Thursday, January 30, 2020

Unrealistic expectations, not racism

There is a story in Central Florida news media about a man who studied "hospitality management" in college and is complaining that he cannot get a job that pays him what he wants to be paid. I used to interview candidates and was responsible for hiring people, so I want to try and figure out why he can';t get a "career." Let's start by taking a look at his qualifications:

First, his resume (pdf warning) and cover letter (pdf warning) have multiple grammatical and spelling errors.
Education:
He has a two year degree in hospitality management that he earned 18 years ago. Two year hospitality degrees are a dime a dozen in hospitality focused Central Florida. The college that he went to is out of business, so no way to confirm his degree or education.

Let's see what his experience looks like:

He mentions being in JROTC and says that he dedicated 3 years of his life to the "core." JROTC is a high school program, and it is spelled "corps," not "core." I wouldn't mention this any more than I would mention being in the high school chess club.

While earning that two year degree, he worked as a cook and waiter at an assisted living facility.

After graduation, he claims to have taken over as the "supervisor" of Yvonne's Southern Cuisine for the next four years. That restaurant had poor Yelp reviews before it went out of business ten years ago.

That's it for hospitality management. He then went on to be a driver for a trucking company that owns exactly one truck. He worked there until the place went out of business. Maybe he was the owner?

In fact, he worked at five different companies in less than three years and claimed to have supervisory duties at three of them.

This guy can't get a "good job" that pays more than $10 because he has no real education, certifications, or experience. The fact that there is no record at all of the real estate company he claims was his employer for the past two years, and the three jobs he had before that lasted only a couple of months each makes him look like a poor employee.

His resume just doesn't make me want to hire him for anything other than an entry level position. He needs to be more realistic. The comments on that article claim that his inability to get a job is because people are racist.