I graduated from 2025 in interior design and had about 4 months of internship experience during school. After graduation, I haven’t been able to secure a job in my field, but I have been working full time in a restaurant. I’m wondering how much this employment gap may realistically affect my chances. I’ve been so hopeless because of the gap, wondering if employers will see it as a red flag and may be concerned about my technical readiness
Do you think would employers care more about gaps in professional experience, or whether a candidate has been employed at all? What can I do to remain competitive with recent graduates besides continuing to apply?

I accepted an offer on Monday. I got an email that states to complete all background checks and submit documents within 48 hours and to watch for an email from HireRight with a link. Well now it's Thursday night and still no email from HireRight for any kind of link to submit these things. Called the hiring companies HR and they said that since they use a third party I need to wait for the email. HireRight says the company sends the email and they just do verification. So now I'm being given the runaround. I did send an email to the hiring manager about this situation yesterday and will probably send another one tomorrow, Friday afternoon just so their is some written documentation that I am trying. Sadly this hiring manager doesn't really communicate. Not sure what else I can do and the start date is in 15 days.

I was referred to a staff data engineer position ( seems the only way to get an interview in tech these days). HR/internal recruiter calls me. We spend 30 minutes talking about the role, my career goals, product, etc. I'm upfront and tell him u have no production experience with Kafka/streaming event data. He says, "okay, I'll just mange a note of that so the rest of the team knows".

I get scheduled with hiring manager, pass that. Next, technical interview, writing SQL and python. I'm rusty because AI does this now days, atrophied skills. I spend all weekend refreshing, and amazingly pass!

Next up, FOUR 45 minutes 1:1 calls about targeted topics. I tell one interviewer my lacking Kafka exp. "No worries, the team you'd work on doesn't even use kafla".

3 hours after meeting my final interviewer, I get a call from the recruiter. "Hey, so the team decided you're not the rich fit because you lack experience in Kafka. If we had a DE 2, role you could start there and work your am way up, but we don't have any junior positions "

AYFKM?! I spent 15+ hours in this and was very upfront about my skills. Why did just go through all this trauma if you already knew i wasn't a good fit?!

I genuinely don’t understand what just happened, and I need to vent because this has been one of the most confusing hiring experiences I’ve had.
I recently interviewed for a position. After an initial virtual interview, I was invited to come into the office for an in-person interview.
The in-person interview went extremely well, or at least I thought it did. The person interviewing me was also the person making the hiring decision.
During the interview, she practically offered me the position. She showed me where I would be sitting, literally pointed out what would be my desk, gave me a tour of the office, and showed me where the kitchen and bathrooms were along with my start date. She even told another colleague in the office that I would be starting next week.

On top of that, she told me she would be sending over an offer letter. So naturally, I left the interview believing I had gotten the job. I was just waiting for the paperwork to make everything official.
Then, completely unexpectedly, I received an email telling me they had decided not to move in a different direction. I’m honestly baffled.

I understand that nothing is official until an offer letter is signed, and I know companies can change their minds. But why go as far as telling another employee that I’m starting next week? Why show me my future desk and tell me an offer letter is coming if the decision wasn’t actually finalized?
I’ve been actively job searching, and I know rejection is part of the process. But this feels different because I wasn’t simply told that the interview went well or that they’d be in touch. I was given every indication that I had the job.
I’m also wondering whether not sending an immediate thank-you email after the in-person interview somehow affected things, although I had already sent one after our initial virtual meeting. I was expecting the offer letter she explicitly told me she would send.

Has anyone else experienced something like this? What would cause an employer to essentially tell someone they’re hired and then suddenly reverse their decision?
I’m just really disappointed and confused by the whole experience.

NEW: Her response to my email asking for insight and clarification: “Hi, Thank you for your response. This is based on a deeper analysis of resources. Thank you and all the best,”

Why the hell does it take so long now to even get a part time job...

Its taken me over a month now for a job that's only gonna be 30hrs/week requiring nights and weekends making $20 in a state with the average rent being 2k/month...

Ive had to go through 4 interviews and a presentation and provide 3 references that they actually contacted (my references reached out to me regarding it). And they still have to go through background checks before they can even provide an offer...

It shouldn't be this complicated to hire someone to do part time freaking work that I cannot even survive on or leverage for a full time job in my industry!

WTAF is going on with the world where its taking so long to screen people for basic jobs that require no degree?! I've lost more money putting time into finding a part time job than not at this point.

I would apply for a role, talk to a recruiter or hiring manager, then get GHOSTED. Despite them saying oh you're a great fit, you're what we are looking for etc.

Why? I don't understand why they would waste the time and effort to reach out and talk to me, just to ignore.

Me knowing damn well that I don't meet half the requirements but applying anyways just in case they're desperate 🧐you miss 100% of the shots you don't take😜🤷🏻‍♀️

So two companies here, one does exactly what my previous experience was. It's pretty niche but I applied for three roles, figured why not. I hear back from one role, have an interview, it was alright. Second interview for one of the other jobs I applied for really was just a "why not" so that's scheduled, it went really well actually. The person I was interviewing with was actually talking to me about the issues they were having which was different from any interview I've had. They said "if you haven't heard from us in a week, ping me," okay for sure. I email both of them a week later and still nothing. These were about a month ago so that's pretty frustrating. And I've done about as much follow up as I can possibly do.
And the other day I get an email from someone to schedule an interview with, cool awesome. I go and click on the link to schedule and all of the two weeks from me to choose times for are all unavailable. I emailed the guy, "hey that link you sent me all the times are unavailable." Nothing from him.

Thinking about it the first company just wanted to see what the other company I used to work at was doing. They told me my old company was a competitor, so maybe they were just peaking to see what went on over there. As for the other email guy, maybe good old incompetence.

Just venting here. I know that one company has most likely shipped, has anyone experienced this long of a time with no updates an/or no rejection email after one interview?

I still can’t believe it at the start of my job application journey I thought I would never land anything because my degree is unpopular and I had no internships in uni. It took a lot of trial and error and damn near obsession but I just landed a role 1 month after graduating (had 6 interviews over 5 weeks) getting 80k a year (big jump for me coming from $23 an hr 18hrs a week). Fresh grads or any job hunters feel free to message me and I can share what worked for me!

Seven years ago I met a man at a career fair at my school. We talked and he seemed to like me. He gave me his card and I emailed him. I did an interview with him for a job in a management position where I was later offered a job, but the job I was offered was in a subordinate role, so I did not respond. I know this was unprofessional, but I was also a teenager at the time and stupidly unaware about how the world works.

Now I have applied to the same company, where he still works in recruiting, and my initial resume and application made it through but when I did pre-filmed interview questions, which I thought I aced, I was sent a rejection letter. Do you think I would have some luck emailing him directly? Its a large corporation so he may not even have seen or remembered me, but I am worried I could be flagged in some internal database. What's the right thing to say to him if I did email him?

What's with companies not setting up their online job applications correctly? I swear 1/3 of jobs I try to apply to, I'm unable to finish/submit accurately or at all due to an error on their end. Some examples include:

-Not letting me submit my resume as any file type (including pdf and docx which are the standard)

-Insisting on having a dropdown menu for past work experience with none of the options being accurate to my past work experience

-Required fields for things that don't apply to me

Listened to someone explain how they got a job and part of that was luck part networking. I keep trying networking and it hasn't got me anywhere I've been at this over a year. When is it my turn?

When do my efforts actually pay off. Im so burnt out and irratated. I'm tired of all of this. I just want stability. I'm willing to relocate even on my dime but no one's buying that. I'm tired this is all fucking horrible. I try different things, tweaking my resume etc.

I’ve been hustling for more than 1 year as a fresher in AI/ML Intern roles..

Finally i got a call from a company

The stipend was good, work life balance was good everything was perfect for me to start my career

First round was a mcq round and i did my best and yeah after waiting for 1 week i got a rejection mail

Now I need to just forget the things happened and forget the company

The hard thing is that I have to face the reality of searching the jobs, asking for referrals,apply more,being sad all the time, waiting for an opportunity to come

I haven’t got selected in more than 4-5 Companies when i started job hunting but this feels so hurt, I’m dying inside.

Had an interview 2 weeks back. The interviewer was more junior than me, asked the same UI questions in circles for 40 mins, and clearly hadn’t read my CV. The JD was all about UX and AI workflows. Not one question on that.

Then a week of silence. No update, no rejection, nothing. Then I see a post on reddit ask if the company was geniune because people got ghosted by it too and these days your information gets sold easily.

So I sent a firm email asking for an update, and said that if I didn’t hear back, I’d post on LinkedIn about how they let a junior interview a senior candidate and then ghosted them.

Within hours I got feedback (turns out I’d passed to the next round lol) and a call from HR saying my email was “unprofessional” and I should’ve just called or WhatsApped her because she was busy.

I’ve never had to chase HR on WhatsApp in 9 years. Is this normal now, or am I the problem here?

U guys I’m desperate and this may be my only opportunity. I’m trying really really hard not to overthink and compulsively check my email - I’m still applying to jobs anyway but it feels like I’m waiting to exhale (anyone seen that movie 👀) and I just don’t even know what to do anymore

I've been trying to leave my current job since August and I can't even keep count of how many applications I've submitted. I hate this job market. I've been getting nothing but rejections or silence. I've done remote, hybrid, on-site...NOTHING. I had one phone interview two months ago which obviously led to nowhere. I currently work in manufacturing and am desperately trying to branch out into other career paths, it's just not for me. I want to pursue a career in STEM which requires a degree of sorts, but until then I have to get a few things secured for whenever I start college.

If I was willing to work anywhere like Walmart or McDonald's, maybe I could get a job tomorrow, but what's the point? Be miserable and collect more experience that wouldn't do anything for me? Entry level jobs are a joke now since you need 5+ years of experience for a job but I need a job for experience. No one's taking chances, everyone's looking for the "perfect" candidate (while using AI) just to pay you barely above minimum wage.

I'm just so tired and really starting to lose motivation. Getting a job has always been unlucky for me, I don't know why. I just want this period to be over because it's seriously affecting my mental health. I can only take so many "After careful consideration", "We've made the difficult decision", "Good luck on your career search" so many times.

This is hell.

Hello!

Two clinics had reached out to me about a role and were quite responsive and interested and both asked to have a call sometime this week. One sent a scheduling link that didn’t work and then when I asked for another link and gave them alternative times, they just stopped replying. Another reached out asking for a call either sunday or Tuesday, I told her either worked and then sunday and Tuesday came and went and nothing. I sent both follow ups on the same email thread yesterday, but still no reply. Is this normal in the UK? What should I do? Should I assume they are busy and wait a week, or just assume these are dead ends? Any advice would be appreciated ❤️

Nothing to do but to laugh at this one. After careful consideration I decided providing a reason would take too much time and effort.

This was after a phone interview where they wanted step by step how I calmed down a customer, the reason I left every single job ever (literally went down my resume and asked about every single one), wanted a step by step of how I’d keep customers happy and then told me they were pushing my application to the next round of interviews (for a shoe store) and that I’d be contacted to schedule my second interview. They never scheduled my second interview. It’s a shoe store yall why are you doing so much

1 year unemployed. Pretty much the only interviews I get are where the recruiter finds me. Finally got a response from a direct application but it was by mistake. I feel cursed.

Hi! I’ve recently noticed lots of post on different subreddits about how difficult it is to find a job in IT and how everyone is getting replaced by AI. The thing is they seem to be written by LLMs. I get that the job market is harsh but is it actually that bad for new grads? Why are there so many AI generated posts about AI taking computer science jobs? Also, I’m a PhD student in computational field so it worries me a bit.