4 Reasons Why You Haven't Heard Back About Your Interview and How to Finally Hear Back
Madeline Mann
Preorder "Reverse the Search" to get $300+ of Bonuses | Career Strategist featured on ABC, Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal | Creator of Self Made Millennial the Job Shopping Method | Job Search & Career Coach
One of the worst parts about job searching is interviewing for a company, and then experiencing the deafening silence of not hearing back from the company for days or weeks. This is often called “ghosting” and it’s confusing to know why it happened to you and what steps to take next.
I have grouped the possible reasons as to why the recruiter ghosted you, into 4 categories. Here is what’s happening behind the scenes when you don’t hear back from a company, and what to do about it when this happens to you!
Reason #1: Other candidates
You’re early.
You may have interviewed early in the company’s hiring process, so while you whirled through the first two rounds, they may slow down your interviews so that they can evaluate other candidates before making a later-round decision.?
Referrals & internal candidates.
When a referral or internal candidate is introduced to the interview process, sometimes companies will slow down their interviewing of other candidates to allow these folks to catch up and be evaluated.?
Referrals are often not friends or family, you can get referrals without ever knowing anyone in the company (you can learn how to do that here).
There’s an offer out for the role.
Another scenario is the company may already have an offer out to another candidate. Let’s not jump to conclusions here, but that is the unfortunate truth sometimes.
Reason #2: Busy Internally.
One of the reasons why it bites to be a job seeker is the interview process is full of people who are overworked.?
Think about it.
You only hire someone to a team if there is more work than there are people. Then we have these overworked people spend hours reading resumes and interviewing people, further exacerbating their inability to make a decision, communicate, and close the process.
Therefore recruiters are constantly chasing hiring managers who:
Most recruiters are waiting to hear back from the interviewer or hiring manager before they move on to reviewing new applicants. The recruiter might have pinged the hiring manager about a candidate, the hiring manager was too busy to respond, and the recruiter moves on to focusing on so many other roles.
However, you can kindly remind them by sending follow-up emails that will make you stand out from the other candidates. Use our follow-up email templates to help you determine the perfect email to send whether you are speaking to the recruiter or the hiring manager.?
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Reason #3: Key people need to get involved.
Sometimes the major decision makers are out of town, on vacation or out for the holidays.?
There can also be an extensive approval process, generally at larger companies where multiple people need to approve of a candidate.
Reason #4: Decision Paralysis.
Companies are terrified of making the wrong hiring decision. Have you ever heard of the term “Slow to hire, quick to fire”? Well companies sometimes take the “slow” part a bit too far because they really don’t want to make a hiring mistake since mistakes are so expensive and detrimental.
What leads to this analysis paralysis? One reason is there is internal confusion about the role itself. Sometimes they need to get a clearer understanding of what the role is, maybe they need to adjust the role, or completely pause the search because something changed in quarterly planning making this random other role more important than this one.?
One thing that stood out to me when I first started my career in HR is deciding which roles are more important and how they should function in the organization, it is such an imperfect science. Especially the more cerebral the work gets, the more unclear it can be to determine which roles are more important.?
Additionally, there can be large changes internally. Sometimes it can be a funding situation, restructuring of the team, a change in revenue, or someone leaving the company. These things change the scope and priority of the role you are interviewing for, and may even lead them to pause or cancel the search.
All these situations can leave the recruiter confused on how to articulate why the candidates were rejected. So they drop the ball, because they don’t have the time, clarity, or manners to get back to you.
What to do if you have been ghosted.
Here are 5 things to do if you haven’t heard back from a company:
There is so much more to say about how to follow-up with the recruiter and land the offer. Come to the free 5 day masterclass “Upgrade Your Career” to learn advanced, bleeding edge strategies on how to be an irresistible candidate (even if you’re changing careers).
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Madeline Mann is an HR & Recruiting leader who is known for her award-winning job search YouTube Channel, Self Made Millennial, and her acclaimed coaching program, Standout Job Search. Mann’s career coaching programs have led to thousands of success stories, and her work has been featured in Bloomberg, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and more.
Product @Savecoins, Web3 & Blockchain enthusiast, Payment Specialist.
2 年Kelechi Nnaemeka, CSPO
Specializing in Sustainability, Waste Management & the Stewardship of Native Flora
2 年I am looking for work after having relocated to a new state, and never have I been ghosted by employers as much as I am these days. I can't even get a "no thank you" when my application isn't selected for an interview; I (emphasis on I) have to follow up when I don't hear back after an interview; I get no response when I ask for feedback to help me in future applications. It's never been like this before and I'm frustrating beyond belief.. I've been reading in the news for months that it's an "employee's game" with all the jobs out there right now, but to me it still feels like the employers have the upper hand and potential candidates are at that whim.. Clearly I needed to vent :) Glad I'm not alone in this, sorry others are experiencing it too. Thanks for the advice you listed Madeline!
Graduate Assistant and MBA student at Oakland University
2 年?? your I'm almost off the market email is a tactic I never heard before. Does it work?
Assistant Director Australian Public Service
2 年Yes! Or applying and not hearing either way for months......very hard!
People oriented and enthusiastic professional
2 年Just what I needed to hear