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A Job Seeker's Rejection Form Letter in PDF?

Or what is this world coming to when everyone is mad at big business? Would you call this good public relations?

Eileen, a job seeker sent me this rejection email from Western Union:

From: "Western Union Human Resources" <hr-westernunion@invalidemail.com>
To: Eileen (name changed for this posting)
Sent: Thursday, March 19, 2009 8:53:55 AM GMT -07:00 US/Canada Mountain
Subject: Status of your Application with Western Union

The details of this message can be viewed by opening the enclosed attachment using Adobe® Reader®. To download this free software, please visit www.adobe.com.

Replies to this message are undeliverable. Please do not reply.

Message.PDF
6K   View   Download 

And this is the attached PDF Eileen clicked to view:

Dear Eileen:

We greatly appreciate your interest in applying for the position of Project Manager, ####, with Western Union, LLC.

However at this time we have decided to pursue other candidates who more closely match our needs.
Please continue to visit our website, www.westernunion.com, to learn more about opportunities that may interest you.

We will contact you should your talents and abilities match a future opening.

We appreciate your initiative in seeking career opportunities with us and wish you the best in achieving your goals.

Sincerely,
Talent Acquisition Team
Western Union, LLC
Do Not Reply.
Do not reply, this email will not reach Western Union Human Resources. (five times in one email include do not reply, email will not reach, and invalid email) 

Okay, big deal another rejection letter from a company.  However, Eileen had originally interviewed on the phone with the Human Resources manager after sending her resume through her neighbor. He told her that he would forward her resume to the hiring manager. He would also send her the job description once it was up and asked her to follow up with him in a week. When she did he said he “brushed her off” saying he was going out of town and she apologized for being persistent in pursuing the job opportunity.  He said he understood she had to do this in this economy.    

When she saw the job posted online, she took 1-1/2 hours (not to mention the time she spent interviewing, following up, etc.) to fill out the online job application. She also asked her neighbor to forward her resume to a Vice President of Western Union. She emailed and called the HR manager and he never responded. And eventually she received the letter which she had to click on to read. 

Now I am sure that Eileen will say that perhaps there were better candidates for the job. But a PDF form letter on a Do Not Reply email?  Can’t Western Union personalize the letter just a bit more? Ever heard of copy and paste to an email and personalize it by using the candidate's name?  Why couldn’t the Human Resource manger take a moment to email her?  Was this handled badly? 

Eileen had also applied for another job with a local company in the Denver area that she also did not get.  However, she said they handled it so differently perhaps you could say, with dignity. The Human Resource manager called her on a Friday, apologized for having to leave a message because she said she realized that this was not the appropriate way to communicate.  But the HR manager was going out of town the following week and wanted Eileen to know that they had hired someone else that had the specific financial experience they needed and thanked her for applying.  Eileen said she emailed the HR manager and the hiring manager for being so thoughtful and gracious in their rejection approach.

So, what do you think? Are Human Resources professionals too busy in this current US economy? Should the company have a better way of handling rejection emails? And how about the public relations aspect? Does Western Union care about people?

What do you think? Please re post this. Just link back to www.BlogBoomerBlog.com and mention that I (Jo Guerra) wrote this. 

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