Waiting to Hear if You Got the Job? You’re Not Alone

To receive a rejection notice at all these days is remarkable, so don’t take it to heart if you don’t. Once upon a time, employers would send a short note to all applicants cut in the first review to let them know they were out of the running. That practice has all but disappeared.
If you receive a rejection note after making the first cut, even a sterile “Thank you for applying,” consider yourself lucky. It doesn’t happen often.

This omission is probably a result of the massive number of applications submitted today for every job opening. In fact, one employer recently received more than 1,500 applications for a set of five openings. The prospect of having to send notices to even one-tenth of the applicants would be daunting. However, they did send rejection emails to all who were not chosen after undergoing a stringent audition, and they were written in a positive, almost personal tone. Such a rarity!

Anyone would rather receive a rejection letter than to never hear from an employer, especially after one or two interviews, but that happens more often than not these days. The worst rejections are the ones you never receive or you learn about when you meet by chance the person who did get the job.

If there is one lesson to learn from this change in how applicants are treated, it is that you should not take it personally. Nearly everyone is having the same experience you are.

However, as I wrote in my last blog post, Don’t Hold Your Breath—Be a Proactive Jobseeker, you can break the deafening silence yourself rather than waiting for notification from an employer.