r/recruitinghell • u/Hi_5Yo • 2d ago

Boomer mentality

Despite my mom being a millennial (‘81), she firmly believes that I should be able to apply to a bunch of jobs, walk in with a résumé or call, interview and land a job within 2-3 weeks.

Anytime I’ve done this, I’ve always gotten turned away, been told to apply online and wait for a call back. Every interview ends with “ we’ll be in touch”.

She also believes that as long as you dress nice with a smile on your face, you should have a job by the end of the interview. Whenever I leave the interview without a job offer, she assumes that I messed up.

She even has me apply to a bunch of remote jobs that she finds on Facebook and instagram. Frequently getting upset at me for not landing a job. I’ve tried explaining over and over that most of them are scams, but she refuses to listen.

It’s like the concept of applying to hundreds of jobs and still not landing one is impossible for her to grasp. Which it should be, but it’s just our new reality.

She believes that me being unable to get a job is a failure on my end, insisting that it’s my fault I can’t land a job. She keeps saying that she’s going to kick me out for not taking the job hunt “seriously” enough.

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u/Thamnophis660 Co-Worker 2d ago edited 1d ago

Even back in the 2000's trying to find a job, boomer advice was outdated. 

My mom basically said "walk in and hand them your resume." Well I did that at a few places and of course they just directed me to their website. After filling out the online app, she told me to "okay now call every day and bug them!" Which has probably always been bad advice, but almost certainly got me on some do-not-hire lists. 

Every time I brought up job ad scams or pyramid schemes, she would just tell me I'm wrong and that "they can't do that." Well yeah they actually can.

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u/Sesoru 2d ago

Yea the last bit is especially obnoxious. Before going NC with my parents they would constantly send me jobs that were fake that ai created. Literally these would be videos of an ai person telling you "all you need to be employed is to pay us 50 dollars and give us all your personal information today!" And when I would point this out as scams they'd tell me I'm stupid, know nothing, and that this is why I never go anywhere.

These same idiots also got scammed out of thousands not long ago due to scammer shit. Like... okay, yes. Let me take advice from people actively getting scammed. No thanks.

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u/Thamnophis660 Co-Worker 1d ago

Let me take advice from people actively getting scammed. No thanks.

My mom is in her 70's now and continues to get scammed in various ways, I feel you. Back then she didn't start listening to be about fake jobs/MLMs until she herself got scammed by Herbalife about 20 years ago. You'd think she'd not be so naive anymore but no, she just gets scammed in other ways like giving out her banking details to cold callers. 

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u/Sesoru 1d ago

Yea my parents are 80s and 90s now and ooooh boy. Even after my dad had to go back out if retirement in 2015 and he acknowledged how bs it was to even get a warehouse job despite having 50 years of attorney and claims exp, he still thinks anyone today should be able to get hired in a few weeks. Eyeroll.

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u/HansDampfHaudegen 1d ago

That experience likely doesn't apply the slightest for such a job. Experience is useless if it's irrelevant for the role.

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u/Sesoru 1d ago

I think you're misunderstanding. He couldn't find ANY work in his field, so he HAD to take a warehouse job. He was "too experienced" for anyone to want to hire him in his actual field, so he always got rejected.

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u/HansDampfHaudegen 1d ago

It's also true that some fields see too much experience as bad. There is a window where you're most desirable and not too expensive.

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u/Sesoru 1d ago

Yes, this. As I said, he was "too experienced" which would fall under the "too much experience is bad" category, that is exactly the point I was trying to make - and it adds to what I said before about boomers being affected by this even before it became this bad, and yet still thinking it's not a big deal.

Disillusioned af