Last year 500 open positions were posted for the company
34 people were hired
The other 466 jobs were never real
The role listed was Head of Talent Acquisition
What was acquired was data, not people
Resumes, salary expectations, skill sets, market intelligence
160,000 applicants gave career histories for free
The data was used to benchmark compensation
Not to raise salaries
To confirm pay was below market and maintain the gap
This was called "building a talent pipeline"
A pipeline that is built and never turned on
Recruiters call it "passive sourcing"
There is nothing passive about wasting 160,000 people's time
But it reads like a strategy
Some listings have been up for 11 months
One has been posted for two years — for a "Director of Innovation"
There is no innovation department and no budget
The listing simply creates the appearance of growth
Investors see open roles and infer momentum
Stock rose 8% after 200 jobs were posted in one week
No hires were made that week or the next
An applicant tracking system auto-rejects 95% of applicants based on keywords
The keywords are unknown — the system was configured in 2019 by a contractor who is gone and never updated
Some applicants spend hours customizing resumes; the system reads them for six seconds then sends a rejection email
"After careful consideration."
There was no consideration
Sometimes the same job is reposted with a different title — "Senior Data Analyst" becomes "Data Analytics Lead" — same description, same salary, same lack of hires
Reposting resets the posting date, fresh listings get more applicants, more applicants mean more data, more data improves benchmarking, better benchmarking produces a slide for the quarterly review
The CFO asked about hiring efficiency; the answer was "optimizing for quality over speed" — quality here means no hires, speed means no intention to hire
HR asked about candidate experience and was shown an NPS of 12 out of 100, described as "within industry range" — the industry range was invented and unchecked
A candidate who had applied to four roles over eight months with customized resumes and cover letters never heard back and was directed to an automated FAQ claiming "We value every application" — the reality was valuing every data point, not every applicant
Promotion metrics looked strong: 500 roles posted, 160,000 applicants captured, cost per acquisition: $0 — no one was acquired, but zero looks good on a dashboard
Dashboards get presented, presentations get approved, approvals lead to promotion — a VP of Talent by Q4 is expected
Talent isn't found; it is collected, like a jar that is never opened
haha yeah that kermit vibe captures it perfectly - the dark side we all secretly love