“Social sector” workers — described by Forbes as “nonprofit organizations and the social sector at-large” — have been losing jobs because of budget cuts and corruption cuts.
Many newly unemployed are unhappy about having to job-hunt. Some complain about having to take jobs from profit-making businesses. Others lament sparse communication from prospective employers.
“When asked about barriers to finding employment, 85% of respondents cited lack of employer response as their primary challenge,” Aparna Rae’s not-very-shocking-at-all Forbes article elaborates. “The irony is stark: a sector built on human dignity subjects job seekers to dehumanizing ‘digital hiring mazes’ where qualified candidates are ghosted after final-round interviews. The disconnect between mission and practice erodes the sector’s moral authority.”
Wow. Dehumanizing to have to … look for work (or customers)? Worse because your last job was all about dignity — unlike all those grubby profit-sector jobs or, for that matter, jobs with nonprofits that rely only on voluntary private donations?
“I want to be seen and recognized as a human,” explains one representative job seeker. “The lack of communication and impersonal nature of the hiring process is demoralizing and makes job seekers feel devalued.”
Job hunting can be tough. It’d be nicer if qualified candidates who have been considered but lose out to other qualified candidates were always notified. Sure. But how does failure to do so represent a “disconnect” between mission and practice, and how does it “erode the [nonprofits’] moral authority”?
Job seekers might feel less demoralized if they didn’t take the impersonal aspects of the search so personally.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
Illustration created with NanoBanana and Firefly
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