Reading comments from other job seekers, I’m under the impression that a lot of us would very much appreciate being told when we weren’t selected for the job. Maybe I’m still younger than some of them, but I honestly can’t remember a time when it was commonplace to receive any kind of notification. I once applied to a job outside of the field, and the interviewer assured me unsolicited that they do call people to let them know if they were selected or not. They never called me. I learned after that that I should neither expect notification nor bother trying to obtain assurances that I’ll get any.
But really, of all of the complaints that us job seekers should have—the very shallow job pool (more of a job puddle, really), the mystery salaries, the low salaries—it seems odd to pick on notifications. Maybe this is the best we feel we can do? That was can never expect anything else to improve, but maybe if we raise our voices enough, more places will send out a nice little form letter or email? Maybe even with a real signature on the bottom if we’re extra blessed? I’m sorry, but with so many legitimate issues that exist when job hunting, it seems like nit-picking to bring this one up. You know why I don’t care if I get notified? Because if they never give me any kind of reply, that’s my answer. I figured it out all by myself. Actually, it somewhat annoys me to receive a notification of fuck off because it often happens 3-4 months after I apply for a job. Why even bother? Thanks guys, but I worked out that you didn't think I'd work out. You've given me no new information.
But I have noticed the lack of paper letters in just the past year. As I write this on Feb 2015, the last paper notification of what a loser I am came in on June 2014 (thanks, Santa Fe! I'm sorry I won't try your chili but I'm glad I won't encounter your scorpions). And I know that paper notification letter had been a thing even as recently as a couple of years ago, and I know that because I have a stack of them.
I’ve saved every single one of them since I began job hunting in 2008.
I’m not sure what my intentions were, exactly. Maybe I thought that when I got a job, I could look over every rejection letter and think: “you didn’t pick me, but I found someone who would.” Maybe I thought that one day when my niece or nephew is looking for a job and having a hard time, I’d be able to pull my rejection letters out of my filing cabinet and show them that people often don’t succeed their first try, but if they hang in there, good things will happen. Maybe I wanted to burn them all at once in some gleeful celebration. Maybe I wanted something to glare at when I drink (though my MLIS is filling that role nicely). I don’t know what I was thinking, but the point is I kept them, so I still have them, so I know they used to be a thing people sometimes received by mail.
And now it seems even more uncommon to receive them by mail than it was before. This is, of course, only my experience and personal experience counts for nothing. But since my experience is the one I’m writing about, here it is. My thoughts on saving rejection letters suffer the same problem as my thought to pursue a career in libraries: it was a nice thought, but ultimately unworkable.
