I know this is a terrible job market . . . but that means it is all the more necessary for applicants to pay attention to the advertisements.  I’ve written about this before, but things have gotten a lot more intense this time.

We’re hiring an administrative assistant, having been without as a budget-cutting measure for a year now. We’re very clear about what we want in an ideal applicant. And, as usual, I am very specific about what I want from applicants: a cover letter, a resume, and salary expectations. (Don’t believe me? Here’s the post, at least until it expires on CL.)

I got 25 responses within an hour of posting the ad. And 120 in six hours, when I stopped checking my office email. Today I have another 50+ to input. My guess is that I’ll have 300 resumes to review before the weekend is over. Look at that figure for a moment: three HUNDRED resumes.

I said it before: you’ll get a lot further in the process if you write your cover letter to me. But you are now going to get an automatic rejection if you don’t include the items I specifically requested: a cover letter, a resume, and your salary expectations. I

I started out willing to ask people for a cover letter/writing sample — now I just mark the person ‘no’. I may lose a great candidate, but I doubt it. In fact, my impressions is that the people who don’t bother to compose a cover letter have little or NO relevant experience.

What a waste.