No your OP came across dripping with arrogance, the kind of arseholes I have turned down aplenty in my life, no matter how "good" their offers seemed.
In any case, you were honest, and I would not work for your company, even if I had no job and you were the last employer on the earth. Backpedalling now is not going to make me think any different about the company you represent, and as we all know, this is SA, where being in a crappy job is the rule, rather than the exception.
so now you are calling me an arsehole because i was honest in what we are looking for?
I am not backpeddaling at all. You can be entitled to your opinion, which makes no sense. You would rather not have a job than work for a company you know absolutely nothing about? Makes a lot of sense that.
Being in a crappy job is the rule? Then you are in the wrong job. Again, if you dont like the position, why even post here?
Why was my original post arrogant? I merely stated what we are looking for. Someone who actually can do the work instead of memorizing a bunch of test papers
/EDIT/ Im adding this, maybe my original post came across badly. I dont know, it is possible. I did try make it a bit light hearted but maybe that was missed. I guess I am tired of having to interview people who want everything handed on a plate to them and are shocked that they are actually goign to have to work. My intention was to be pretty straight forward with the requirements so that you know before making the drive if its for you or not. Interestingly, I have had people respond, they focused on the vendor neutral part, project based work etc. I guess people see the parts that they want to.
I dont really understand posting here though unless you want clarification. The aggression was surprising, I certainly dont go look at job adds and then get all aggressive at the person posting because I dont think its a good deal. But, maybe its good to have these opinions so that anyone reading the ad gets a different opinion and see's something they might not have thought of.
In any case, although i disagree with your points, i am sure they have made some people think a little further if they would want to do something like this. Which in term saves them a trip and me an hour interview that probably wont lead to anything
Unfortunately , when dealing with the people you actually want to hire (not the brain dumped variety) , you will find that they are pretty smart people. They are not easy to coax into a bad deal.
BS refers to your lack of understanding of the current marketplace for IT staff , which you have clearly displayed by your post. This lack of understanding may not be your fault , and it may not be your job , but then don't post job ads.
How do you know this is a bad deal? maybe come for an interview and find out for yourself? I am not coaxing anyone anywhere either, I was pretty plain and forthcoming about the job. Again, if you are interested apply, if not dont.
I understand the market place fairly well, and understand what we need in a team member fairly well.
For instance , you mention overtime , and the fact that IT staff need to just get over being asked to work for free.
What you fail to understand is that you simply cannot make that demand of employees anymore because good IT workers are in demand and dont have to take it. And they are gaining market power by the day. There are plenty of employers who structure their jobs in a 9-5 way and hire more workers if the load demands more time than that. They spend the money , and employees stay.
The nature of our business is after hours work. The changes and work we do has high impact and needs to be performed after hours. this is not hidden from the engineer and we are upfront about the amount of overtime worked. We cannot structure work as 9-5 all the time, it simply isnt possible. We do give flexi time and freedoms from sitting 9-5 though as i mentioned earlier. If an engineer wants overtime, dont apply for the job?
As such , required overtime is no longer a demand companies can make. You can try , but then you will simply get rejected in favour of employers who don't make that demand. So , when you make that demand , it gets labelled as BS. An hour here or there is OK , but any kind of sustained overtime will make employees move.
Again, overtime is discussed before joining the company. Did i mention there is huge amounts? No, so you have no idea exactly the amount that is worked. I just said there would be overtime and if thats a problem the job isnt for you.
Agreed, overtime cannot be demanded, but this is discussed before employment and you either accept that sometimes we simply cannot do our work during normal hours and you may have to work outside of traditional hours.
Nobody has "time to give" , no matter how young or old.You are going to have to pay if you want peoples time who have the ability to execute. Currently , it looks like you're not paying enough as the people you want are not attracted to the position.You mention you hired youngsters who took no action and got nothing done. If you want those who are learning , why complain when their ability to execute is constrained?
Actually everyone has time to give. It just depends on whether you are willing to sacrifice personal time for work. Again, thats a choice that should be made before joining. It is certainly harder for me to sacrifice this time when I have a daughter and thats something i work on. You have no idea what we pay or the kind of people who are at our company. I think the ratio of CCIE's to employee's would surprise you.
There is nothing wrong with young people learning, I even mention we mentor them side by side. But there are issues with young people who brain dump, expect large salaries and dont want to work hard for them.
I don't have a dog in this fight , nor do I think any of you are bad people. I'm just pointing out how your expectations are unrealistic. Time to sit down with your boss and give him a reality check.
Fair enough, I think if you judged me a bad person because I tried to get more C.V.s for someone to join the team I am in, and pretty much told it like it is instead of making it look awesome only to screw someone over once they joined, then you would be a fool.
I also dont think the expectations are unrealistic. If you really button down what I thought we needed:
someone who can actually do what their certification says
someone willing to work overtime (i didnt mention how much), and based on my experience in this field, you will always work overtime (the unpaid is an issue for some people, agreed)
doesnt mind doing physical labour when necessary
someone who wants to learn diverse skills
someone who isnt against africa travel
I dont think any of this is unrealistic?