There’s No Labor Shortage
The Ideal Candidate Doesn’t Exist
Way too many times have I read and watched news articles and stories of a “labor shortage”. I don’t believe any of it. It’s a lack of “The Ideal Candidate” for any job. They don’t exist.
In going through several job recruiter emails, the one thing that I see most are posts that have a laundry list of requirements and must-haves that no one on this planet will have. None. No one. Tech companies being the worst offenders by raising the “ideal candidate” bar out of reach.
I did tech work for 29 years and can brutally say that there isn’t a person on earth that will have every single skill or enough time in a job that is required. Here’s a couple of examples, including my smart-ass comments, of what employers, admittedly mostly government I.T. contractors, are looking for.
Qualifications:
- 9+ years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree in Aerospace or other Engineering, Mathematics, Physics or a related discipline. Alternatively, 7 years of prior related experience with a Graduate Degree.
- Really? 9+ years or 7 years based upon your degree? Why don’t they also add 2+ years of rodeo clown experience with a PhD?
- Active TS/SCI security clearance w/CI Poly
- Who the hell carries this around? I had a TS/SCI clearance during my Navy time. No degree or experience needed there. The average individual won’t have a security clearance at all nor can you get one on your own.
Preferred Additional Skills:
- Experience in supporting modeling, simulation, and analysis of national security space related problems desired
- For the job in question, this makes sense. Every industry does all of these…I’m betting that the majority of those companies don’t require a post-graduate degree or security clearance.
- Software Tools: STK/Astrogator, Astrodynamics Standards,
- I was today years old before I learned that Astrodynamics Standards was a thing.
