What would you do?

How would you respond to someone who corrected your posted job listing?

  • Ignore and look at other applicants

    Votes: 3 10.3%

  • Reward their initiative and contact for an interview

    Votes: 26 89.7%
  • Total voters
    29
  • Poll closed .
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65LoveAffair

65LoveAffair

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Okay, this is a theoretical question. Say you had placed a job listing on an internet board advertising for a clerical position, but the listing had a number of grammatical and spelling errors in it. One of the applicants responding to the listing, instead of submitting a traditional cover letter, decides to correct your errors and submits a letter that includes the corrected job listing. How would you respond to this? Would you be offended that the person pointed out your errors and ignore their application, or would you respond favorably to the person taking the initiative and demonstrating their grammatical expertise?
 
You either dumb down your company to make YOURSELF look smart, or hire smarter people than you to BE a smart company.
 
I don't think it's quite so black and white....

While grammatical expertise is useful, I would conduct at least some level of psychological profiling to quantify the brusqueness, and make sure they aren't going to be a complete P I T A for you and your staff to work with!
 
I was a newly hired California Highway Patrol officer. At the shooting range, the Sgt. was giving instructions on when to fire, how many rounds, etc. When we all finished our practice shooting, I noticed we still had 6 rounds left over, which meant the Sgt. must have overlooked one of the firing exercises. After no one else spoke up, I decided to take the initiative to point that out to him the extra rounds we still had (by missing six rounds of fire, it meant it was impossible for anyone to evaluate a score for that quarter). Well, he blew his top and told me if I wanted to shoot six more rounds then that was my business, or something to that effect. Well, I was glad to find out I was the only one "brave" enough to point out the Sgt's unintentional error, and disappointed in the fact that the Sgt could not take it in stride. My co-workers thought I was foolish. Not surprisingly, my evaluations went from good to bad and I was forced to resign or get fired. Fortunately, the United States Border Patrol hired me a year later.
 
As an owner of multiple business's I would tend to like this "theoretical" person, for the job, though I would also almost expect them to be a handful. (The reply was pretty ballsy)
This very well could work for the business, just remember the boss would be the one with the last say and then it should be final.
If this person can/would/does control their tendencies to point out imperfections without an "In your face" attitude, then they could be an asset in the position they applied for.

They might have just used the example they were given to prove their capability in the position.
I would suspect this to be the case, and would have to at least give this person consideration.
Given any attitude, I would pass. (we don't want to cause more work for ourselves, but less)
 
6-david-5 said:
i don't think it's quite so black and white....

While grammatical expertise is useful, i would conduct at least some level of psychological profiling to quantify the brusqueness, and make sure they aren't going to be a complete p i t a for you and your staff to work with!
Click to expand...

x2
 
6-david-5 said:
I don't think it's quite so black and white....

While grammatical expertise is useful, I would conduct at least some level of psychological profiling to quantify the brusqueness, and make sure they aren't going to be a complete P I T A for you and your staff to work with!
Click to expand...

^^^^^^^this^^^^^^^^^^^^
 
As a former teacher, spelling and grammatical errors drive me crazy! With the online resources we have today, anyone can perform spell check, look up a word or have someone proofread a document. If you have a high school education, there's no excuse for butchering the English language, as proper grammar, sentence structure and spelling was taught throughout your term as a student.
 
6-david-5 said:
I don't think it's quite so black and white....

While grammatical expertise is useful, I would conduct at least some level of psychological profiling to quantify the brusqueness, and make sure they aren't going to be a complete P I T A for you and your staff to work with!
Click to expand...

i agree. sounds like a potential pain in the ***.
 
65LoveAffair said:
Okay, this is a theoretical question. Say you had placed a job listing on an internet board advertising for a clerical position, but the listing had a number of grammatical and spelling errors in it. One of the applicants responding to the listing, instead of submitting a traditional cover letter, decides to correct your errors and submits a letter that includes the corrected job listing. How would you respond to this? Would you be offended that the person pointed out your errors and ignore their application, or would you respond favorably to the person taking the initiative and demonstrating their grammatical expertise?
Click to expand...

Such a response would absolutely intrigue me. At the very least I would need to invite this person in for an interview.

Writing a response allows you time to review and correct yourself, In a personal interview, your responses are pure, uncorrected, and candid.

As a VP of Ops., and and business owner, I've always leaned toward informal interviews. I've found that interviewees are much more relaxed and natural in a neutral setting, as opposed to my office. Further, I always required a second interview that would take place in my office. That just the reverse of most interviewer's approach.

...and I usually to the HR report with a grain of salt. In 45 years of business, I always found that HR people are very zealous in te performance of their duties. Not a bad trait, btw, just one that needs to be tempered by the department heads, or, as in my case the head of OPS.

You can usually tell how a person is going to "fit it" to the company on the "skills" level, and on the "personality" level after the first few minutes of an informal interview.
 
One consideration was how the 'cover letter' was phrased.

If it was along the lines of 'As an example this cover letter is the sort of thing that I can really help with your business. Just like the first impression I send to you with this letter, there is the first impression your business sends to the customer with your ad. I can bring you value here.'

Now if the cover letter was snarky or even left an impression that way. Thanks, but no thanks.

Dennis
 
scooby67 said:
As a former teacher, spelling and grammatical errors drive me crazy! With the online resources we have today, anyone can perform spell check, look up a word or have someone proofread a document.
Click to expand...

you ever read this poem?

Eye halve a spelling chequer
It came with my pea sea
It plainly marques four my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.

Eye strike a key and type a word
And weight four it two say
Weather eye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.

As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee fore two long
And eye can put the error rite
Its rare lea ever wrong.

Eye have run this poem threw it
I am shore your pleased two no
Its letter perfect awl the weigh
My chequer tolled me sew.


(back on topic) I would at least give the guy an interview
there is a certain value in an employee who "sees" work and keeps himself busy in a productive way
sounds like that is what we are seeing here
 
n30774



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Here is a thought.

Might a person see the spelling and grammar errors as a test and suspect that pointing out the errors was the correct response?

We need to know the intent of the person that placed the ad as well.

Sending back a corrected version of the ad could be taken in many different ways.
 
If I were the applicant, I would wonder what kind if boss I would have if he couldn't spell properly. I would think that someone would make sure that the ad is correct before putting it out there. Not very professional.
 
furyus2 said:
If I were the applicant, I would wonder what kind if boss I would have if he couldn't spell properly. I would think that someone would make sure that the ad is correct before putting it out there. Not very professional.
Click to expand...

On the surface I agree. But what if the employer is looking for real initiative? Might this not be a good way to separate the wheat from the chaff?

As a former head hunter I can tell you that resume's mean very little. You can not read desire, initiative, or out of box thinking capability in a resume. I was a head hunter for engineering folk. I have a natural understanding of engineering in general. The best candidates I interviewed were the one's that could take their complex technical experience and translate it into laymen's terms. The in box thinkers failed. The out of box thinkers were not just book learned engineers, they were practical engineers. They had the degree's, but more importantly they had an honest love and dedication to their trade.

Tom
 
One would hope the error-filled job posting was a screening device to test applicants to quickly sort to people that were suited for the job
 
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