Employers are posting seemingly vacant positions that were never actually intended to be filled.
The labor market is tightening, and it’s getting harder to find work. After the Great Resignation, which created more job openings than employers could fill, workers used to have a choice of jobs. Now they’ve largely lost their leverage amid layoffs and budget cuts, and those jobs are becoming increasingly scarce.
Still, there are open positions, or at least they seem to be. Job boards like LinkedIn and Indeed continue to post open positions, and workers are actively applying. Yet despite the influx of highly qualified candidates, many attractive job ads have languished on digital platforms with an increasingly common label: “Posted more than 30 days ago.”
Even though the ads may be old, job seekers generally still assume that companies are actively hiring for these positions. The truth is more complicated. Some of these ads are simply advertisements for positions that have not yet been removed and have already been filled, but others were never meant to be filled. These are called “ghost jobs,” and they are becoming an increasingly common (and problematic) obstacle for job seekers.
Talent and exposure
Yet despite the influx of candidates, a staggering number of job postings do not result in hires. Revelio Labs, a US-based workforce intelligence company, has shown that The ratio of hires per job advertisement fell below 0.5 in 2023meaning that more than half of the listings did not result in an employer converting an applicant to an employee.
fake images
Job ads are more than just a talent vacuum that sucks up applicants’ resumes. They are also a tool for shaping perceptions inside and outside the company. More than 40% of hiring managers said they post job ads they are not actively trying to fill to give the impression that the company is growing. A similar percentage said job ads are made to motivate employees, while 34% said job ads are posted to appease overworked staff who may be waiting for additional help to come on board.
‘A major waste of time’
Experts warn that not all job postings that appear to be phantoms are. “I don’t think it’s a widespread practice for companies to post jobs they have no intention of filling,” says Annette Garsteck, a US-based career consultant. Instead, a lack of recruiting resources and a staggering volume of applicants per position can mean that hiring can’t move quickly and, as a result, recruiters can’t respond to all applications.
In 2023, StandOut CV found that over a third of job postings were ghost jobs, defined as adverts posted for more than 30 days.
Regardless, whether these offers are phantom jobs or simply look and feel like them, the result is similar. Job seekers end up discouraged and Burned.
“Ghost job postings are a major time-waster for job seekers,” Scott says. “Completing a single application can take several hours, as a serious candidate will spend time researching the company, customizing their resume and cover letter, and then jumping through hoops like listing all the jobs they’ve held and answering screening questions.”
Still, because of the market — and despite the consequences it can have — some candidates continue to send out as many applications as they can, hoping to get a response. Other job seekers say the abundance of ghost jobs has made them change their strategies.
Samantha, a senior graphic designer living in the US, has been looking for a job for three months. She says she started by looking at a wide range of companies, but the lack of responses from most of them has led her to be more selective in choosing where to apply. Instead, she is looking for more specific positions that fit her profile and that are likely to have fewer applicants overall.
At the same time, however, she is still unsure of the right approach. “I don’t know if it’s better to just shoot bullets and hope to hit the target,” she says, “or if I should just sit there, aim and shoot once or twice a week.”
Ghost jobs may give employers a chance to boost their image and build a resume pool in the short term, but the benefit may not last. If a potential employee feels scammed by a company they’ve never heard from, they may feel scared off from applying for future opportunities at that company. Companies that post ghost jobs may end up getting hounded by them instead.
JOBs Apply News
For the Latest JOBs Apply News, Follow ©JOBs Apply News on Twitter and Linkedin Page.
