Your Hiring Process Is Broken
Companies are losing strong candidates to outdated recruitment practices.
There was a time when administrative roles were among the most stable and straightforward positions to land. You showed up with solid skills, a professional demeanor, and a proven track record of keeping an office running smoothly. That was enough to get serious consideration.
Now, candidates are facing six-stage interviews for entry-level roles, job postings that linger online for months, and hiring managers who seem disconnected or outright indifferent during the process.
Why This Feels Different Now
The question looming over many job seekers is whether this isolation and indifference is becoming the standard.
Are hiring processes becoming needlessly complicated to satisfy internal policies rather than identify real talent?
Are managers checking boxes instead of genuinely evaluating candidates?
Is leadership forgetting what administrative roles actually require. And how vital a good fit is for both sides?
Why Candidates Are Walking Away
The most troubling part is that many talented professionals aren’t rejecting the job because of the work itself. They’re rejecting the culture revealed by the process.
Candidates see managers who seem disinterested or unprepared.
The lengthy, impersonal interview formats suggest a lack of clarity about what’s really needed.
The overall tone suggests that the human element -- the very thing that makes an admin invaluable -- has been stripped away.
The Disconnect: Complaining Without Correcting
What makes this worse is the constant refrain from leadership that “no one wants to work anymore.” Yet, many of these same managers fail to recognize their own role in driving candidates away.
Job descriptions are often poorly written, signaling burnout, chaos, or unrealistic expectations.
Interview processes are impersonal and drawn out, designed to filter people rather than identify genuine talent.
Compensation frequently fails to match the scope of responsibility, leaving candidates asking why they’d give their best when the offer suggests their work isn’t valued.
This mismatch between what companies expect and what they offer is a self-inflicted hiring problem. One that can’t be fixed by blaming applicants.
The Hard Truth
If this continues, businesses will keep struggling to fill critical administrative roles. Not because of a talent shortage, but because of a leadership shortage in how those roles are recruited for and valued.
Hiring is the first impression of company culture. When it’s rushed, overly prolonged, thoughtless, or detached, it tells candidates everything they need to know about what working there will feel like.
Until managers start putting real effort into the process, like writing clear, realistic descriptions, interviewing like they value people, and offering pay that reflects expectations, these roles will stay open.
Leadership is a rare skill, and most people in general don't possess it, let alone hiring managers. So much hiring of the hiring process is completely backwards, now. Some hiring methods actually select for traits that are actively harmful to the company!! Lying on resumes, inflating experience, and an extroverted salesman-esque attitude are the norm, and quiet, head-down introverts are passed up entirely, when those kinds of people are the backbone of any organization. Sad to see, but fantastic post.