How honest/glossy are job adverts?

B0bbyEwing

After friends/family being in my ear, after a number of you guys saying in various responses and tbh after knowing it myself anyway, the past day I've spent some time going through Indeed looking at what's available. 

Now, I don't know if I'm talking myself out of things, whether my reality has been skewed by the company I work for or what but I'm finding that I'm being put off some jobs instantly due to the phrasing in the adverts - purely based on recognising those phrases from our own adverts & what they mean in our place of work.

I suppose you'll only really have an insight if you took a job on an actual advert & how the advert compared to the reality.
Or whether you're behind the wording of your companies adverts.
Or whether you just check the ads from time to time & have a see how the company you work for advertises & knowing yourself what the reality is.

To explain...

I'm running in to a lot of "Must be flexible" or "flexible approach" or "flexible working hours". We use that exact same phrase. 
In my place of work, depending on the department, it means you'll start work Monday but forget seeing your home before Friday night (or you may as well as).
Or we'll give you a home time, because you'll probably want a number to go off, but in reality we may as well not bother. You might finish at that time, but at that very time we may tell you once you've done 10.5 hours already that you've got another 1, 2, 3 hours to go, except we wont say you've got another 1, 2, 3 hours to go, we'll just say keep going & you wont know you're done ... until we say home time now.

Then I see "occasional weekend work". This is actually a major gripe where I work and lower level management have made numerous complaints to upper level management & directors for the way they gloss over & just outright lie to new starts. They'll be told this exact phrase. They may even get worse than this & be told "1 Saturday per month" (a complete lie).
The amount of new starts we've had quit a few weeks in when they find out that it's actually virtually all Saturday's. Certainly a lot more than what they're told. 
Upper level management will deny all knowledge. Directors too. Thing is, ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL these new starts over many years who've never met each other before all say the exact same thing?? So either that's just some weird coincidence or upper level management/directors are lying & are just saying anything to get someone to take the job & hope they will put up with it once they're in.



Due to all this, I am not very trusting when I see other companies using the same phrases in their adverts. Though I only have one company to base this off from my experience.

Does your own experience echo this or have you seen a decent/honest side to all this phrasing from your own experience?

MovingForwards

Sounds like you work at the company I left a few months ago! 

Some of the adverts I'm seeing have lots of 'buzz' words, but don't give any idea about what the job actually involves; no examples as I'm in the middle of something and having 2 mins away from it.

I do miss the days when an advert / job spec was the role done, with a few ad hoc / extras when covering absent colleagues.

MalMonroe

I've only ever really worked in the NHS and in Higher Education and their job ads are basically quite boring and follow the 'company' format.

When a job I fancied was advertised, I always looked at the job description and person specification, considered whether or not I felt I could fit in and either applied for it or didn't bother.   

The wording of ads never bothered me but I really don't think any I've seen have been 'dishonest'. 

In my experience, 'being flexible' has always meant that my employers were willing to be flexible - if I worked overtime (not often) then I'd be given time off (rather than being paid). I always considered that it made for good working practice for both employers and employees to be flexible. In both the NHS and Higher Ed I was able to negotiate flexible working. Never had any problems and mostly enjoyed my jobs. Bosses were usually very understanding too, even if I asked for time off to go for interviews (which was encouraged in both spheres).

You said "Or we'll give you a home time, because you'll probably want a number to go off, but in reality we may as well not bother. You might finish at that time, but at that very time we may tell you once you've done 10.5 hours already that you've got another 1, 2, 3 hours to go, except we wont say you've got another 1, 2, 3 hours to go, we'll just say keep going & you wont know you're done ... until we say home time now." 

-  but my jobs all had 'core' working hours, for example - 7.30am to 6.30pm and we employees were allowed to make arrangements with our heads of department to work within those hours to suit ourselves. If we wanted to tweak them at all, we could re-negotiate. I think that's fair enough. Because that way you get paid for the hours you actually work. It's all a question of negotiation with heads of departments or supervisors and HR of course. Flexibility, in my understanding, works both ways.

My very last job before I retired was working in the private sector (only for five years). I absolutely hated it. Totally different scenario. My boss was lovely and let me work flexitime (even though other employees told me "we don't do flexitime here") and was really sweet. But the rest of the company, nuh-uh. There was no proper pension scheme at that time (only for the directors and company secretary), no proper pay if you were off sick and a lot of petty-minded colleagues. With both NHS and Higher Ed I got full pay for the first six months of being ill and then six months at half pay if ever needed.

I would always recommend working in the public sector if possible because they have pay grades on scales, you're allowed to negotiate flexitime and if you work hard you can progress - sky's the limit. In the private sector, as PA to the MD, I was at the top and there was nowhere else to go. Not even sideways.

Now, I'm a self-employed pensioner. I love my boss and all my T&Cs and I'm allowed to work from home. Bliss. 

If you see a job advertised and you think you'd be a good fit, don't overthink it, aka don't sweat the small stuff. Just apply. You'll find out at interview, if you get that far, whether you feel you could work with the people there - and whether they're honest or not. I don't think the wording of job adverts is very important really. As long as you get the gist and can make the decision as to whether or not you feel you'd like it.

From what you say, it seems as if you have had enough of your job. Why not look around - ignoring the flim-flam jargon of course? Nothing to lose. After all, variety is the spice of life.  Good luck, whatever happens.   

B0bbyEwing

Not to ignore you MovingForwards, but MalMonroe has given so much to respond to lol, so here we go...

MalMonroe said:

In my experience, 'being flexible' has always meant that my employers were willing to be flexible - if I worked overtime (not often) then I'd be given time off (rather than being paid). I always considered that it made for good working practice for both employers and employees to be flexible. In both the NHS and Higher Ed I was able to negotiate flexible working. Never had any problems and mostly enjoyed my jobs. Bosses were usually very understanding too, even if I asked for time off to go for interviews (which was encouraged in both spheres).

Interesting way to look at it (also I guess it depends on the wording - "must be flexible" is different to "flexible working hours").

Where I work it's pretty much "must be flexible". The translation of that is do as you're told & don't even frown if you don't like it because we don't care.
 
The late working thing as an example. Some times I get it. Totally. Say you'll be dealing with a product that needs to leave at ridiculously early times in the morning but something has happened which means the only way to get that ready is to work past the normal working time. I get that.
It's when you're told that something "must" be done tonight............but then it's sat there waiting to leave for an hour in the morning & nothing else is happening. It could've got dealt with with plenty of time to spare in the morning, all while keeping the workforce happy.

Of course I'm speaking generally because I'm trying to not go in to too many details so that leaves this open for someone to side with the company in this scenario. All I can say is you'll just have to trust that in our case there are many times when stopping 1-2 hours at night could've got done in 30mins in the morning (even if starting 30mins earlier) without any ill effect to the business.

...which is why I am cautious around the phrase flexible.

MalMonroe said:

You said "Or we'll give you a home time, because you'll probably want a number to go off, but in reality we may as well not bother. You might finish at that time, but at that very time we may tell you once you've done 10.5 hours already that you've got another 1, 2, 3 hours to go, except we wont say you've got another 1, 2, 3 hours to go, we'll just say keep going & you wont know you're done ... until we say home time now." 

-  but my jobs all had 'core' working hours, for example - 7.30am to 6.30pm and we employees were allowed to make arrangements with our heads of department to work within those hours to suit ourselves. If we wanted to tweak them at all, we could re-negotiate. I think that's fair enough. Because that way you get paid for the hours you actually work. It's all a question of negotiation with heads of departments or supervisors and HR of course. Flexibility, in my understanding, works both ways.

I accept this. We too have "core working hours". Imagine the actual building has set opening hours and these are also our hours, but then you can randomly be made to work beyond these. 5mins, 10mins who cares. 1hour, 2 hours, it starts getting a bit much, especially at no notice. We couldn't have a situation where we say can I start at this time & end at that time because if you're starting 2 hours later then the department is down in those 2 hours & if you think you'll make it up working 2 hours after everyone, well there's no guarantee the work will be there. It's not an office job where a pile of papers can wait for you to be done. 
Again, without being completely specific about the job, it's a little hard to explain well.

MalMonroe said:

 no proper pay if you were off sick and a lot of petty-minded colleagues. With both NHS and Higher Ed I got full pay for the first six months of being ill and then six months at half pay if ever needed.

Depends what you mean by proper pay. I think you mean decent pay?
We get bog standard SSP. My dad when he was working got I think the same as what you said - 6 months full pay, 6 months half pay when he was off with heart trouble.
No chance of that ever happening where I work though I'm afraid.

MalMonroe said:

I would always recommend working in the public sector if possible because they have pay grades on scales, you're allowed to negotiate flexitime and if you work hard you can progress - sky's the limit. 

Yes. For those with good memories who've dipped in & out of my postings, they'll probably know my ties but I know someone working in the NHS who is also keeping an eye out for anything that may be coming up.
There's various political grumblings but I suppose you'll get it anywhere. Overall they like working for the NHS.

MalMonroe said:

If you see a job advertised and you think you'd be a good fit, don't overthink it, aka don't sweat the small stuff. Just apply. You'll find out at interview, if you get that far, whether you feel you could work with the people there - and whether they're honest or not. I don't think the wording of job adverts is very important really. As long as you get the gist and can make the decision as to whether or not you feel you'd like it.

Funny thing is, I've sat in on interviews at my work & from them you would never be able to guess it runs as it does. 
I know you interview them as much as they interview you but yeah when I first sat in on one it was a bit of an eyeopener. I thought wow, how different are you.

MalMonroe said:

From what you say, it seems as if you have had enough of your job. Why not look around - ignoring the flim-flam jargon of course? Nothing to lose. After all, variety is the spice of life.  Good luck, whatever happens.   

The job itself, as in what I do on a daily basis - no not really. It's easy enough. Pays the bills. Not really stimulating but am I overly fussed? Probably not.
Some of the people, such as certain management - that's why I'm looking (or one of the reasons). "Petty-minded" you said. I can relate.
I like certainty & uncertain home times are no good. I'm not to 10-15mins, no big deal but when you're told in a sneering manner you WILL be staying on (& you know we're talking AT LEAST 30-60mins) then no thanks.

So yeah, as I say, I've started looking. I just found more & more & more adverts with these same phrases & found myself dismissing them simply through personal experience & thought ... I'm going to see if this mirrors other peoples experiences of this phrasing too or whether my personal experience is causing me to be too harsh.

Own_Worst_Enermy

I don't know I've gone from 'a week' training which means 2.5 days not 5. The training' just means reputation so get rid of the so-called trainer.

20 years ago some one marked off actual training plans accomplished, but less today.

You start a job but when was the last piece of paper you signed that could do the job duties.

 Bring back 2000! and earlier!

MovingForwards

@B0bbyEwing a lot has changed since MM retired 😉 that's when roles used to match the job spec or there's rose tinted glasses when she reflects on her time. Don't hold your breath for a reply to you taking the time to comment on the points either.

Public sector managers have a limited selection of options they're allowed to pick from to create the advert, therefore it doesn't match the actual role.

I've pointed out to managers my job is nothing like what I applied for. The only things that are right are working from home and flexible hours; everything that led me to apply isn't part of the job.

B0bbyEwing

MovingForwards said:

@B0bbyEwing a lot has changed since MM retired 😉 that's when roles used to match the job spec or there's rose tinted glasses when she reflects on her time. Don't hold your breath for a reply to you taking the time to comment on the points either.

Public sector managers have a limited selection of options they're allowed to pick from to create the advert, therefore it doesn't match the actual role.

I've pointed out to managers my job is nothing like what I applied for. The only things that are right are working from home and flexible hours; everything that led me to apply isn't part of the job.

I'm always curious to see how other people experience a situation vs if it happened at ours.

So you say you've challenged your managers about the advert not being totally right.
If you did that at ours, regardless of whether you were correct or not, you'd get told that you're wrong, that you were told exactly what the job is and the job is the job. Basically like it or lump it.

Then you'd either stick it out for a while while looking for something else, or you'd become another statistic of those guys who don't even make it a month (aside from those who never turn up, the record is perhaps about a couple of hours).

So what kind of reaction did you get in your experience when you came out with that?

MovingForwards

They told me what I already know about only being able to pick from a limited selection to create the spec with a "you know what public sector is like".

Doesn't make it right though when looking for roles with specific aspects of interest and means either stick with or or move on again.

Savvy_Sue

Charity sector here. When we say "occasional evenings and weekends", we really mean it - SOME staff have to do an evening a month, and SOME staff have to do occasional evenings / weekends. But you choose your evening, and volunteer for the weekends. That may not be everyone's experience in the sector ... 

B0bbyEwing

Savvy_Sue said:

Charity sector here. When we say "occasional evenings and weekends", we really mean it - SOME staff have to do an evening a month, and SOME staff have to do occasional evenings / weekends. But you choose your evening, and volunteer for the weekends. That may not be everyone's experience in the sector ... 

Thank you for your response.

There is hope yet

Andy_L

The, late, journalist Simon Hoggart coined the phrase "the law of the reduculous reverse" where the pointlessness of a (political) statement can be judged by how likely it is that someone would say the opposite

I find it works well for job adverts "we want a dynamic hard-worker" is pointless because you would never ask for "a lazy, idle shirker"