Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Accept or reject?

Not them—you.

You have my permission to reject a job offer.

“Wait—me? But I’m desperate!” Everyone who’s heading out to find that first fulltime, professional job after college is worried about being rejected. It happens often enough—you send off your stuff over and over. You get no answer, over and over. Rinse, repeat. The process can be disheartening.

But there are predators out there who know you’re frustrated, worried, got ants in your pants about the job market. And they are willing to take advantage of it. Examples:
  • You’re led to believe the job you applied for an accepted pays $50,000 a year. (Woo-hoo!) But at your first day of work, you’re informed you’ll be earning minimum wage, because you’re “on probation” for six months. Or that the $50K is actually based on commissions.
  • You’re asked what salary you expect; without doing any research, you give a bottom-of-the-barrel response (hoping to please the prospective employer with how cheaply you’re willing to work). Within a week of starting work, you talk to someone doing the same job and credentials, getting double your salary.

 Not everybody is out to cheat you; misunderstandings happen. But here’s a good checklist of how to avoid getting burned:

As a bonus, you’ll learn how to say “thanks, but no thanks” to a job offer in a way that doesn’t burn bridges, or get you a bad reputation.

Thanks and a tip o’ the Twitter hat to Marcia LaReau, @ForwardMotionUS.

More on the subject here: http://corcodilos.com/blog/7561/how-can-i-go-back-and-ask-for-more-money?

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