What Would A Mediocre White Man Do? (new mantra to live by!)
this is SO REAL both the specific case and the broad case in the specific case: if you actually met 100% of the requirements they couldn’t afford you I tell this to every woman I talk to job hunting about APPLY ANYWAY THE MEDIOCRE WHITE MEN ARE DOING IT (via @galwednesday)
“if you actually met 100% of the requirements they couldn’t afford you”
I really needed to hear this. I had never thought of it this way. This literally never occurred to me, I’ve just spent my whole adult life thinking I was underqualified for everything. Thinking I’m not good enough for anything because the “minimum requirements” are so high.
I need specifics. I wanna know what I can get away with. I wanna know what they really mean by “minimum.” I wanna know how much I’m actually worth.
As someone who worked in hr, this is true.
True to the point that if someone was extremely unqualified, but because of timing we were desperate, we’d bend rules to get them hired. And the only people taking advantage of this were guys.
if you actually met 100% of the requirements they couldn’t afford you
this made so much click in my head. because this was literally it–spend half the time being unqualified for everything and just not applying. and the rest of the time being qualified and not getting hired. because ahahaha fuck you, you’re too expensive now/we’re too worried you’ll jump ship and leave us because of how qualified you are! guess we’ll just hire this shitty dude to do it !? ?
I debated posting this here but WWAMWMD? He’d post it. #girlgogetyours
It’s way more than “if you actually met 100% of the requirements they couldn’t afford you”
The reason they couldn’t afford you is that if you meet 100% of the requirements, you’re ready for the next position up.
Career strategy 101: The most valuable employees are always learning. Every company wants employees who won’t stagnate, i.e. sit in one role doing the same thing ever year and continue getting annual raises. A company wants to hire you for one thing at one salary, and then move you up through higher positions over the years, i.e. they keep getting new benefits for the additional money they’re spending on you.
A good company will offer you development opportunities, either within your role or in addition to it. So when the company interviews you, they want to see that you can learn what they need, and you want to see that they can teach you new skills. Companies know that the best applicants are interviewing them in return and that if they don’t offer development, they will lose those applicants to better jobs.
Companies structure positions this way intentionally and they assume you know it.
So not only should you apply to jobs you aren’t 100% qualified for, you can use 100% qualification as an indicator that you’re overqualified and should look for the next job up.
This started funny but became really important to know.
