Mass-Rejection Letter to Aspiring Writers + Unsolicited Advice

Regular readers (a few “friends” held at gunpoint) are no doubt familiar with my pieces about hiring SEO writers and optimizing the applicant screening process. “Fans” of those articles might appreciate this companion piece. I’m in the midst of a round of hiring. (Future-Dan is also using this article for those who didn’t make the cut for the CMS text copy/paste role. The details are slightly different, but the gist is the same.)

I’m sending this to people who didn’t make the cut:

First, let me say thank you for inquiring about working with me.

Unfortunately, you did not make the first cut.

If you want more info about how I made those cuts, please read on. Otherwise, thank you again, and good luck to you!

The job listing was up and active for less than half a day.

I received >60 responses.

13 were cut because they came in more than two hours after I’d marked the gig as closed. Alas, a quick glance at those responses makes me think none of them would have made the cut regardless.

47 made it in by the deadline.

Only 16 of those 47 made it past initial screening.

Why did I cut 31 people?

The most common reasons:

1. It was obvious all but a few respondents hadn’t looked at the gig-post for more than a few seconds. If they bothered to glance at the linked writer onboarding article, they didn’t hint at it strongly enough for me to realize they had. Some went so far as to proudly diss things I’m looking for as if I wasn’t.
   Stuff like: “I will never use AI when writing!” …when I mention AI use is required.
2. Weak communication skills. Several applicants focused on describing themselves so effusively that they forgot or didn’t notice I asked for brief responses. Some missives had typos. Others exhibited awkward writing.
   (Maybe English isn’t a first language for some? I work with only a few writers who learned English as a second or fourth language–anecdotally and unsurprisingly there’s a je ne sais quoi that’s challenging to grok for non-native languages.) That said, most applicants communicated their ideas clearly.

With rare exception, the 16 finalists had good attention to detail.

In the second paragraph of that onboarding document, astute noticers will find a link to detailed information about how I screen applicants. The instructions for how to get through the screening process were right there, and all but one or two people missed them.

It would take somebody less than a minute to unleash ChatGPT on those two URLs, feed it the job posting language, and ask it to create a winning response. I tried. It worked. It was fantastic.

I don’t hire people who don’t notice crucial information.

When you’re trying to earn a position, try to impress. Minimally personalized resumes or cover letters rarely impress; try to understand the specific challenges the organization faces, and hint how you might help overcome them. Try to quickly demonstrate that you’ve spent at least a few minutes looking into the person or org on the other end of the conversation.

Every HR person sifting through dozens or thousands of applicants is looking for something. Your first job is to see if you can figure out what that is. Not every position will make it obvious.

If you wanna geek out on near-meaningless data from this round of hiring…

Here it is:

• One of the 16 finalists had a typo in their message. Ironic, because they also pointed out a typo in my onboarding article. (Maybe they wanted me to feel like I was in good company.)
• Two of those cut had typos.

I stopped measuring conciseness, pleasantries, etc. at the deadline cutoff, but of the 47:

• Average length: 91 words
• Avg length of those who made the cut: 112

That said, the longest two submissions did not make the cut. Neither did the four shortest. (Nine words is a little curt, yah?)

• 13% of those who did not make the cut greeted me by name.
• 62.5% of finalists said something like, “Hiya Dan!”
• 31% of finalists used both named greeting (mine) and closing (theirs)
• 6% of those cut did.

Based on AI’s best-guess of gender based on first names, 47% of respondents were male but only 25% of finalists were maybe-dudes.

• 6.25% of finalists sent some notion of a portfolio even though I specifically asked y’all not to.
• 16% of those cut did the same.

One finalist seems to have used a fake name and email address. That’s odd. “Effie White” if you’re out there, call me!

Three weeks after publishing this piece, I did another round of screening. 8 out of 117 applicants made it to the second round of screening.

Responses to this rejection letter have been overwhelmingly positive. Ranging from specific inquiries about which points they missed, to “Thanks this was helpful”. I also got one outlier, “You truly are a dumb c___”. (Allan, why didn’t you demonstrate those dope writing chops when you had a chance? Calling me an ignorant piece of reproductive anatomy is way more interesting than your rejected application: “I am quite interested in the role. I believe in my ability to tell well researched, articulated and SEO friendly articles.”)

Thanks for reading. And if you sent me a message about writing and I sent you here, thanks again for contacting me about content work. I appreciate your time.

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I hope to not have to hire again for a long time. Hiring is rough. (Training too!) Do what you can to make it easier for those hiring. Dan posts stuff like this mostly for himself. This is a tool. As much as I don’t wanna hire ever again, I know I will. I’ll use this piece again, then. And maybe somebody’ll find it and it’ll help them get hired 😉