job discrimination

Kendra, please take this the right way,but you are wrong to assume
those negative reasons of why they did not hire you when you have no
proof or evidence that your physical appearance was the reason. I was
a manager and I had to interview and hire people and never has an
applicant call me back and ask why they did not get hired or give
advice on how to improve on their interviewing skills.
You must understand that there are many ways on how someone goes by
determining their decision. Unless you were a manager, you would not
understand. I have no idea why the manager at Old Navy did not hire
you - no more of an idea than you do. But, you had an interview and as
far as you know they said you did well in your interview and they did
not choose you is apart of looking for jobs is you will get a lot of
no"s before that ONE YES. It is not the one for you and you should be
glad because that means the one you do get will be BETTER than OLD
NAVY. Dont Give Up and Get Those Negative Thoughts out of your
mind,heart and mouth. PEACE

You have my sympathy and I suspect you are probably right that being
overweight played a part in you not getting the job. 25 years ago I
was very overweight and could not get a decent job to save my life. I
had excellent skills, was neatly dressed, polite and friendly, but I
still never got job offers. Over the course of 2 years, I lost 130
pounds and I was offered a job nearly every time I interviewed. I
finally had my choice of many great job.

However, I do agree with the other posters that you are not entitled
to a job. just keep looking and someone will see past the outside and
hire you for your skills and attitude.

You are not entitled to any job. If they don't want to hire you, it
doesn't matter what the reason is.

By acting this way you are making sure that this company will never
again consider you.

Yep, I'm sure you were just as qualified as the thousands of others
applying for the positions. Next!

When I interviewed for my current job I had zero experience and I was
so nervous durring the interview (the first I'd ever been to) that I
couldn't stop my hands from shaking and I gave horrible answers to
their questions and walked out feeling sure that they would never hire
me. After I started working the boss told me that the reason he hired
me was because I was so nice and honest. I even admited that I was not
the fastest learner but that I did the best I could. I know there were
people there WAY more qualified for the job then me but the guy doing
the hiring thought I would do better then them. It's not all about
experience, and sometimes that doesn't even factor in. They can train
you to do the job, they can't train you to fit in with people
personality wise. Also, you mentioned that your previous job had no
problem telling you why they let you go, well they have to. However,
they are under no obligation to tell you why they didn't hire you and
most places won't tell you more than that they found a better
canidate.

The problem you may be facing is that you are assuming those are the
reasons they didn't hire you.

And that they are obliged to tell you why they said "no".



First off they're not obliged to say anything to you other than
"sorry, but no". Badgering them for more is not going to bring you
anything good. Especially if they get to the point where they have to
hang up on you.

Second... if they have to argue with you over telling you "no" ...
that means you're burning your chances to ever go back for a job.
They may take such an act, not as determination, but as being
argumentative. On top of that it may confirm their suspicions that
you would not have been a good fit for their workplace.


And third... You may feel they need you but that doesn't mean they
are obliged to hire you. If they felt you were not going to be a good
fit with the rest of the employees they are allowed to tell you "no".
It's not always about how much skill someone has (or believes they
have) but also how well they work with others, including others they
may feel that they are better than.

In my experience as a hiring manager, I would never tell anyone why
they were not hired. All the companies I worked for forbade it. If
someone called and asked why they were not hired, the only thing I
could tell them was that a better candidate had been selected.

In today's job market, if you are lucky enough to get an interview,
your best bet is to send a nice polite note to the interviewer after
you get home thanking them for their time and consideration. If you do
not get the job, you are still better off sending a note thanking them
for taking the time to interview you and asking them to keep you in
mind for any future openings. Sometimes the person who was hired
doesn't work out or they quit after a couple of weeks. I am more
inclined to call someone back who sent a nice polite note if a
position opened up.

I know some job coaches and websites tell job hunters to ask for
feedback as to why they didn't get the job. Hiring managers are very
very busy with payroll budgets cut back and having to take on
additional responsibilities. They don't have time to talk to every
applicant who calls on the phone.

I wish you luck in your job search. Remember, it's not just how you
answer the questions that's important. Overall attitude, friendliness,
and personality are often more important than what skills you possess.
Skills can be taught, attitude and personality can't.

"i said well i'd like to know as it could be helpful advice as i
continue my job search she told me that she was then going to hang up
the phone after i asked several times for areason as to why i was not
being hired. "

Sometimes the squeaky wheel doesn't get the grease. It gets thrown
away and replaced with a wheel that doesn't squeak at all.

Just a thought.

Sorry, but no. You probably weren't hired for a variety of reasons,
but the ones you listed are just grasping at straws. Also, harassing
the manager for a reasons is 100% guaranteed to make sure that if you
do ever apply with Old Navy again, they will put your application in
the circular file and not give it a second thought.

If you want this as your hill to die on, so be it, but you are going
to be in for a world of hurt every time you apply for a job and don't
get it. Get over it, and get on with your life.

Sure it's discrimination to not hire you based on your looks, it's
just not illegal discrimination.

There's an incredibly large amount of reasons that you didn't get
hired. It probably has to do with your limited experience (you
probably didn't see EVERYONE who applied for the job) and something
with your personality not fitting in with the people there.
It is considered bad form, however, to call a manager and berate them
for not hiring you. You have successfully made sure that you will
never get a job there.

Kendra,
I can understand how frustrating it is and why you would want to know
if there was something in particular you did or said that made them
not go through with the hiring process. However there are a lot of
reasons they could have chosen to go in a different direction. You
said you answered most all of the questions. Did they have everyone
answer each question or did some people answer certain questions? Did
you have a positive attitude? There are a lot of things that can
happen (maybe you seemed shy and didn't smile a lot - I don't know)
but a lot of times with these entry level positions these companies
hire for attitude and less for experience. Now the manager is
certainly not going to tell you why you didn't get the job. The most
they will say is they chose to go in a different direction. They
really open themselves up for liability if they start to tell
applicants specifically why they aren't going to hire them. The best
thing you can do is go on as many interviews as you can - even if you
don't want the job, or maybe find someone to practice interviewing
skills with. Were you on time or early? If you are more than 5
minutes or so early you seem to desperate and they may not hire you.
Also if you are to eager for an interview (calling the manager
multiple times for example) that can be a bad sign. Again I don't
know specifically what happened but I wish you the best. I'm sure
that there is something out there that will match your personality,
and skillset.

For any given job, there may be dozens of applicants. They have picked
someone who was more qualified.

They cannot and will not, give you a reason why you were not picked.

Don't take it personally. Keep trying and move along. You will find
something eventually.

They do not owe you an explanation and are under no obligation to hire
you just because you graced them with your application. It's not
discrimination but rather having lots of applicants for a few
positions. They simply found someone else who met their needs better
than you did and no, they do not need to disclose their thought
process to you.

By calling up and hounding the manager you can rest assured that you
have closed the door permanently at that business on being hired in
the future.

You weren't the victim of job discrimination.

The company simply found someone more qualified than you for the
position.

And, FYI, they do NOT have to tell you that....or give you a reason
why you didn't get the job.

discrimnatory to assume that they didn't hire you because of your
looks? That to me is every bit as wrong.

I mean, honestly, the way the sconomy is right now, companies can
choose not to hire people who have brown eyes or a size 7 shoe if they
wanted, at the end of the day, they are trying to pick the BEST
possible candidate. Stop taking it personally and look for other
opportunities.

In honesty, if a company doesn't want to hire you, take it as a
blessing because it probably wouldnt have been some place you wanted
to work anyhow!

The reason you didn't get hired probably has nothing to do with your
appearance. There was simply someone who was more qualified than you
or that they thought would make a better employee. You sound rather
judgemental in your letter stating that you thought you were the best
person there. You can have a great interview and there is something
that just doesn't click with the interviewer. You state that Wal-mart
let you go so that may be one reason they didn't want to hire you and
instead hired someone with less experience that wasn't fired from a
previous job. '

In this economy where they were many applicants for each job HR
managers do not like to be bothered with questions from those who were
not offered the jobs. Some find it annoying. it isn't the manager's
job to school you in the art of interviewing. It would be nice if she
would have offered to, but its unecessary and the fact is they didn't
want to hire you- its just a seasonal job. Don't give up- put
applications elsewhere and try not to be so sensitive.

When the manager said she didn't want to discuss it - chances are she
had no idea who you were so she really couldn't comment. You really
shouldn't call HR and bother them when you don't get a job offer. It
leaves a bad impression and if they need help in the future they
aren't going to look at your application favorably. Good luck in your
job search.

My HR reps comes over to my desk and hands me a stack of resumes. She
also does the same for the other people who will be in the decision
process. I go through them and am pretty quickly able to pick out
people who are not a match to the job and throw their resumes in the
trash.

How is that nothing to throw away? The original resume could not be
physically throw away unless I went to our data center in Michigan,
found the server rack that houses our HR software, unbolt it from the
floor, and throw that in the garbage.

My original point was just because the Voice of Reason threw away some
resumes does not mean that she is breaking some law or a bad employee
because you don't know the specifics.

Frankly, if tehy won't hire you because you're a big girl, I think
that's a shame. There are plenty of plus-size teens with money to
spend and what better way to promote the larger sizes of the clothing
than to have an employee who's wearing it?

Try a store that's more accepting of plus-size teenage employees, like
Maurice's, Hot TOpix (sp?), etc. Keep a good attitude and remember:
IF someone doesn't want to hire you because of your weight (which is
legal, by the way - overweight people aren't a protected class), screw
'em.

I agree with the other poster. Unless you CAN PROVE discrimination,
you don't have a leg to stand on. There are at least 5 or more
applicants for any job these days.

Just move on to another application with another retailer if that's
what you're looking for.

I'm with the manager. If you're going to be pushy and not take "No"
for an answer, what kind of a salesperson would you be? An annoying
one.

Unless you have proof you have nothing.

When I interview people I am very friendly and treat everyone with
respect. Unfortunately like you some people have come back saying
"the interview went great and I thought I had the job you must not
have hired me because I am ....."

You need to just move on, not everything is about discrimination,
theres a good chance there was just someone more qualified.