In under two minutes we can put an end to ghosting candidates. If you’ve been ghosted by a company, consider sharing this article with them.
One of my more popular articles was Why Companies Ghost Candidates and What To Do About It. I cover the many reasons why a company may ghost a candidate, the vast majority of which are not a reflection on a candidate but the chaos and confusion within the company. Most of the time the candidate shouldn’t take it personally, but it’s hard not to.
Job hunting is emotionally challenging. Sending out resumes means putting yourself out there, and that is emotionally draining in any domain. Not hearing responses isn’t great. On the other hand, if you apply to lots of jobs and see lots of rejections, no matter how polite (e.g., even nice ones like, “you have a strong resume but we’re going in another direction”) that can become a daily emotional beating, too.
Thanks to ATSs (Applicant Tracking Systems, the software that processes resumes and helps companies manage the interview flow), many people do eventually receive an automated rejection. When a candidate is hired, the company can close the role and automatically send a form email (with default language or language the company chooses), to notify all the applicants.
The worst situation is where a candidate gets ghosted for weeks, and then gets rejected. It’s the worst of both worlds. There’s no excuse for ghosting a candidate these days, especially if you use an ATS that automates sending bulk emails.
At the end of this article are a few simple email template companies can use for the applicant pool in general, or for active candidates, meaning those with whom there’s been some interaction such as a phone call or interview. (I’m assuming the company already has an automatic “Thank you for your resume, we’ll be in touch” email that gets sent upon resume submission.) Modify as you wish.
You can use this at any point in the process. In general, I’d recommend not going more than two weeks with the active candidate pool or a month with the general candidate pool without a response or update.
If you interview someone, have some courtesy
have some sympathy and some taste
use all your well-learned politesse
or your firm’s hiring reputation will be laid to waste.
I do understand that companies can get thousands of resumes and may not want to reject people but may not be able to even review all resumes in a timely manner. I do think it’s ok that an applicant (meaning submitted a resume but not moved to a call, interview, or other next step) may wait a few weeks and then may only get a rejection email. It’s a lot of work for a company. But once the candidate has moved beyond that, whether a call, or an interview, or even some online assessment or form, the candidate deserves to be kept in the loop. Think of it this way, it’s not great if someone doesn’t swipe right back at you on a dating app, but it’s a whole other level of rude if you went on a date and then the person ghosts you.
If you’re a company that received a link to this article, consider it to be a hint (possibly sent anonymously) from a candidate you ghosted. That’s the candidate's way of saying, “Hey, please don’t ghost people in the future; here’s an easy way to avoid doing that.”
Whether you use an ATS, email folders, a spreadsheet, or other system, do track your candidates and don’t let them fall between the cracks. This simple cut and paste email will just take a few seconds to set up but will mean a lot to your candidates over the coming years. Put yourselves in their shoes for a minute, and you probably remember the emotional taxation of a job hunt.
It’s good for your company, too. Candidates do share experiences with companies on chat boards and other forums. In keeping with the Halloween theme, to borrow from the Rolling Stones, if you interview someone, have some courtesy / have some sympathy and some taste / use all your well-learned politesse / or your firm’s hiring reputation will be laid to waste.
Hi <name>,
As we’re evaluating candidates for the role there are some additional discussions happening concurrently that are needed for us to resolve in order to continue the process and to make a hiring decision. It may be a few more weeks before we get back to you as we work through these decisions; we just wanted to keep you apprised and know that the delay in getting back to you is not a reflection on any candidate. We’ll be in touch.
Hi <name>,
We had some unexpected travel and deadlines come up which is significantly slowing down the hiring process. It may be a few more weeks before we get back to you as we continue to review candidates; we just wanted to keep you apprised. We’ll be in touch.
Hi <name>,
The hiring process is taking longer than we anticipated. It may be a few more weeks before we get back to you as we continue to review candidates; we just wanted to keep you apprised. We'll reach back out to you in the coming weeks.
Hi <name>,
We’ve had a very large number of candidates to review. It may be a few more weeks before we get back to you as we review all the applicants before moving forward; we just wanted to give you some transparency into the process. We’ll get back to you within the month.
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