Before I go into my rant, I just want to say that I’m sure Craigslist still serves a purpose for many other visitors.

Now that that’s out of the way, I can now say that Craigslist is of no real use to me. I’ve gotten so much run-around from the job postings that it’s no longer worth it for me to check the site even once a week anymore. Posters post for the sake of posting and never follow up on what they were originally posting for. I’m not even going to go into the recent headlines where people have been killed when responding to a Craigslist post, like in the case of the “Craigslist Killer.”    

I’ve now been out of work since July and until the last week or so, I’d been visiting Craigslist daily, mostly in the web/info design section, in the hopes of finding a legitimate job opportunity. Instead, I’ve found nothing but ridiculous postings and scam artists. In one case, I replied to an ad where the poster just needed a “view-sourced” copy of his website. That’s all he asked for. We spoke a few times by phone and I made the copy of the site. He had made it clear that he had several more projects in the works so I didn’t even bother to charge for the copy. Took all of about 10 minutes for me to make the copy and I made the code available to him. In the meanwhile I started attending bartending school. We were still communicating by phone and when I finished bartending school he made the next project available to me. Sounds like my gamble paid off, right? Wrong. In my opinion, the next project amounted to nothing more than a pyramid scheme. I’m not going to get into any of the details of the site, but there was no way would I want my name associated with it. As a web designer/developer, my first request on a project is that I can either put a link to my site in the footer, list the project on my portfolio site, or both. Adding a link to their footer is primo though. So if I’m not willing to have my name associated with his site, I can’t put a link in his footer, can I?

Another example is a posting for an Assistant Web Developer that was posted last Wednesday or Thursday. I went through the very short job description that was posted and I was like, “wow, this is really something I can do!” So, I called the recruiter that was listed and drove the 45 minutes to get to the interview. I won’t list what the name of the recruiter was because I wouldn’t want to give anyone the wrong idea about the entire agency. This was just one office. Well, I walked into the office and was greeted from across the room by a receptionist that, in my opinion, didn’t have the first clue about how to dress for a professional office. She kept bouncing me from seat to seat and room to room, mumbling instructions that made me sound like an idiot for asking her to repeat them. In any event, I finally got to sit with the actual recruiter and had a very nice discussion with her about what my skills were and that I would be willing to travel to the job location for the expected 90-day contract for the rate they were offering and yes, I was available to start working on Monday. My appointment was at 9am. I had gotten back home at 11:30am or so and after I got comfortable, I checked Craigslist – nothing new had been posted. About 10am or so the next morning, I see a duplicate posting that had been posted at about 9:30am. So, at the risk of being paranoid, I called the recruiter to ask her what that was all about. She said, “Oh, not to worry. The client wants a pool of resumes.” Yeah, ok, no big deal. I know that employers like to draw from alot of resumes before narrowing down even for an interview.

So, imagine my surprise when I saw the posting listed again this past Thursday and Friday. This time when I called the recruiter and asked her whether or not I was even being considered for the job. If not, that’s fine. Just let me know so I don’t keep hounding the recruiter and wasting my time thinking I have a shot at the job. The reply? “Oh, no no. The client hasn’t finished collecting enough resumes to begin interviewing.” My reply? “Well, for a position that was supposed to start this past Monday, I’m guessing that I’m out of the running for the position.” I went on to say, “If you’re not getting enough responses or you’re not getting desirable candidates, maybe you should reconsider your posting on Craigslist. It’s free you know so it’s not like you have to worry about your word count.” Even if I wasn’t out of the running, I’m sure with that last comment I am now! (lol)

I mentioned before that I went to bartending school. I’ve already been a bartender, but that was so long ago and there were so few types of drinks that I actually made, I decided that I would take a stab at a profession that is mostly recession-proof. So I spent a week in training and had to memorize 130 drinks. I completed the training and passed the final at the end of August. This is now October. Bartending is a recession-proof profession, huh? Actually it is. However, you’re far more likely to find a bartending job if you’re 20-something, 5′7″ and 120 pounds. I’m so not any of those things! (lol) But, again, I look on Craigslist to see if there’s anything worthwhile to apply for. Unfortunately, 90% of the listings are looking for everything I’m not. To that end, I’m job hunting the old-fashioned way – walking into bars and asking to fill out an application.

Even though I have a particularly bad attitude toward Craigslist right now, I do have to admit that I did get one good gig last year. Not only was the client great to work with, we have a standing relationship and he’s gearing up for a new project in the next few weeks.