Employment Prejudice @ Southern Humboldt Community Credit Un

For some reason, Craigslist is blocking me:

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Employment Prejudice @ Southern Humboldt Community Credit Union


I was checking out the 'Jobs' section, on Craigslist, last December, when I saw that a bank in Garberville was looking for a computer support person.

The Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt was offering up to $90,000, for the right person:


<i><u>Information Systems Manager (Garberville, CA)</u>

Our growing credit union is looking for your IT/IS experience! Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt is accepting applications for an Information Systems Manager. The IS Manager will be responsible for maintaining Credit Union networks, servers, operating systems and communication links. Also included is a wide variety of tasks involved with managing staff and resources dedicated to supporting office automation, PCs and end user equipment, network and systems security, and database administration, as well as establishing and maintaining relationships with support vendors and maintenance business partners.

Minimum requirements include a BS/BA (or equivalent) in a relevant field and at least two years' experience in a financial institution. We offer a generous and comprehensive benefits package and a great work environment.

A full job description is available upon request. You may access and submit an application through our website www.ccush.org, Tools tab, then choose "Employment Application."

compensation: $65,000-$90,000 annually, DOE</i>


So I applied to the position.

I applied three different ways:

1) I sent an email directly to the person who posted the ad, via Craigslist's anonymous mail forwarding mechanism.


<i>To fkpcb-6775967950 -AT- job.craigslist.org
Sent Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 1:52 PM

Janet,

I'm writing in response to your ad on Craigslist for an information systems manager.

I've been professionally managing information systems, full time, seven days a week, for over thirty years.

I started out as a career employee but over thirty years I've seen a lot of layoffs, especially in 2000, and 2008. So I've spent the past decade or so doing a lot of contracting. But it's not my preference. I have kids. I'd prefer stability.

I started out as a UNIX systems administrator, got into network administration, worked for a few database companies and got trained in database administration, worked for a few banks (Wells Fargo, Fremont Bank) and brokerages (Charles Schwab, RCM, Hambrecht &amp; Quist), did a lot of work in Silicon Valley (GE, NET, AMPEX, Cirrus Logic, Friendfinder, PG&amp;E, Roche, etc).

I don't have a CISSP but I could get one if you'd like. I've been doing server, desktop, network, and perimeter security for over thirty years, too. I installed Tripwire, on Windows NT, for Fremont Bank, for instance, and tuned the policies.

My oldest daughter is going to school at HSU, and I live in Fortuna. I could move closer to Garberville, if needed.

I've attached my resume to this email, and I will strive to apply via the web-based application mechanism cited in your Craigslist ad - but, I must confess that I get a trifle impatient when business logic requires me to enter my entire work history, and that same business logic declines to take note of the fact that said work history spans three decades, and the data entry of which, into the web form, manually, represents a nontrivial amount of uncompensated labor.

It's much easier to just email you my resume.</i>


2) I found the email address for the Human Resources Department, at https://www.ccush.org/Tools/Employment-Application, and sent the HR department an email, directly, as well, saying the same thing.

<i>To hr -AT- ccush.org
Sent Sunday, December 30, 2018 at 1:58 PM</i>


This was replied to:


<i>From     hr -AT- ccush.org
Sent Monday, December 31, 2018 at 10:04 AM

Thank you for your interest in employment at Community Credit Union. While I can appreciate your desire to not invest a "nontrivial amount of uncompensated labor" into an application process, you should realize that there are other purposes for a formal application besides listing your job history.

Thank you for submitting an application.

Janet Sanchez
Senior Vice President
Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt</i>


3) I also applied via the credit union's web site.


As described above, the business logic of Southern Humboldt Community Credit Union requires that one tediously enter every single friggin' detail of every single friggin' place one has ever worked for one's entire life history.

If you've ever filled out a job application, you know that the employment history is the hardest part.

If you've ever filled out a web-based implementation of the older paper job application form, but virtualized, so that one never runs out of 'pages' ... then you know that it can take much longer to fill out a web-based employment history, than it does to fill out a comparable paper history.

I have spent the better part of a day filling out such job applications - only to never hear anything back.

I can not afford to waste an entire day applying for just one job. Nobody can!

If you've been on this miserable planet for half a century, like I have, and you've been working in information technology, as an adult, for over 30 years, then you, too probably have a job history that that goes back several decades.

I explained this pretty clearly:


<i>To hr -AT- ccush.org
Sent Monday, December 31, 2018 at 10:41 AM

Dear HR person with a secret, inner life,

Have you ever spent an entire day cutting-and-pasting 30 years of experience into a different format?

I cannot afford to spend an entire day applying for just one job. Nobody can. Do the math. You're a bank. Numbers are your thing.

You need to take a step back and realize that your entire application infrastructure is designed for people with a relatively short employment history. Is that what you want to attract? People with LITTLE OR NO EXPERIENCE?

Just because everyone else is doing it doesn't mean you're doing the right thing. You are following the herd. Moo! Why not try being a leader, instead of a follower?

There are hundreds of web-based recruiting sites that have realized that and expedite the application process by just requiring a resume and contact information. They will read the resume. If they have questions they will call. If you were to ditch that tedious 1980s-era form-based approach, you would find that you were in good company.

You need to take ANOTHER step back and realize that banks like yours have been attracting and recruiting excellent candidates, WITHOUT requiring an Internet web page to capture all that precious information that is already on my resume, for, oh, somewhere between one hundred and maybe five thousand years.

The fact is, your web-based procedure is DRIVING GOOD PEOPLE AWAY.

Honest Injun: I was supporting Sybase HR back in 1995 and 1996. They used a piece of software called Resumix, which could receive resumes via email, even FAX. It scanned the resumes in. It did OCR. It parsed the contents and put everything in the database, automatically, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It could work with a bunch of different databases - Oracle, Sybase, Ingres, others. I supported it, upgraded it, trained its users - along with dozens of other responsibilities.

(If it's not on my resume, it's because I got dinged for having a resume that was too long and loaded down with too much obsolete technology and buzzwords. It's not because I'm trying to hide anything. It's because employers DON'T want to know. I did a slash-and-burn and removed everything from before 2000. No matter what I do, it's wrong. C'est la vie. If you want the full resume, let me know.)

You are asking me to manually do what people have been doing automatically, in seconds, with computers, for over a fifth of a century. Why?

I applaud you for taking the time to reply, so that I can articulate this problem, in detail.

Now, please do me, and yourself, a favor, and itemize exactly what those "other purposes" are, that the formal application procedure enshrines. What value do they add? Is there any other way to achieve the same end?

If you are saying that your recruitment process is designed to eliminate those whom are unconventional, how do you plan to attract and retain a systems manager who is unconventional enough to keep your bank from being hacked?

Do you think such people grow on trees?</i>


Because Janet Sanchez didn't seem to have too much experience with Human Resources websites, I gave her concrete examples of what I referred to:


<i>To hr -AT- ccush.org
Sent Wednesday, January 2, 2019 at 7:22 PM

Janet,

Here is a URL to an HR website that only wants my resume and my contact information.

https://boards.greenhouse.io/thousandeyes/jobs/1144862?gh_src=k2no7b441#app

The URL was acquired via GlassDoor.com, the premiere recruiting website:

https://www.glassdoor.com/Job/san-francisco-site-reliability-engineer-jobs-SRCH_IL.0,13_IC1147401_KO14,39.htm?fromAge=7&amp;jl=2787834142&amp;ja=87234076&amp;jaguid=000001680fdc6d9f94bcba7f38b4b5e7&amp;pos=101&amp;srs=EMAIL_JOB_ALERT&amp;utm_source=jobalert&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=jobAlertAlert&amp;utm_content=ja-jobtitle&amp;utm_term=

Clearly, human resources professionals on the other side of the Redwood Curtain do not see things as you do.

Please explain to me why you need to make applying for a job with your bank so cumbersome and complicated?</i>


I didn't hear anything back, and so I sent another email:


<i>To hr -AT- ccush.org
Sent    Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 8:35 AM

Janet,

Do you intend to schedule an interview for me or have you decided that I am not a candidate that you would care to interview?

Please advise.</i>


Apparently, Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt believes that talented IT people are so common that they can afford to ignore seasoned professionals:


<i>From     hr -AT- ccush.org
Sent Thursday, January 3, 2019 at 3:07 PM

Thank you for your interest in employment at Community Credit Union. At this time we have opted to move forward with other applicants. I wish you well in your search for employment.

Janet Sanchez
Senior Vice President
Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt</i>


Coincidentally, Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt also pulled their Craigslist ad.


Sooo ... if you encounter problems with Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt's information technology infrastructure ... you now know why.

It's my suspicion that when the Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt refused to accept my web-based application because it was incomplete, that the responsible individual - Janet Sanchez - purposely ignored my other two applications as well as the information contained in my resume, because she was intent upon hiring another, preferred candidate - nepotism, perhaps - and did not want her preferred candidate's candidacy interfered with by my application - so she ignored it.

It is also my position that when Janet Sanchez ignored my application because it was allegedly incomplete, that she rode roughshod over the very Human Resources regulations, that are intended to protect vulnerable citizens, which she is being paid to enforce:


<b>Title I of the ADA requires an employer to provide reasonable accommodation to qualified individuals with disabilities who are employees or applicants for employment, except when such accommodation would cause an undue hardship.

https://www.eeoc.gov/policy/docs/accommodation.html</b>


Apparently reading my resume is undue hardship ... and Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt's Human Resources Department can only process web-based job applications, having forgotten everything that they did in the 20th century.

It's not clear if I am a qualified individual, under these guidelines - although, I have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, as a result of some previous abuse by another, even worse employer, in Silicon Valley, back in 1992 and 1993 - so I might very well qualify.

No, what <b><u>IS</u></b> clear is that Janet Sanchez does not regard these rules as relevant to her duties and made no effort to accommodate my disability to fill out 30 years' worth of employment experience.

Perhaps she did not want to fill out 30 years' worth of employment history, either!

Maybe Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt doesn't WANT good people; perhaps they find it convenient to blame "the computer".

Food for thought, comrades.

In the old days this would have been grounds for a lawsuit but because today's lawyers do not see any value in enforcing the law, and Humboldt County's legal community is riddled with criminals, liars, and frauds ... I find it more satisfying to present my case to the court of public opinion.

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