Tell Us About Yourself

It is funny how fantasies about your future life become quickly entrenched until you believe them without question.  A lot of people when children make assumptions that they will be married, have children, have a particular kind of career, go to certain places and do not really question these assumptions until probably they are having their 'mid-life crisis'.  Spending a lot of time reflecting on my life, being a diarist, perhaps I have questioned these assumptions sooner.  As I have noted in previous postings, I had a very bleak view of my future and ironically with a long period of unemployment, that view of my life is coming true rather than any more positive expectations that I had.  We seem to be moving very quickly into the bleak, hopeless society in which the privileged only get wealthier and more privileged and the rest of us fight for the crumbs they drop, which I had expected Britain would become by the late 1980s.  Of course, I thought it was quite likely that we would be in a nuclear wasteland or something resembling society in 'Blade Runner' (1982).  It is probably due to this perception that I never expected to get married or have children, though, looking back, I do see that I did anticipate that I would find work as an adult even though I expected the economy to be struggling, perhaps more like the society in 'Brazil' (1985), all drab with us as office drones.  To some degree, I think it is because, when I went to university only 6% of 18-year olds did (I was 20 by then anyway) and so I did feel I was in a privileged sub-set even if at the bottom of that group in terms of future opportunities.  I never expected my life to be as opportunity-free as it has proven, though I did anticipate that problem (pretty accurately) more widely in society.

I realise that there were some small scale, unrealistic, assumptions that it has taken me a long time to shake off.  One was that some day I would have a book published and be able to be reviewed and do book signings and even appear on television talking about my book.  It took me until the mid-2000s to realise that with over 40,000 unpublished novels in circulation in the UK at any one time now, that the chances of me being published is probably as narrow as winning the lottery and with a lot more effort involved to get such long odds.  I went about it entirely the wrong way I see now.  Rather than become famous from writing novels, I should have realised (and the example of Jeffery Archer was already around in the 1980s) that I had to become famous for something else first so that I would then get my books published, no matter how poor the quality.  Just look at Melvyn Bragg, Alan Titchmarsh, Roy Hattersley let alone the supermodels' novels.

The other assumption I realise I made, was to some degree connected with becoming a successful novelist.  It was that some day I would be asked by a newspaper to complete one of those questionnaires that they give celebrities each week.  They ask the same questions of each and get short answers usually making up a single page of a magazine supplement.  This style of article, to my knowledge, has been around at least thirty years and I would find myself as a teenager thinking how I would respond to these questions, naturally not questioning that I would be important enough to be considered for such an article.  I remember now that I used to also think up what records I would suggest for 'Desert Island Discs' a radio show that asks celebrities to choose eight records and some other items they would have to have if stranded on a desert island.  I do not know if it still runs.  I heard only a couple of episodes of this programme in the 1980s but read a book about it, so often would draw up lists in my mind of what records I would choose and what I would say about them.  I guess it is little different to the 'mix tapes' teenaged boys in particular would make of their favourite tunes often to give to girlfriends.  We have gone through mix CDs to iPod playlists compiled on this basis now.  These days I listen to very little music and have never downloaded a track and have not bought a CD since the mid-2000s, so it is probably no surprise that my consideration of what would be on my list has faded from my mind.

I am still reminded of the 'questionnaire' interview because it is regularly used by 'The Guardian' newspaper on Saturdays when I buy it.  Looking through some recently I was reminded of my teenaged assumptions that I would one day be featured in such an article.  Reaching 43, being unemployed and losing my house, it seems more unlikely than ever that I will ever be featured in one.  Thus, I decided as with the other things I have posted here as the 'lead tablets' to cast them out of the clutter of my mind, it was probably a good idea to quesionnaire myself.  The one that follows is a mixture of the one currently used in the 'The Guardian' magazine combined with a few other interesting questions they and other newspapers have used in the past.  I do not care if no-one else is interested in this, this posting is very much for my own peace of mind.


Alexander Rooksmoor:
43 years old
unemployed office manager,
failed author;
semi-active blogger since May 2007.





When were you happiest?
Before the age of 2; on a handful of days out drinking with my best friend; a few days on holiday, most recently one lunchtime in Swanage.

What is your greatest fear?
Torture and being made homeless.

What is your earliest memory?
There are two memories which I can call to my mind's eye which I now know could not be genuine.  The first is seeing myself from a third person perspective as a baby being handed over to my mother in hospital.  Given that my brother was born at home, I can only think this is a memory of seeing one of my cousins being given to my aunt.  The other is me watching a football match in colour in the living room of the house where my parents still live and being told that it was 1972.  This would not have been my first memory as I was 5-6 in 1972 and I remember starting school which I did at the age of 4 in 1971.  However, I now know this is also a false memory as my parents did not own a colour television until many years later.  Perhaps the first genuine memory is crawling up to the French windows and hefting a metal-headed hammer to smash in the small wood-framed panes in it.  I have a dim memory of this event but it has been corroborated by my family, I was 2 at the time.  The greatest set of memories I have of the time that have not been revived by looking at photos, are of the play school I attended, when I must have been 3-4.

Which living person do you most admire and why?
Tony Benn for continuing the faith that the world can be a more equitable and fair place.

Which living person do you most despise and why?
Margaret Thatcher for making greed, selfishness and callousness 'normal'.  Rather than a state funeral, I encourage people to riot on her death.

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
Fear, followed by wrath, then self-righteousness.  If incessant bad luck is a trait then that would be high on the list too.

What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Racism, followed by self-righteousness which often fuels racism.

What was your most embarrassing moment?
There have been many.  The one that still cuts is the moment, aged 10 that, I shoved the chain letters that would have continued the friendly chain started by friends of my girlfriend, down the side of an armchair, because, after weeks of ridicule, I could not stand the humiliation of my friends seeing the confirmation of a connection between me and the girl in question.  In those days no boy had a friend who was a girl until you hit puberty, but, precociously, I felt I had found my soulmate.  I was torn between ridicule on one side and disappointing the girl in question on the other.  She was disappointed, but I held the shame longer.  When I apologised to her 10 years later, she dismissed it as nothing.  I was not to have a girlfriend for another 12 years.

Property aside, what is the most expensive item you have bought?
A second hand car for £3,350 in 2002.  I sold it in 2007 for £400 and I still see it occasionally parked in my street.

What things do you always carry with you?
Coins in a change purse, very taped up at the moment; a selection of house and bicycle lock keys on a lanyard; Dextrosol tablets usually lemon or orange flavour, never blackcurrant; two handkerchiefs much to some people's dismay; Polo mints; my 'memory book' a tiny notebook made by my lover; a pen; insulin injector; stamps; restaurant business cards even though I cannot afford to eat at them.  I used to always carry some matches even though I have never smoked, a small two-ended penknife inherited from a grandfather [until carrying even small knives was banned], a camera and a hardbacked notebook which I bought in Freiburg-in-Breisgau in 1989.

What is your most treasured possession?
My imagination.  I always fear I will lose it to Alzheimer's.

What single thing would improve your quality of life?
A permanent job.

What do you most dislike about your appearance?
So many things battle for primacy in my dislike: front runners at present are my piggy freckled face, my flabby tummy marked with a scar, the large scar across my genitals, the sides of my head which look so long as to be alien, my hunched shoulders.

What makes you unhappy?
Fearing the future for myself, my loved ones, Britain and the World as a whole.

What things keep you awake at night?
Hemorrhoids, fear of having my house repossessed, nightmares of torture or mutation (as opposed to mutilation which tends to be encompassed by the previous category).

If you could go back in time, where would you go?
When asked this question as a teenager there was no time that I preferred as I knew they were all unpleasant and barbaric.  I think I would go to 26th July 1945, the day the victory of the Labour Party under Clement Attlee was announced and a better world seemed possible.  More generally I would go to the 1890s Britain when it seemed that the possibility of a better world was possible if you fought for it.  I would certainly go to early 12th century Antioch out of curiosity, to Germany in the 1920s to get real background for my novels, to Renaissance Florence, to London to see the first run of one of Shakespeare's plays and to die in Spain during the Spanish Civil War so I could die for a cause I believed in.

If you could bring something extinct back to life, what would it be?
Compassion for other humans we meet.  Graciousness.

If you could edit your life, what part would you change?
I certainly would cut out the bullying, notably by my parents.  I had low self-esteem, but it was really crushed by humiliation both at the hands of fellow pupils when at primary and secondary school reinforced by parents' incessant portrayal of me, to my face, as 'wrong' in so many ways.  Some might say it instilled humility in me, but I think I had that enough and, instead, it left me struggling to cope with achieving anything once I entered my later teenage years and especially after I had left home.

Who would play you in the film of your life?
Back in 1991/2 my best friend drew up a cast list for ourselves and people we knew for a movie of our lives.  Pretty arrogant by a fun pub activity.  I think Patrick Stewart would be best placed to play me now, on physical grounds, but it would be a challenging role because he tends to be far more positive about life in the roles he plays than I have ever been.  The late Ken Campbell would have been ideal.

What would be your fancy dress costume of choice?
I usually get cast as Uncle Fester for fancy dress events.  I would like to choose from one of Jeremy Brett's costumes as Sherlock Holmes in the television series.

What would your motto be?
This fluctuates, for a long time it was 'Semper Diligentia, Semper Felix' [Always hard working, always happy] from when I assumed I was going to be ennobled at some time despite my opposition to the House of Lords.  It became the more venacular 'Better busy than bored'.  I think these reflect my life, but a motto should be a message to the future and on that basis I would choose between 'A life lived in fear, is a life half-lived' or 'It is better to die on your feet than to live forever on your knees', neither of which are my invention.

What is your favourite word?
Transformed.

What words do you over-use?
'Of course', 'Today, I' and 'fuck'.

What is the worst thing anyone has said to you?
There is a long list.  The thing that probably lingered with me longest is 'You'll never be the answer to a maiden's prayer'.  Another one which lasted long is 'You must apologise for asking me out' [asking the woman speaking out on a date].  'You are strange' and 'I've only just met this man but I already hate him' [referring to me to others even though I was standing there] come close behind.

Have you ever said 'I love you' to anyone and not meant it?
I have never said it to my parents or my brother and they have never said it to me, which is good as I love none of them. I have said 'I love you' to only three people in the world. One of them I did love at the time but to her I was a convenience and while I no longer love her, I bear no grievance against her. The other two, a woman and her son, I do love still and tell them as often as I can.

What is your guiltiest pleasure?
Eating chocolate [being a diabetic], masturbating [as it is for most men] and watching action movies, occasionally all three simultaneously.

What is your favourite food?
Depending on the time of year and where I am, one of the following: a good fish curry, grilled trout, roast pheasant or boar, a ploughman's lunch.

What is your favourite smell?
My lover's skin and croissants cooking in a French bakery, both together if possible.

What is your favourite book?
'The Book of Heroic Failures' by Stephen Pile (1979), one of the only books I have read more than once.  Its gentle humour is lifting, and its illustration that others struggle with life, but are 'heroic' still, is inspirational.  I love the concept, the title and the content of this book.

What is the love of your life?
The only woman who stayed with me more than 16 months.  For a real 'what' rather than a 'who', it used to be that moment in a cinema just before the movie started.  Nowadays it would be winning a challenging victory at the last on a computer wargame.

Who would you invite to your dream dinner party?
Jesus Christ, his wife and any of their children, just to find out.  Mo Mowlem, La Pasionara and Rosa Luxembourg to be inspired.  Laurie Lee for his stories during the meal.  Thomas Paine for a refresher in what radical thinking entails.  Napoleon Bonaparte and Saladin for their reminiscences.  Leonardo Da Vinci for an after-dinner slide show of inventions we never saw.  Mary Shelley for an after-dinner ghost story.  Keir Hardie and Winston Churchill to talk about the Great Upheaval.  Tommy Cooper for entertainment.  My father's parents who were always gracious hosts.  Of the living: Terry Pratchett, Tony Benn, Mark Thomas and Moira Stewart.  I always thought of having a living comedian, but my choice has changed over the years.  Once it would have been, in sequence, Phil Cool, Lenny Henry, Lee Evans, Alan Davies and now, in the dinner party setting rather than on stage, Noel Fielding or Dara O'Briain, along with Milton Jones who would keep up constant banter.  Comedian Jimeoin would have to come after I had stopped eating otherwise I would risk choking on my food.

If you had a super power what would it be?
I have constantly thought about the ability to teleport myself in my life, so I think it would be the power that I would be best equipped to deal with.  Given what I answered to the question above about when in time I would like to visit, then a time travelling ability would be very useful to me.  It might also show me that bad decisions I believe I made were the only right decision at the time.

I would be quite happy to swap a super power for the power to learn a foreign language well, to be able to do a martial art and to play a musical instrument.

What is the worst job you have ever done?
Wrapping shrink wrap around 2-metre high cages of food before they were loaded on to lorries throughout a 10-hour night shift, and, being told on my first (and only) night on the job that I was not doing it fast enough.  Having been turning round and round the cages all night in the same direction, I could barely walk without falling over when the shift ended.  I refused to return to the job.  I have done jobs cleaning out rotten food, especially melted ice cream and mouldy cheese in warehouses, not half as bad as that job.

What has been your biggest disappointment?
My life.

What has been your greatest regret?
That I have always been too fearful of possible outcomes to have pursued what I have believed in, to the extent that I should have done.

If you could edit your past, what would you change?
First the occasions when I should have spoken, said anything, and did not.  Then the occasions when I spoke and I should have stayed quiet.  I was correct to speak on those occasions but using some other medium to get the message across would have helped me have an easier life.

When did you last cry and why?
Seeing my lover and her son curled up together asleep on a bed.  Mainly because it was a very touching scene and I was aware it might be the last time I would see them like that.

How do you relax?
These days, blogging.  I find I become very engaged in it, it vents my anger and I forget about all my problems as I focus on what I am writing.  Indulging in my guiltiest pleasures is another way.

What is the closest you have come to death?
Walking alone in the hills overlooking Oxford in 1994 when I suddenly got spasms in my feet and fell over.  The main reason why I survived is because I felt it was ridiculous to die in sight of Oxford and managed to drag myself, sometimes walking backwards barefooted to a pub.

Possibly even closer was driving, joining the M3 from the M27, during a rain storm one morning in 2006 when cars from the left and the right of me both decided to overtake and then cross over a couple of metres in front of me.  How all three of us did not collide, I have no idea.  The junction is tricky as the inside lane of the two-lane slip road continues running beside the M27 to become the exit slip road for Eastleigh, effectively giving the M27 four lanes at that point.  I had been in the outside lane of the slip road which had then merged into the slow lane of the M27. The car on my left had overtaken me on the inside on the slip road and now moved across two lanes to the middle lane of the M27.  At the same moment, the car on my right moved from the M27's middle lane moved across two lanes to the lane for the Eastleigh exit.  Statistically all of us should have died.  It was only because I had slowed to 60 mph to comply with the matrices, plus luck, that we did not.

What is the most important lesson life has taught you?
Too many people act on the basis of how something appears superficially rather than on the basis of the deeper truth.

What do you consider to be your greatest achievement?
Not being unemployed for longer than I was.

What song would you like played at your funeral?
Difficult question, probably 'Concierto de Aranjuez' by Joaquín Rodrigo (1939) at the start and 'Bring Me To Life' by Evanescence (2003) at the end, though like most people I have a whole set of tunes and songs I would like played.  I would love it if the people who attended, assuming there are some, left to the theme from 'The Water Margin' by Masaro Sato (1973) as I hope it will inspire them to get out there and challenge some of the injustices of the world.

How would you like to be remembered?
As better than I am in reality.  I hope people will remember a good friend, someone who spoke plainly, someone who stood up for what he believed in, someone who was an entertaining raconteur and someone who was considerate and understanding.  Quite a tall order it seems.

Tell us a joke.
Q: How many Surrealists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Fish.

Job Application Burn Out

With redundancy about 7 weeks away I am obviously flat out in terms of job applications, but it is frying my brain. Back in 1998-9, I did 126 job applications in about seven months. These days my rate seems a lot slower because I have only completed 17 since February. The expectation when you sign on for unemployment benefit is that you apply for at least 2 jobs per week. I suppose it gets harder as you get higher in companies. I have been in my profession since 1994 and am on the cusp of senior managerial roles, so I guess there is a lot more to write than when I was applying back in the late 1990s. My hit rate has improved. I used to get 1 interview for every 25 applications I made and now I have had 3 out of 17. I suppose the higher you move up the pyramid even in these times of rising unemployment, there are fewer candidates in the field. I remember applying for a civil service job back in the late 1990s and they had a total of 5000 applicants for about 40 posts and had had to extend the deadline and print more application forms to cope.


At least these days electronic applications means I do not have to spend a fortune on printer ink, large envelopes and postage. There was a fad in the late 1990s for employers to insist you sent in at least 4 copies of everything, and for some reason Scottish employers I encountered insisted on 8 copies. You wondered if they had heard of the photocopier. Anyway, did encounter one employer recently who asked for 4 copies of the paper form and I just did not bother applying as I thought who wants to work for such a backward organisation? One employer who does provide electronic applications then has a complaint that they get too many applications by email so insist you print it out and post it in. They say this as if it was the fault of the applicants, but if I worked there I would look at what I was putting into my job advertisements and specifications that are encouraging such a strong response. I know most employers just want one perfect applicant so they do not have to deal with the sifting process, but that is unrealistic, especially when so many people are out of work and the number is rising, and we are again being encouraged to apply speculatively as well as in response to advertisements.


I think that with the move to Essential/Desirable requirements there has been a real inflation in what you have to write, though it is clear that some companies recruiting do not understand the implications of this. The record so far is from a company in London which had 36 Essential requirements and 10 Desirable ones, but a new twist came the other week when one company wanted me to demonstrate ('with evidence' as they state clearly) my abilities in 26 areas, fine, but they gave me only 4000 characters (including spaces) on their electronic form, probably about 800 words or less, making about 30 words per requirement! How do they expect to get an understanding of applicants from that?


Anyway, for those application forms which actually allow you to address the specifications I am averaging about 5000 words per form. I was a bit worried that I was writing too much, but I checked in with an employability advisor and she said that if they say something like 'write no more than 4000 words in this section' you should be at least writing something over 3000 words. These 3-4000 words addressing the specification are then supplemented with me having to detail all the different jobs and education I have had. I am rather stunned how many employers ask in immense detail about study I did so long ago. I cannot remember on what day I took an exam in 1998 let alone in 1984. What is the likely impact on me being a senior manager if I got a 'B' grade or a 'C' grade for 'O' level Mathematics twenty-five years ago. They do not even teach 'O' levels any more and presumably my career since I entered the profession is what should be under consideration not what choices my parents made in terms of my study back in the late 20th century. I have at least another 23-26 years of work, by then they will be expecting me to remember stuff from half a century ago.


I am finding that each application is taking me 3-4 hours to complete and now I am close to my limit. It is really draining writing mundane stuff out repeatedly (each of the 17 applications has required a different format, often with embedded macros, making it hard to cut and paste the basic information across from previous forms) and then having to tax my brain to address the numerous weird specifications. I am really getting burnt out, but if you admit this you are seen as lazy. I am trying to be tactical and limit myself to 3 applications per week, still up to 12 hours work, but target the ones I think I am best suited for. I am at a real crossroads. I earn £37,000 now, and am applying for jobs that range from £28,000 to £60,000 so whichever one I get could mean a real change in income, for the better or worse and may mean that my career now goes on to the next stage or drops back to a lower one, which would compel me to start applying again as soon as the economy picks up. However, given that I have lived in 4 houses in the past 5 years it would be nice to settle in one place for a bit, but in the current climate it seems unlikely.


The inability of recruiters to write what they actually want from a job is one I have long known. Two things happen. First everyone who has a stake in the new post insists on certain requirements being included which is why they mushroom in number and in fact there are often overlaps, but the everyone involved wants their specific take on a skill included. Then there is a misunderstanding about what the job entails. This is very common among senior managers who are often behind the recruitment. A colleague from a different unit yesterday told me how they had recruited all the wrong people. They had wanted staff with line management experience, but the way they had written the advertisements they had got people with project management experience. Of course, there is some overlap but project management often involves dealing with non-human aspects of the work to a greater extent than pure line management. Due to this matching with criteria in the recruitment process (at the initial stage often done mechanically by human resources staff even before it reaches those who know the job area) if someone matches the job as described they almost have to be recruited. Often I have encountered managers thinking a job involves something when in reality it involves something entirely different and this comes to the fore when they are recruiting.


I did a posting recently about the unfeasible things that job specifications list. Often this is simply that there are so many and in such diverse areas that the work would normally be covered by 3-4 people in different posts. For example, some jobs want you to have line manager, project manager, marketing, market analysis and research skills. However, I have encountered a few gems of specific skills that in themselves seem bizarre. In a good workplace you should only ever assign activities the success of which can be determined, and in this age of training, in theory should allow people to be trained in them rather than stemming from some inherent ability. So I laughed at the specification which said 'must be able to command respect in the room', on that basis simply being a thug, 2 metres tall you could achieve that. You cannot train that and it depends who is in the room at the time. It was clearly a thing to filter out any external applicants who would be unknown by the existing staff. How do you measure 'respect' anyway. It reminded me of the 1980s comedians Hale & Pace who used to have two characters, who seemed to be night-club bouncers who called themselves 'the management' in a thuggish tone.


Even if you get beyond the stage of the specification you find the interviewers are obssessed by one particular thing and ignoring the list of specifications, make all their judgements on one basis. I remember having six interviews at the same company but gave up when I realised that the lead interviewer always immediately categorised everyone on the basis that they were 'a born administrator' or not and if you were not perceived to be part of the Elect then you stood no chance of getting a job and conversely, someone lacking many of the abilities but seen to have that particular nature was let in. The other case was a woman who judged everyone on the basis of what time management software they used. This was utterly foolish because there are a range of methods of time management and any piece of software is liable to be obsolete in 2-3 years anyway.


The other specification which made me laugh was because it was wrapped up in meaningless management-speak from the 1980s, it said 'you must be able to engage people through vision'. I could have a guess at the meaning, but surely they could be more explicit. Just because unemployment is rising again it does not mean that we have to return to the meaningless style-over-substance approaches of the 1980s corporate culture. I do hope that I can get a senior managerial position and begin to address some of this foolish behaviour in at least one company. In the meantime, for now, it is back to writing out what exams I took in 1984.

P.P. 16/08/2010: The record for the number of requirements in a job specification of a vacancy I have applied for has now been broken.  The total was 51 requirements, though a number were effectively the same skill stated in different words.  There was no indication which of the requirements was essential and which was desirable, so I guessed they were all essential.  In total it took me a little over 4 hours to complete the application; I must be getting faster!

We Expect You to Be Able to Walk on Water - Excessive Demands in Job Specifications

With the end of my current job less than five months away I am back into the pattern of applying for work. Of course I am doing this at probably the worse time possible. There are going to be so many more people out there seeking jobs. I have already accepted that given that all the jobs in my field seem to be in northern England or Scotland and I am living currently in southern England, that I am going to have to move yet again which will mean that by the end of 2009 I will be in the fifth house I have lived in since 2005 and the eighth since 2001. You can hardly say that I am not part of the flexible labour force, though of course half of those moves have been compelled by the landlord rather than me seeking work.

Anyway, having swallowed the fact that there will be yet more packing and unpacking, before that stage I actually have to get a new job. Of course, I have accepted that it means that I am likely to face a pay cut too, but again, I reckon I could probably tolerate a fall of £5000 (€5600; US$7100) per year, perhaps more, especially if I move to northern England and Scotland, where, bar from in expensive city centres, the cost of property to rent is cheaper than the South-East of England and some consumables are cheaper too. Against this willingness to be flexible is the fact that I am now over 40 and despite anti-ageist legislation, I know that in all fields employers prefer a cheap, young employee over an old, more expensive one. So I quite expect to be unemployed with only my £1400 redundancy payment to help me out, this would pay less than two months' worth of my mortgage, so house repossession is also likely.

Despite the fact that much of what I have currently could be gone by the Summer, I am persisting in looking for any job that I seem suited for. I am registered with online agencies and have weekly emails of vacancies. I also have friends and relations keeping their ears and eyes open for possible jobs too, just as you are recommended to do. At present I am being very positive and applying for posts that would actually be a promotion for me, though I may be deluding myself in that regard. The big challenge is the job specifications. I discussed some of this back in August 2007 when looking at the silly way so many companies behave when recruiting people. Now I am back to actually applying for jobs once more, I am finding many new examples and I am sure thousands of you out there have your own war stories.

I do wonder who writes job specifications. In most companies of any size the Personnel Department or Human Resources or whatever, is often involved and from my experience on that side of the process, have a great deal of input which usually slows down and complicates the recruitment process. These days there is often a standard pattern, with an outline of who you would be reporting to if you got this job and what functions the job entails, well that is fine, it is generally what you need to know. Sometimes there is a detailed description of the company and its history which if you were interested you would already know anyway, but some people insist on including as if they are going to set you a comprehension test on it. Then you get to the so-called Person Specification. This reminds me of people who go to dating websites and somehow expect that they can order a perfect partner who matches every item they tick or cross. In fact humans are more varied than that and do not fit patterns.

The idea behind person specifications is a sound one, that they break down the requirements of a job into bite-sized chunks against which the applicant outlines their abilities and experience. When applying for my second job in the civil service, the interviewer literally read out these and asked for a response which was then written down by the secretary, sometimes she would ask for another example too. It was incredibly mechanical and would have been better handled by completing a computer-based questionnaire. It is clear that these specifications are an aggregate of the wishes of a team of people, often coming from very different parts of the company. Many people involved in recruitment have set requests that they always ask for (particularly in terms of qualifications) which in fact bear no relevance to the job in question. I remember working with one colleague on recruitment who always insisted that the applicants must make use of time management software in their work. I suppose it is a good principle, but she simply kept asking about the use of this stuff and ironically none of the applicants used it. Asking for certain qualifications is more about the perceived status of the job than actually what the job entails. I am incredulous that I received application forms for managerial positions which ask me to list every exam I took in secondary school and which grade I got. I last took such an exam in 1984, what effect does whether I got a 'C' or a 'B' in 'O' Level Mathematics (an exam which has not existed since 1992), 25 years ago, have on how good I can manage a department now? It is just like saying that the overseas sales of the company in 2009 are influenced by the balance of payments or the exchange rates of 1984. For all the emphasis on skills, abilities and experience in person specifications, so many of the elements included are simply ritualistic.

Companies are conscious that their staff costs are often the largest single component of their outlay so they seek to reduce them, often below a level which permits the company to function most effectively. This seems to be particularly the case in the UK, which ironically has a low-salary economy, but certainly has the longest working hours of the EU. This is because so many UK employees are actually doing the job of 2 or even 3 people. I remember some jobs of the past that I have looked at that definitely seemed to include this. In particular in the late 1990s I remember a company in Norwich that wanted someone who could translate documents from German to English, establish a database, maintain an online presence and work on the helpdesk until 10pm when requested. In many companies these functions would be carried out by four staff, perhaps with some overlap, but to expect all of these skills to be wrapped up in a single individual for £16,000 per year (which even in 1998 was not a stupendous salary) either seemed that they had a precise person they simply wanted to give the job to, at a miserly rate if they indeed had all those skills or that the coming together of different departments had meant the stitching together of a Frankenstein's monster of a post. This was just one of the most extreme examples, but you see if constantly. Whenever recruiting staff I always battle to keep down the number of requirements on the person specification and ensure they are actually relevant to the job the person will do, not what people think the person doing that job does or wishes they would do.

Often the demands are contradictory. Even if you can read the coded language of person specifications it often conceals a turmoil behind the thinking of the recruiter. The most classic case of this I saw was when I worked with two colleagues on a panel to appoint a deputy to the fourth member of the panel. She was one of these people who bunged in loads of additional requirements, like so many managers, seeming to feel that a single employee could somehow radically alter the department and this in a 0.5 post not even a full-time one. Her specification wanted someone who could organise huge events, deal on a one-to-one basis with clients, maintain and further develop the website in new directions and carry out both secretarial and administrative roles on 2.5 days per week and the actual days altered week-to-week as the manager required, though she often gave less than 14 days' notice. We asked the manager if she wanted an assistant or a lieutenant. Now there is a difference, the former simply does what the manager asks and takes little iniative; the latter can stand in for the manager if she is not there and will develop new projects under her own steam. Anyway, the manager said she wanted a lieutenant. She had the chance to change her mind when we interviewed the applicants, one was like an assistant in personality and one like a lieutenant. The manager went for the latter who turned out to be incredibly hard working (often staying late and coming in at weekends despite being part-time) and advanced the department's provision and profile. Was the manager pleased? Of course not, she whined and complained that this woman was taking far too much initiative and being too brusque. She kept the woman on probation for 12 months longer than normal by which time the woman sensibly resigned. Of course the manager had in fact wanted an assistant, well, in fact a lackey, but had felt embarrassed to admit that despite it being offered to her. In addition, her own self-esteem seemed to matter far more than any benefits which accrued to her department.

So, even behind the over-stacked, contradictory person specifications there is often a whole extra layer of incompetence just lurking there. Now it is my turn for the first time in almost four years to start applying for jobs again. Fashions in recruitment seem to change pretty quickly, in my experience the acceptable style for a CV lasts two years, but person specifications are still around and seem to be much in the same style. Of course the companies I am applying to, may be simply lagging in terms of fashion. Person specifications usually have Essential (usually shown with an 'E') and Desirable ('D') criteria which are usually used to separate two very close interviewees. The former, in theory, are what you must have in order to do the job, though as noted above, in fact they are usually the requirements three people need to do three different jobs and it is unlikely anyone straddling so many skill sets actually exists. This is why you so often see re-advertisements with the company complaining that there were insufficient good candidates. It also helps explain why industry feels young people are under-skilled. This may be true in some cases, but no-one has analysed if in fact, the mismatch stems from companies increasinly wanting applicants who are made up of more than one individual's abilities and have years of experience in a newcomer to that labour market.

I was told that if you match 4 out of 5 of the E requirements then you should apply for a job. Of course many recruiters do not work that way, it has to be that you match 6 out of 5 (the sixth being the one they would have wanted to include but it was felt there were too many and you should know what the extra ones were) or otherwise you are hopeless. Recruiters are merciless in telling applicants when they feel they have wasted their time. (As an aside, you know how, especially in times of high unemployment you are advised to speculatively apply to companies that you think you could work for. When I did this one rung twice to tell me at length that 'this is not how things are done' and that I should know better. They thought I was lying when I said other very similar companies took my applications in good faith and in at least two cases in the past it had got me work). No-one ever applies for a job for 'fun'. There are far better things to do in a day than spend a couple of hours filling in yet another form and trying to draft what you are saying to the hundreds of requirements expected by the company. As applicants we take it seriously, it is a shame companies often do not do so too.

My last application was in response to a person specification. It had 18 E requirements and 3 D requirements, actually not a bad number. However, when you look at what they entail, they need a strategist, a process manager, a product quality controller, a staff performance/personnel manager, a market researcher and forecaster, a marketing manager and a researcher, and, of course, your bog-standard line manager and committee chair. Now, many of these skills do not actually sit well alongside others. In addition, if I was as good a marketing manager as they are seeking, I would be going for marketing manager jobs, not this vacancy and in fact that goes for most of the other types of post they are wrapping up in this one. I applied partly for the challenge of stretching myself across these different roles, but I anticipate they are going to be disappointed because this is not one job it is at least four if not more.

Setting unrealistic expectations is going to lead to disappointment and though the successful applicant will have done their best and try to fit with what is required, that disappointment that they are not the super-human that was desired is going to hang over them, as it did over my 2.5-day lieutenant colleague, and that is an appalling basis on which to start a working relationship. It also reduces effectiveness as managers squabble over the employee to make them come and do the role that they wanted and thinks they have appointed someone for, whereas 1-3 other managers also try to snatch the new worker thinking that the person was appointed to the role they felt they needed. The newcomer is left dizzy and their efforts are dispersed; they are at the whim of management changes and work that they have focused on might simply be declared unnecessary or irrelevant when a different manager comes to the fore. Thus, unrealistic, aggregate person specifications disconnected from the job in hand, not only make life difficult for applicants but also harm the company.

P.P. 17/06/2009 - I just encountered a new record for the number of requirements on a job specification. This one, which is actually a lower-ranked job than the previous record holder (36 Essential and 10 Desirable requirements). This one has a total of 38 Essential and 10 Desirable requirements. It is clear that whoever wrote the specification clearly cannot tell the difference between every task you might be assigned in the job and what the necessary skills are to undertake it. Whatever they might assume, there is a difference. To me all of this signals that more staff across companies need to be trained in how to recruit (and interview) effectively to save wasting their, the company's and the applicants' time.

Another phenomenon is that even with jobs which being advertised to the general public and are not internal posts, you are asked to show evidence that you have experienc of their particular, named committees, which not having ever worked there is impossible. This may be suggesting that really they only want internal candidates and yet have felt or been compelled to advertise more broadly, or, I believe more likely, that no-one has proof-read the specifications before they are sent out. For one the other day, which only had 20 Essential requirements, a number of skills were repeated down the page so responding to each in turn I found that I was repeating myself. It is a waste of time for the recruiters as well as for the applicants. Employers, please take far more care over your job specifications. In my experience, you can reduce your requirements by a fifth simply by removing duplication.