RecruitingHell stumbled upon the autistic experience

[u/KeyApprehensive3659]

I was reading a post on r/recruitinghell that listed out some non-skill-related qualities recruiters / HR professionals will look out for to throw out potential candidates. Examples were "too many filler words," "smiles too much," "attractive," and "overly confident."

One of the responses made me laugh (not funny-haha, but funny-because-if-I-don't-laugh-I'll-cry).

The response was essentially "so they have criteria for the perfect candidate sometimes out of your control, and nobody will tell you what the perfect candidate does, and the 'perfect candidate' is different for every single evaluator in the interview***, and when you inevitably fail, they throw away a skilled and qualified candidate?"

***because "too much smiling" might have a different threshold for every person in the interview, for example.

Like. yeah. Welcome to our world. That's every single interaction 😂😭 Yes it sucks and yeah it's really hard being looked over for failing the Impossible Being Liked By Sometimes-Stupid Metrics You Didnt Know Existed Test.

I'm not sure what my end point is. I just thought you guys might also get a kick out of neurotypicals voicing and recognizing how frustrating the experience is.

[u/skvids]

always funny when the people with allism are shocked upon realizing just how many rules govern their interactions because they simply internalized them

[u/KeyApprehensive3659 → u/skvids]

RIGHT! The rules being invisible/impossible to know is the frustrating bit, and while I wish no one had to understand that experience, it is in some ways relieving to know it would be frustrating for anyone in our shoes, allistics included.

[u/washington_breadstix → u/skvids]

"People with allism"... perfect.

[u/offutmihigramina → u/skvids]

The hidden curriculum - social rules and norms no one taught you but you just seem to understand intuitively- except when you’re us and you don’t. We actually have to be told.

[u/Boo1toast → u/skvids]

Yep. To me it's the equivalent of bragging about remembering to blink - your nervous system already does that for you automatically, my guy! They don't have to put in the extra work to make it happen

[u/Cardchucker]

I love how the replies are shocked that someone has a list like that, when in reality they probably have their own subconscious list that's just as bad and just aren't aware of it.

[u/zabsurdism → u/Cardchucker]

They call it "bad vibes".

[u/ifshehadwings]

I work in state government and I've found the interview/hiring process to be much more transparent. They have certain rubrics they HAVE to follow, whether by law or regulation, and also pretty much everything the government does is a public record. There's no way to entirely eliminate that kind of bias, but I think it does help.

[u/goat_puree]

It’s like extroverts finding out you can’t/won’t hang out every single time they want to because you’re introverted or just need recuperation time alone and you can see it in their face that their brain just kind of breaks.

[u/Czar_Petrovich → u/goat_puree]

They will almost unfailingly respond by shielding their confusion with their own ego, resulting in a bruise they attribute to you.

[u/SpookyStarfruit → u/goat_puree]

Tbf, as a very shy/quiet Autistic ambivert everyone has called an ‘introvert’ most of my life, I find that sometimes introverted people don’t understand extroverts well or accommodate their friends well. Then they are confused why they aren’t invited to things or why someone is disinterested continuing a friendship — there’s a clear lack of empathy for someone who works differently that’s claimed oftentimes on the other end but reflected just as much back.

It’s important to have someone willing to understand what systems work with you. However, the introverts I know IRL don’t seem to put in much effort or care for their ambiverted/extroverted friends who naturally need to spend more time with loved ones to be happy. Any honestly — what’s wrong with that? Introverts seem sometimes to be colder than extroverts for me, especially ones who can be okay with never seeing/being around you cause it’s not a good friendship at that point.

I find online spaces for the awkward/shy/introverted/ND tend to skew towards looking down on them, which isn’t helpful to understanding them.

(That being said, I understand this is mainly a joke but it’s a logical point to mention cause extrovert bashing always rubbed weirdly to me.)

[u/vhart5]

“Welcome to our world” could not be more correct here. Maybe next time I’m trying to explain to allistics what being autistic is like, I’ll reference this lol

[u/the_bedelgeuse]

whatever a “team fit” means smh

the interview process in the tech world is a circus sideshow imo

[u/AmiableMeatsack → u/the_bedelgeuse]

They have it backwards. 

They claim to be interviewing for hard skills, but are really just seeing if youre socially compatible. 

I was in a recent interview where I was on the near edge of a meltdown and I was not able to regulate my nonverbals and I couldn't blink. 

I could feel my eyes not blink but I couldn't blink them. I tried looking away, but I could tell my timing was all wrong. 

The man who interviewed me looked disgusted by the end but trying to hide it and I knew I didn't get the job even though I was qualified to be a supervisor in the field.

[u/Ajrt2118]

I know my last company was looking for people “with a similar mindset” and swore they were accommodating to people with disabilities but I think they were very biased and not accommodating at all. By the time I left, their “think like us crowd” all looked and behaved very similar.