of traffic going that way in the morning (and I most definitely am not a morning person). So instead I scrolled down and picked the 10am interview the next day.

When I arrived at 10am, I was glad that I had picked that interview time. The store opened at 10am! How could I have been interviewed at 8am? I thought that was a rather stupid mistake on the part of the company. I mean, you know what time you're open. Then when I arrive at the human resources department to tell them I am there for an interview with the fine jewelry department manager, they tell me to take a seat because she doesn't come in until 11am.

I wait around until 11am. Finally, the manager arrives. Before she can interview me however, she has to do a bunch of other stuff. So 30 minutes later, she is finally ready to interview me. At the interview, she basically just repeats all of the questions from the online job application. I would have thought that maybe she never got the online job application, but this is not the case. Instead, she has printed it out so that the application is sitting right in front of her. So I again tell her the same answers.

The interview ended at noon. At this time, I was told that I had the job if I passed a drug test (which resulted in wasting even more of my time, but that could be a whole different article).

I thought that the online job application was supposed to speed up the process, but this was not to be the case. After spending so much time applying, I had wrongly assumed that the interview process would be shorter. Instead, the interview was basically the online job application all over. I had also thought that it was convenient not having to wait for that phone call about when I should come in for an interview. That was also not to be the case. It was far more inconvenient having the interview scheduled online, because when I arrived, the manager had no clue I would even be there for an interview that day. The system doesn't even take the manager's schedule into account when scheduling those interviews (or even the store hours apparently). I was greatly disappointed with the online job application process and the failure of companies to use it correctly.