“My interviewer said she looked forward to talking soon. Is that a sign I’m getting the job?”
“My job interview seemed to go great—but then they said they’d get back to me even if I don’t get the job. Is that a bad sign?”
“They said they were looking for someone with more experience—should I not have even applied in the first place?”
Having received antsy emails like this from job seekers for a decade and a half now, I’ve concluded that job searching is so anxiety-producing that it drives otherwise reasonable people to seek—and convince themselves they’ve found—hidden meaning in the most mundane of communications with employers. It’s the kind of overanalysis that’s common in dating (“When he said he likes kids, was he signaling that he wants to settle down quickly?”).
The power dynamics of job searching can be so imbalanced and so high-stakes—since job seekers’ ability to pay their rent may depend on the outcome—that it’s no wonder people parse the words of every communication from employers too, trying to ferret out signs about their chances. Here are a few more examples of people tying themselves in knots:
I called today to follow up after what I felt was a great round of interviews. They told me that they are interviewing more candidates and will get back with me. Is this a nice way of them telling me I am no longer in the running for the job? If so, why can’t they just come out and say that?
A job was posted on Dec. 12. I applied on Dec. 16. Got called for an interview on Dec. 17. Then the job was removed on Dec. 18. During the interview the interviewer said that they will get back with me at the beginning of January. Are these good signs?
This person is even trying to parse meaning based on who their interviewer cc’d on a follow-up email:
After my final round interview, the interviewer told me that they would get back to me in the next few weeks. I emailed two weeks later, on a Friday morning, reiterating my enthusiasm and asking if I could get a sense of their new timeline. The interviewer emailed back on Monday, saying they would get back to me sometime this week. My interviewer CC’d the office manager and regional HR head, as well as another manager who I had interviewed with previously. What does this mean? I know I’m trying to read tea leaves here.
The majority of these jittery queries say, essentially, “My interviewer said (clear statement about timeline or next steps), but what does that really mean?” And in most cases, what it really means is (clear statement about timeline or next steps). If an interviewer says hiring is taking longer than they expected and they need a few more weeks … it probably means hiring is taking longer than they expected and they need a few more weeks. If they say they need to finish more interviews before they can give you an answer … it probably means they need to finish more interviews before they can give you an answer.
Of course, there are times when an employer doesn’t give candidates the full story and something more interesting is happening behind the scenes, but the majority of the time, candidates should just take these messages at face value.
An awful lot of candidates respond to routine timeline updates by wondering if it really means that all hope is lost:
I was invited by a company for a job which was not posted yet—most likely I was the first candidate. After the first round, I was invited for the final round. They came back to me on time and said, “You made a good impression but we want to see more candidates, so this will take time, two to four weeks.” Can I already be considered as being rejected?
The answer here is no. Of course you would prefer that they tell you simply that you’ve gotten the job. But employers are generally pretty comfortable rejecting applicants and don’t tend to hide behind weeks of “We need more time.” If they’re ready to reject you, they’ll just reject you (or realistically, they might not bother getting back to you at all). They’re unlikely to invite prolonged contact by continually emailing you to say there’s no decision yet.
Conversely, while some candidates see rejection looming everywhere, others are too quick to see signs of an impending job offer. They assume that statements like “You’re a great fit for this job” or even just “We’re looking forward to talking soon” mean “We will be offering you the job.” When an interviewer says, “This is where your office would be,” the candidate may hear, “This is where your office will be.” Then, when an offer doesn’t materialize, the candidate is frustrated and feels misled—even if the interviewer’s statements had been par for the course in the process of meeting potential employees.
Rejections themselves can really bring out the tea-leaf-reading behavior in us. I regularly hear from people who received a job rejection that uses very mundane rejection language, and they nonetheless are trying to parse meaning from it. The messages I get range from “They said my qualifications were impressive—does that mean they think they can’t afford me?” to “They rejected me after only a few days—does that mean they think I was an awful candidate?” The truth is that most of the time, rejection notices carry no message whatsoever beyond “We are not offering you this job.” They’re just form letters that the company sends to hundreds of candidates.
It’s obviously a reflection of how fraught and opaque job hunting feels that candidates are primed to see hidden messages throughout the process. Some of that is on employers for not being more transparent; job seekers would probably have a lot more chill if, for example, employers spelled out each step in their hiring process from the very start, along with anticipated timelines (although those are notoriously likely to change), and if they more reliably and quickly closed the loop with candidates they decided not to hire. But a lot of it is simply the nature of job hunting: It’s taxing, the stakes are high, and it’s not always in either side’s interest to be 100 percent transparent while candidate evaluation is ongoing. But a determined resolve to take communications at face value would go a long way toward easing job seekers’ stress.
