In the same way that it’s important to listen when you have a good gut feeling about something, it’s also important to listen when you feel like the red flags are starting to surface. In the last couple of months I’d pursued a few new opportunities, and they looked like great ones– either doing stuff I loved or offering some great development opportunity. I was pretty excited, but one in particular stood out because it was delivering training which I’ve always wanted to do more of.

Red flag 1: Application

It didn’t start well. The advert required a full application form to be done, down to every single education institute, qualification, training course and job I’d ever had and then a lengthy personal statement on top. I’d forgotten how much I hated doing them, and how in 6 months and gaining 5 new clients, none of them had required it. It’s really made me realise how little value they can have – yes you can see I have continuous employment, but is that any guarantee I’m any more or less dedicated than anyone else? I may have done some great training courses – but it doesn’t tell you if I’ve got anything of the right approach. And do you really care whether I got A*- C GCSEs more than 20 years ago? It took me forever. Partly because it was so long. And partly because I got full of rage so often I had to stop.

Reg Flag 2: Lack of Clarity

I got a thanks-but-no-thanks reply but in it was the request of a quick Teams call to discuss what I offered. A mixed message I wasn’t sure how to receive. And the Teams call didn’t really help or clarify anything. I heard a fair bit about what their current training offer is, including some of their aspirations for their training and what their trainers would have. They were looking for both training experience and personal or professional experience of some of their services, and at the same time admitted it was fairly unlikely. We went over my offer and my experience and all its transferable qualities. The meeting felt patchy and uncoordinated but it ended with the contact requesting I send over two course outlines so they could see my offer in more detail and compare it against other people they were speaking to. My sense of a red flag had worsened, but my new year was still looking dry, and if I was taken onto their schedule, it could offer a rare thing for a freelancer – regular work with regular income over the longer term, not just with this organisation but their set-up meant I may also be offered work with other organisations. Plus, I really did want to do more training because I’ve always loved it.

Red Flag 3: Upfront Investment

So I diligently put together the course outlines, in time I didn’t really have spare. Plus because I’d never delivered those specific topics before, it was a fair amount of effort to research, design and put together a pretty detailed course outline for what I would be delivering. At this point, I recognised I’d put in several days’ worth of time into this application, and it was feeling really unbalanced for where I was in the recruitment process. The red flag continued to grow, but I was invested. I’d also convinced myself in developing the course outlines how much fun I’d have delivering them.

Red Flag 4: Decision-Making

After receiving the initial confirmation of receipt, I waited. And waited. The initial week passed where they said they’d be speaking to another candidate, and nothing. I gave it another week and enquired. They were hugely apologetic and blamed the bureaucracy of it having to go through senior managers, and there was a difficulty getting everyone together. I think I knew then it was a no-goer. But I was polite and asked them to keep me updated. Another 3 weeks later, I took a course I knew was very relevant to them and could improve interest but really I think it was an excuse to get an answer. I’d already accepted it wasn’t going to happen, but I did want closure. Similar response to the previous.

Red Flag 5: Communication

It’s now been further 6 weeks with no contact. It’s fine not to be successful, and if they came back now and said let’s go, I’m not sure I would because the lack of communication has been so bad. Not to recognise the effort people have put into submissions, or their likely frustration at the lack of news. I once heard someone say, “no response is still a response” and this is exactly that. For whatever reason they’re not progressing with me, or even expanding the training programme as a whole, but they haven’t got the coordination/decency to say. Meanwhile I’ve wasted a lot of time, including some precious evenings, to squeeze it in.

Onwards and Upwards

Lesson learnt. Listen to the early red flags before you get in too deep. Be really careful about how much you invest before there’s any certainty. Also, blackmark the organisation for future reference, definitely not one to get involved in without a huge amount of caution.

Photo by Tarik Haiga on Unsplash