A warning for job seekers: Is that Job Ad Real?

One of the questionable things that people do is post a job ad when the job does not exist.

Now, this sounds a bit extreme, and there can be mitigating circumstances around this. If you're a hiring manager at a larger corporation, you've undoubtedly seen some of these behaviors:

• A VP has a pool of headcount, so they spread them amongst their teams. But, the pool is not as big as the total needed roles, but in the spirit of competition, all the direct reports are charged with filling their roles as fast as possible.
• You have the headcount, you post the ad, and 4 weeks into the search, the headcount is pulled back as the company goes through a re-budgeting process.
• Etc.

And yes, there definitely are firms that post ads for jobs that don't exist so they can build up a pool of candidates with certain skill sets.

But for you, the job hunter, this is not necessarily good news.

How many ads fall into the 'not real' category? Figure that between 30% - 50% of ads represent jobs that don't really exist one way or the other.

Comments

[jobseeker]

Another problem with some job listings are those that are come ons for MLM scams or pay for training first cons.