06 Mar FROM CARRIER PIGEONS TO EMAILS: A JOURNEY IN CIVIL ENGINEERING RECRUITMENT
Next month I will be celebrating my 27th year of recruiting #civilengineers. Do y’all remember the Grumpy Old Man character from SNL, famously noted for his “Back In My Day” ramblings? If not, be sure to pull some up on YouTube, they are classic. In any event, here is my version of recruiting’s “Back In My Day” ramblings:
👴 Back in my day, #recruiting was a whole different beast…
1️⃣ Nowadays, you kids have it easy with your fancy emails and text messaging. Back in my day, we didn’t have all that electronic mumbo jumbo. We’d send marketing and thank you letters by carrier pigeon, and if we were feeling really high-tech, we’d slap on a postage stamp!
2️⃣ Resumes and contracts? Ha! We didn’t have time for that nonsense. We’d fax ’em over faster than you could say “dial-up internet.” And let me tell ya, waiting for that fax confirmation was like watching paint dry.
3️⃣ The internet? Bah! When I started, the internet was just a twinkle in Al Gore’s eye. We’d have to trudge through snow, uphill both ways, to gather names from company voicemails. And cold calling? That was our bread and butter! We’d duct tape our hands to the phone cradle and dial until our fingers were numb and our voices hoarse.
4️⃣ Our database? A plastic box filled with notecards. None of this fancy-schmancy computer nonsense. And being able to access information anywhere anytime from the cloud? Fuh-get-about-it! If you wanted information, you’d better be prepared to dig through those cards like a miner searching for gold.
5️⃣ Caller ID? Hah! We didn’t have the luxury of knowing who was on the other end of the line. Every incoming call was a game of Russian roulette. We’d scramble to find our call sheets, hoping to jog our memories before the poor soul hung up in frustration.
So next time you complain about a slow internet connection or a missed call, just remember: we old-timers paved the way with blood, sweat, and rotary phones (actually that’s not true…I’m not THAT old, our phones did have buttons!).
HELP ME OUT – SHARE SOME OF YOUR “BACK IN THE DAY” MOMENTS AS A #RECRUITER or #CIVILENGINEER !
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