JOB APPLICATION REJECTION

Kip Boyle:

Hi, everyone. Welcome. This is Your Cyber Path. It’s the podcast that helps you get your dream cybersecurity job. I’m Kip Boyle. I have Wes Shriner with me. We’re experienced hiring managers. We’ve hired a lot of cybersecurity people, and we want to share what we know with you. We want to make what is not easy to understand about the hiring process a lot more easy for you.

Now, if you want to give us any feedback on the show, if you want us to answer a question in a future episode, please visit the show page. It’s at anchor.fm/yourcyberpath. That’s all one word. When you get on that page, you’re going to see a button that says message. You click that and you start talking and then we will hear from you. And I would love for you to do that. Okay, so let’s get right to the episode. So imagine you just submitted your resume.

Wes Shriner: 

So Kip, I got to give you some news.I got to give you some news before we get started,

Kip Boyle: 

Okay, go ahead.

Wes Shriner: 

Kind of a big week this week.

Kip Boyle: 

All right, go.

Wes Shriner:

I graduated with a master’s degree from a University of Washington Tacoma with a master’s in cybersecurity and leadership. So I’m all [edumacated].

Kip Boyle: 

That’s right.

Wes Shriner: 

And we are ready to go. It’s going to be fun.

Kip Boyle:

Dude, that’s not easy. I remember talking with you about just how much work that was and stressful to be doing that at the same time as working a full-time job, managing teams of people. I’m impressed, man. Congratulations.

Wes Shriner:

Thank you. It was a very cool program. It was split with a business course, as well as a technical course each quarter on your way through. And I’m going to throw some props out there for the business side, for the business courses. Understanding your emotional intelligence, understanding team dynamics, understanding strategic organizational change, those are all key components of a solid security professional. And so while the technical side is something we all need to understand and will grow in, that business side is how we grow our business as we do it. So it was really a neat pairing for a master’s program.

Kip Boyle: 

Well, that’s fantastic. It sounds like the cybersecurity programs are getting more sophisticated and more relevant in their curriculum compared to what they used to be like 5 to 10 years ago. So that’s fantastic.

Wes Shriner:

I didn’t look at them 5 to 10 years ago, so I’ll trust you on that one.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, you should trust me on that one.

Wes Shriner:

I will.

Kip Boyle: 

Okay. And that was University of Washington, right?

Wes Shriner: 

That is, and thanks for letting me interrupt you there. That was kind of a big accomplishment this week. Very exciting.

Kip Boyle: 

Absolutely.

Wes Shriner:

So had the family out and had a barbecue.

Kip Boyle: 

Oh, wonderful. Wonderful. Okay, so here’s our episode for today. So imagine submitted your resume and job application. You hit the submit button and very anti-climactic right? Because there probably isn’t a noise. Nobody’s thanking you. And so off it went. And now you’re like, “Okay, when are they going to call me? Like, I want this job. I want to work for this employer.” But they never call you. What went wrong? So did you do anything that caused your application to be rejected? You don’t know, right? It’s possible. It’s possible, but what really happened? Let’s talk about that.

Wes Shriner: 

So today we’re talking about the filtering mechanisms and how do we overcome those filtering mechanisms to get through? And I got to tell you, life on the farm. Life on the farm says the coolest thing I’ve ever seen was when the well started working for the first time. And we got water shooting out of the dirt. And that was the coolest thing ever. I got water out of dirt. I love that well and what it could do. For this city boy, moving to the country, and then living on a well was one of the coolest pieces. But you need to understand, you can push the water out of the well, and you could drink it probably, but have you had it tested? That water has to be filtered before it gets to your house before you start drinking it because there’s all sorts of minerals. There’s all sorts of chemicals. There’s all sorts of bacteria that can grow in that well.

And so after you’ve got the water coming out and you start to think about plumbing it, you’ve got to put an electrolysis system or a salt filtering system. Any of these systems are $5,000 or $10,000 just to get that water confirmed as clean before it gets to your kitchen faucet. That’s if you have your own well, it’s your own house. And I’m sure there are hackers on this who are going to pipe in and say, “No, man, you can do it for way cheaper. Just do this, this, and this.” And God bless you. Thank you. But I got full-time job right now, buddy.

And so we’re going to just go with the filter system for getting the well water into your house is $5,000 or $10,000 and a lot of work. And the same is true in that job application filtering process that we’re going to be talking about today. It’s a lot of filtering that happens before you even get to the hiring manager. We talked before in a previous episode about how you’ve got about 30 seconds in front of that hiring manager, or your resume does, 30 seconds to a minute in order to make that decision. But there’s a lot of things that happen even before you get to that point. So, let’s take a look.

Kip Boyle:

Yeah. In fact, hiring managers don’t even know all of the resumes that are submitted. We only get to see the stuff that the recruiter believes is like the best of what was submitted. But yeah, that’s a very filtered kind of a thing. Let’s talk about that. But I want to first start by saying that hiring is a regulated activity. We have to be very careful. There are laws, regulations, from federal and state governments. There are internal policies, corporate policies that also layer onto this. So there’s a lot that we have to pay attention to. And so we do not reject job applicants based on protected status. So we’re not going to filter you out because of your race, of your skin color, your religion, your gender, your national origin, your age.

Wes Shriner: 

A long list. It could be any number of things. Let’s just say that list may change.

Kip Boyle:

Yeah. And it does change. And there’s more than what I said, but the point is is that I just want people to realize is that this screening process is, or the filtering process is a weening out. We’re trying to identify … And I’ll try to use a farm metaphor. We’re trying to get the cream to float to the top. We want to skim the cream.

Wes Shriner: 

Nice.

Kip Boyle: 

There you go. But now, so those are the things we … Those are reasons that we cannot filter somebody out, but there’s plenty of perfectly legal, perfectly ethical reasons for not moving forward with a job applicant. And Wes, what are some examples of right off the top?

Wes Shriner: 

Well, let’s just make sure we’re putting our best foot forward. If we come forward with incomplete sentences, spelling errors, gerund phrases, missing words, simple stuff that we know we can tidy up before we deliver it. I’ve seen resumes that don’t look like the person who wrote them read them before they sent them in. And we’ve got to be putting our best foot forward. Make it easy to read. Make it something I want to read. Don’t make it generic. Let’s keep it personal and professionalized to what you do. Don’t leave big gaps in unemployment unless you have a plan for how you’re going to talk about them. And a lot of these automated engines say, “Well, how much money do you want to make?” on the application. And it’s possible to leave that blank or put a $1 sign in there because it doesn’t make sense to be talking money before you’ve had a conversation about what the job really is.

Kip Boyle: 

And that’s a great point that recruiters, the people in the HR department, and the hiring manager, are not always aligned on that. So what you just said was interesting because if that was universally true, then a candidate would never be prompted for comp requests that early in the process. So yeah. So there’s all kinds of like little misalignments that can happen in the filtering process.

Wes Shriner: 

Yeah.

Kip Boyle:

Yeah.

Wes Shriner:

So what other things can you think of?

Kip Boyle: 

Okay yeah, yeah, I can think of some other stuff. Like for some companies and some industries, they’re looking for candidates that have high tenure in their previous jobs. So if they perceive you as a job hopper, then they might filter you out because they’re concerned that you’re going to show up and you’re going to be there for a couple of years and then you’re going to take off. And so culturally, that might not be a good fit.

Wes Shriner: 

Let’s flip that and also say some companies are looking for people who move every couple of years and are not interested in what they call dead wood. So it can go both ways on that one. It’s really about the corporate culture when you’re looking for that one.

Kip Boyle:

Yeah. Yeah. So you’ve got to know.

Wes Shriner: 

You do.

Kip Boyle: 

A photograph. A photograph. Do not. In the United States of America, do not attach your photograph to your job application.

Wes Shriner: 

No, just don’t.

Kip Boyle:

I know from hearsay that in other countries that it’s expected to include a photograph, but not in the US. I have never seen that. Make sure your resume does not have one page for every year that you’ve worked. That’s too much, way, way, way too much. What you’re really doing is heaping work on me. You’re trying to make me filter your achievements and I’m not going to do that. So you need to do that, all right? So brevity, conciseness, that’s really important. I’ll filter you out if I’ve got to work too hard. Don’t write long paragraphs. You want to write in bullets so it’s easy for me to do skimming. Don’t misspell important words. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen people spell HIPAA. H-I-P-P-A.

Wes Shriner: 

Don’t do that.

Kip Boyle: 

Wrong.

Wes Shriner: 

Don’t. Don’t spell SQL wrong.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, you’ve got to have that stuff … Yep. Yep. JSON, whatever it is, whether it’s an acronym or an actual word that you can find in the dictionary, be very careful about that sort of thing. And then your bullets. We’ve talked about this in previous episodes. You want to start with an action verb. And the topic has to be in the first five words of each bullet. If your bullets are incomprehensible and dense, then I’m just not going to read it, and you’re not going to get credit. So anyway, so those are some of like right off the top stuff that all of that is totally within your control. So make sure you pay attention to that.

Wes Shriner:

And those action verbs with the first five words for topic, please go back and listen to that podcast. It’s just a couple of podcasts ago and well worth it. If that’s not making sense to you, spend some time on that, because that is worth its weight in gold. There’s some other reasons we may not get through that are not failure reasons. I mean, this is a dynamic environment, change is continuous in the technology space. The hiring manager may have just forgot to mention that they need to see cloud experience on the resume. Oh, so they just mentioned that to the recruiter after the job description has already been published. Now only those with cloud on the resume get through and you’ll have no idea why you didn’t get through. It’s not on the job description.

Maybe somebody with your same name used to work at that company. And by luck, you’re on the do not hire list accidentally. That would be a weird but possible reason. Some companies actually filter people based on having too many applications in a short period of time. If, if you’re taking a shotgun approach and scattershot, “I’d like to apply for six jobs at this company, some at the director level some at the technician level, and I’m hoping that they will be able to filter me across those six roles.” It’s likely you won’t be considered for any of them. So be very specific in what you’re pursuing in a small window of time. Now that may change over a period of time. Like six months later, you could apply for a different type or level of job and have a reason for that. But be purposeful in what you’re applying for.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah. We’ve talked about this before and I think it’s an apt thing to mention that when you’re seeking employment, what you’re really saying is, “I want a relationship.” And so the things that you would not want to do on a one-on-one basis with a potential romantic interest, or just like somebody that you want to be friends with, don’t come off as being desperate for crying out loud. And some of this stuff like applying for six jobs all at the same time at different levels. I mean, there’s a lot of desperation that comes across with that. And that’s not attractive.

Wes Shriner: 

Understand there’s not a machine on the backend that will do a referral. If you get considered for one role, you may be considered for those other roles as well if they’re a natural fit. Some companies also-

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, some applicant tracking systems do that.

Wes Shriner: 

They do. Some do, some don’t. Some companies take a referral from someone inside about a person. Let’s say somebody you used to work with named Bob, Bob works at that company. Bob gave an opinion about you two years ago for a specific job. It didn’t come back good enough and you may never get invited to a recruiter discussion at that company ever again. You’ll never know why, but that company held on to Bob’s opinion about you. And there’s no easy way to overcome that in today’s America. Now the California privacy laws are changing that, and I’m loving what’s happening in that space. Tell me everything you have on record about me is a very interesting story that as it rolls out to the rest of the country is going to change some of the hiring practices around this idea. But bottom line, it may not be in the job description and you may never know why you were passed over. So do not single-thread your job search. Multi-thread everything you’re doing all the way to the end.

Kip Boyle: 

Right, but that doesn’t mean six applications at the same employer, just to be clear.

Wes Shriner: 

Sure.

Kip Boyle: 

I mean six applications at six different employers, or 12 at 12 different ones, or whatever it is that you that you need to do. Okay, so I think you can see that some of the things that would cause your resume to be legitimately rejected are in your control. We talked about that. Then there’s some things that you have no control over or just are completely opaque to you. There’s no way for you to know and that’s not a good thing. I mean, but it is what it is. And we just want you to be aware of that. What else? What else, Wes?

Wes Shriner: 

So much of this industry, the tech industry, as well as what I see in the greater Puget Sound area for even non-tech roles, so much is done through networking, through human networking, through a statement. People hire people that they trust.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah.

Wes Shriner: 

We’ve kind of talked about that when we say your executive part of your resume is how you will speak to my boss and some of your other parts of your resume. Well, you’re teaching me to trust you by how you’ve presented yourself. And the human networking piece says, “I’ve already got an opportunity. Someone told me you’re trustworthy.” And that’s a powerful, powerful thing. So maybe this hiring manager already knows, or likes, or trusts some of the candidates who applied, and you missed that window. And that’s okay because there’s other roles out there and you’re going to have people in your network that are going to trust and like you as well and going to give you a leg up in that space also.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, yeah. I’ve seen this over and over again. And as I reflect on my own career, I left the Air Force over 20 years ago. And every job I’ve gotten since I left the Air Force was because I knew somebody who advocated for me from the inside of the organization that I wanted to work at. And some of those people were the hiring manager. And the hiring process was really very simple. “Kip, do you want to come and work for me?” “Yes, please.” “Okay.” I mean, that was pretty much it, and then some paperwork that kind of happened on the backside that I really didn’t see. And my goodness, I mean, what a blessing that is when you’re able to work your network, people who know you like you and trust you and it makes getting your next job that easy. I wish that for everyone.

Wes Shriner:

So the most important thing for everyone we can do for any of us is leave well. Any role we’re leaving, whether it was an easy role or a hard role, whether we had a good relationship with our superiors or not so good, whether we were successful or less successful, we can leave well. And leaving well is one of the most powerful things we can do for making sure our network is going to be strong and looking out for us later.

Kip Boyle: 

Yep, yep. Reputation, we’ve got a whole episode on that.

Wes Shriner: 

We do, and we should make sure we’re catching that. So if you’ve missed that one, that’s another go back for, I got to say. I do want to shift gears here just a little bit, Kip, if I can. Most hiring managers don’t really filter most of their resumes. I don’t know that that has come out, but we talked about the water filtration system upfront. Let’s talk about the resume filtration system now. It’s often done long before it gets to the hiring manager. And an employee, I’m going to call them FTE or full-time employee application goes through that artificial intelligence engine and into the recruiter.

The recruiter filters for keywords, work experience, and probably some other critical background items. And the contractor may … That’s the FTE role. If you’re going in for a contractor role, hourly or SOW type work.

Kip Boyle:

Statement of work.

Wes Shriner: 

Then the path is even longer. So let’s talk about what the contractor path is. The agency gets a job description from the supplier management portal of the company. So company A has announced, “We are going to hire somebody in a contract role.” They have a vendor management company or supplier management company. They go through, they give the paperwork to the supplier management company. The supplier management company distributes that to between 3 and 20 different contractor agencies who then get to propose candidates for that role.

They haven’t ever talked to the hiring manager. All they have is that basic job description to go off and sure hope that that’s an accurate one. So based on that information, the agency sifts through the resumes in their database, and they call you and they say, “Maybe you could be a good candidate for this role.” And if you say yes, they do a recruit interview for what they think is likely what is needed. “Okay, we’ve agreed that the contractor agency thinks you are at least 80% of the job description. Okay, we’re going to send you forward into the job application portal.” If those 20 agencies each present three people, you’ve got 60 applicants of a sudden.

The requisition is closed two days later with, I don’t know, 40 or 60 applicants in there. And either you made it in that two day window or not. Then the hiring manager gets to fish through those 50 resumes for some relevancy to what they really wanted to hire a contractor for. Of those 50 that come through, they probably invite 2 to 5 for telephone screens that usually lasts about 30 minutes each. And they usually try to pick one from that pool of two to five people, hashtag decision made. And that’s the contractor process. It’s a very convoluted process with a lot of filters involved. It works for the employer, but it’s a struggle for the candidate because there’s a lot of places where there may not be feedback coming back to you and you just get filtered out of the process.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, that can be very frustrating there as well. And thank you for walking us through that because not everybody’s going to go for an FTE. Some people want to work as a contractor for whatever reason. So that’s super insightful. Yeah, it’s a long process with not exactly the best, most accurate filters going on there. So be patient, folks.

Wes Shriner:

And so I’m going to keep bringing up some interesting parts, Kip, if I may.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, please do. Yeah, yeah.

Wes Shriner:

So the, the company has a legitimate open position. Company A has a legitimate open position that they’re going to hire for. That company also happens to have a contractor sitting next to that open chair who is very, very likely to get that job. But the company is required to post that role externally for two weeks and interview all legitimate candidates before they most likely hire the person they had planned to hire in the beginning. This is not fun. And in some cases, be glad you didn’t get that interview because it could be a bigger waste of your time the longer you’re in that cycle.

Kip Boyle: 

Right. And you’ll never know that. So you’ve got to sort of soothe yourself with the thought that that could have been the reason.

Wes Shriner: 

I had one of my staffers who reached up to me and said, “Hey, I see this requisition open. It looks really interesting to me. Can you find out if it is something I could go post for?” I reached out to the recruiter and the recruiter said, “Well, they could post for it, but that’s already given to Bob over here. It’s not guaranteed to Bob, but it’s most likely going to be Bob’s full-time position.” So now it’s not really something you want to stick your neck out for unless you know it’s a real open position for an internal application like that.

So this happens again in another way, too. If the company has hired a foreign national who is applying for US residency or a work visa, the process requires something similar. The process requires that some 12 to 18 months into the sponsorship process, the company is required to post for the job description specifically that person is doing. They’re already a full-time employee. They’re already working for the company. And the company must justify the work visa with a evidence that there is no other domestic worker who could do that same job to the same skill level as the foreign worker being advocated for.

So the company is required to create the job description, to publish it to the world, to review some number of applicants, and document why they were accepted or rejected at the resume level or at the interview level before that internal FTE is allowed to continue with their work visa process. Documentation of the job, the job description, each application, when and why they were possibly rejected is required to be presented to the US government to continue the work visa process. And again, I’d like to say, be glad if this is happening if you get rejected at the resume level, because the further along you get the more of a waste of time this could possibly be for you. There may not even have been an open position to begin with. The company may have changed directions and that that position goes away. There’s a lot of other reasons why the job description that was, is not the job available today or was never really going to be available.

Kip Boyle:

Yeah. So this really highlights something, and I want to come back to this because it kind of takes us full circle. A lot of what we’re describing, which is invisible to you as a job applicant, you can sidestep all of that by having a great network of people that you can turn to when you are looking for a new opportunity, because these things don’t typically happen to people who have strong networks that they can call on. So that’s what you need to be thinking about.

Who do you know? Who could you call if you are ready to change jobs, or if you’re trying to get your first cybersecurity job? Are you intentionally building your network so that next year, you can call somebody? A trusted network is the key to solid work referrals so that you’re not wasting time with stuff with phantom job postings. And it’s key to a long career. It’s not just about getting jobs. It’s also about having people that you can turn to when you get stuck on a really important problem that you’re trying to solve at work. These are people that you can ask for their advice. Maybe they’ve been there before. So I want you to understand that a good, strong network, a good, healthy network is not just about getting jobs. It’s also about getting help whenever you come into a difficult situation.

Wes Shriner: 

Let’s turn that around, Kip. Let’s turn that around.

Kip Boyle: 

So yes, we don’t want people to go out and do slimy networking, so what do you mean?

Wes Shriner:

So let’s turn that around just a little bit and say instead of the network is there for you to have somebody to call, what if you were the person people were comfortable calling when they needed help? Networking is not a bunch of handshakes at a conference, especially in COVID land. During the COVID era, we do not want to have a bunch of handshaking at a conference. It’s also not collecting LinkedIn connections. Please don’t assume that having a thousand LinkedIn connections is the way to having a strong network. That is not your source of strength in that. Networking is …It is making a friend that you can call and that can call you.

Kip Boyle: 

Definitely.

Wes Shriner: 

In fact, the kind of friend that really does call is the strongest because, “Oh yeah, you can call me anytime,” is a very Seattle nice way of saying, “We’ll see you later. Maybe we’ll never talk again.” But actually having a friend who calls you or that you call is a powerful, powerful thing. Networking can also be creating a memory or a connection that causes a shared and mutual interest in success you and I are creating a podcast together. We’ve been doing this for some time now. We have a shared mutual interest in our success for this podcast. But you also mentor me in other places in life as well. So I find that’s a really powerful relationship to have. And that’s a network that started by me working with Josh and Josh saying, he knows Kip. And I said, “Well, can I go with you to lunch?” And so…

Kip Boyle:

That’s right. That’s absolutely correct. And I learn things from you all the time as well. So it’s really a two-way street. And we’ve got to be prepared to give if we want to receive. That’s what networking really is. It’s not any of the stuff that it makes us cringe. It’s all the stuff that we love. I mean, who doesn’t want a genuine supportive network that you can pour effort into and that other people will be there for you? Yeah, that’s fantastic. So in the age of pandemic and quarantine, a lot of this in-person opportunity is not there. So you’re going to have to get good at virtual networking. And the truth is we’re all getting good at it. We’re all learning how to do most of what we need to do by Zoom call or Google Meet, or whatever the video conferencing system is that you’re learning. So until things loosen up again don’t wait. Don’t wait.

Wes Shriner: 

There are plenty of industry events that are still happening in the evenings, whether it’s an ISE II, or an ISSA, or a ISACA, or a privacy association, those are just the first four that come to the top of my mind. Those are happening via Zoom.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, BSides, right?

Wes Shriner:

And they’re still looking for memberships.

Kip Boyle: 

There’s BSides. Yeah, there’s BSides, right? Every month, almost every major city,

Wes Shriner: 

AWS Reinvent is going to be online and free this year. What a great opportunity to jump into that as well.

Kip Boyle: 

There you go.

Wes Shriner: 

So understand that when you-

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah, that’s a good point is that by going virtual, you can actually reduce the cost. So it’s more accessible.

Wes Shriner: 

When you go to these events, when you engage, you’re there to help others. You’re there to be a resource to others. And in the process, the resources will come to you as well.

Kip Boyle: 

Definitely. All right, well, we’re coming up on the end of our episode. Any final words, Wes?

Wes Shriner: 

Just that understanding the well water filtering system is hard and it takes an expert, a person willing to … A smart person, willing to apply themselves to get to fresh water. And the same is true when we’re trying to find the right job for us. We’ve got to apply all of the skills and abilities we’re going to be bringing to that job in our job search to make sure that we get the results we’re looking for.

Kip Boyle: 

Yeah. And then we can have water over the long haul.

Wes Shriner: 

Outstanding.

Kip Boyle: 

Okay. Everybody, if you liked our podcast episode, then you should consider signing up for our masterclass where we go way in depth with topics like this and topics we haven’t even gotten to yet on the podcast. The masterclass is called How To Get Your Dream Cybersecurity Job As Told By Hiring Managers. And back in April of 2020, one of our students got his dream cybersecurity job before he even finished all the lessons. I was very inspired by his story. I think you will be. If you want to check it out, go to yourcyberpath.com/steve, S-T-E-V-E, and check it out. He’ll tell you about it in his own words. So until next time, remember, you’re just one path away from your dream cybersecurity job. See you later.