I know its been a while since I posted a casual little tid bit here, but I was thinking about all of our blog readers and YSN members this past week in New Orleans when a very juicy hot topic popped up relating to job hunting. I was speaking at the annual convention for the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) – the trade association for all the career centers in the US and the companies/employers that want to recruit their students.
Well, anyway, my presentation on “What Students Don’t Understand About You, Your Company, Your Opportunities…And What You Can Do About It”, was well received and very interactive…which is always a great thing. I must say though, the meatiest discussion of the two hours was on a topic I’d never have expected – recent graduates rescinding job offers AFTER they’ve accepted them!
Apparently, a bad trend is emerging here. Students, eager to get the best opportunity, and loaded with confidence about their marketability (even without any real work experience) are dragging contract negotiations with prospective employers out sometimes over a period of months while they decide if it’s the right fit, or worse, formally accept offers and then keep interviewing. Many times, they’re finding something else and leaving the recruiters who expended a lot of time, energy and money into them in a real bind.
Now you may be wondering how big of an issue this really is. For whatever it’s worth, about 70% of the room I spoke to said that this had happened to them…and that it was a growing trend.
A lot of interesting dialogue followed this discovery, but to summarize some of the highlights:
1. If a recruiter offers one student a job, they often have to turn another qualified candidate down. When a student rescinds an offer they’re previously accepted, not only does that company lose the new hire, but also the next best candidate – who might have genuinely wanted to be a part of that company. So, by rescinding, students are not only hurting the company, but a fellow job hunter.
2. The cost of recruiting is high. Advertising, exhibiting at career fairs, give-aways, corporate web sites, recruitment tracking systems, flying candidates in for interviews, assessments, etc. Not only are candidates making an investment in a company they chose to work for, but the company is making a significant investment in them, even before the first day of work. In my opinion, everyone in this mix needs to be more respectful of this mutual investment – particularly students who need all the support they can from their first employers to get their careers started on the right foot.
3. Burning bridges in business is never a good thing. Students probably don’t recognize the bad taste they’re leaving in the companies mouths by backing out of deals like this, or how it can come back and bite them. As companies continue to get burned by this, they very well might seek out new ways to discourage this – by blacklisting candidates from ever pursuing an opportunity at that company or affiliated companies, by blacklisting other students from that particular school, or urging career centers to refuse access to services and resources to offending students.
Heavy stuff! Bottom line, we can all appreciate someone trying to get the best job offer or shopping opportunities, but there’s a serious question of ethics here to be considered. Is it ever okay to enter into a contract and pull right out because something better came along? What does this say about a person who is just starting to establish their professional identity, launch their career, make that big leap into “adulthood”? Should employers and recruiters rethink the level of investment they are making into young people for fear that they might not stick? Or is this just another example of how the dynamics of the working world are changing – not to mention the relationship between new or emerging talent and their employers?
I’d love to hear what you all think! Students, young professionals, recruiters, even parents….what’s your perspective on this?
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
If I’m an employer surely I’ll consider this as a form of “betrayal”. Anyway, things are not that serious here, at least my friends are not doing so. I myself will definitely not do this to my employer. What goes around comes around. I really don’t wish to be treated like this when it is my time to be the boss.
The third point that you have mentioned is to me the most important thing to consider. It’s like a quake happening at the epicenter and everything hundreds of miles away still being affected. At the end of the day, even lecturers and institutions might be jeopardized both directly and indirectly by the selfish act of those people.
honestly l wouldn’t tolerate that if i was a manager ,this tanishes not only the image of the person who rescinds the offer but the institution from where that person came from,u can just imagine if quite a number of students from the same instituion continues with the same act ,that would mean ,recruiters will lose interest with that instituions ,so it also tanishes the image of the rest of the students of that institutions,
Considering that ,the recrruitng process ,is costly ,l do not think no company or an organisation would ever tolerate such an act ,Therefore its unethical