With unemployment approaching 10% in Missouri, it’s not surprising that craigslist users are starting to get aggravated with “employers” who use craigslist to perpetuate scams. I don’t know if yTen is a scam or not (there were enough red flags when I first checked the web site that I dismissed any present and future yTen postings), but 7 or 8 (I lost count) Springfield area residents were frustrated enough to voice their frustration on the cragislist jobs board.
Some of the posts were already deleted by the time I clicked on the RSS feed headlines, but I’ve re-posted 3 I was able to capture after the break.
DISCLAIMER: I did not write these posts, nor can I verify their validity. The information presented below is for informational and archival purposes only.
I also believe the lid needs to be blown off of yTen. These 7 min interviews where they herd applicants in and out the door like cattle is bit ridiculous. And the interview?, does this guy even know how to spell the word graphic? I doubt he’d know design if it kicked him in the twig and berries.
Beware: this is a sham organization that will give little respect to your work and even less respect to your wage.
- Location: Spfd
- Compensation: Not near enough
RE: Graphic Artist (Springfield)
So, didn’t feel like calling back any of the people who showed up last time, eh yTen?
That’s fine. Be just like everyone else who never calls after an interview so you’re stuck wondering if they wanted to call but misplaced your number, or if they’re just ignoring you, hoping you’ll go away.
Word of caution: if you’re going in to this interview, be prepared to feel like you’re not worth much. Blowing through applicant after applicant, and apparently not enough respect for any of them to call back.
No thanks.
- Location: Springfield
- Compensation: Certainly not the gas I had to burn to get to this waste of my time.
RE: Graphic Artist (Springfield)
It looks like I’m not the only one who had a bad taste in their mouth after having an ‘interview’ with yTen. I walked in the door and immediately realized there were two other interviewees ahead of me. It’s a sad state when a degree that requires just as much or more education than the pencil pusher asking the questions results in insulting cattle calls. The poor people working there looked like they were chained to their cubicles just out of reach of anything sharp! Run hard and fast and don’t waste your gas!
It also speaks volumes that the home page of their website features a 13 year old iMac G3 and that their entire website could be duplicated in a couple of hours with time to grab a bite.
- Location: Springfield
- Compensation: you couldn’t pay me enough!
Which just goes to show that even during an economic downturn, you can’t treat people this way without them getting upset.
I posted the third one down. It was just a very unpleasant experience for me; almost demeaning. I told my wife about it when I got home and it just kind of ate at me over the weekend. There is just little respect for our field in this area, generally speaking of course.
I worked my butt off in school, had a great job and was eventually laid off because I was the freshest face in a bad economy. To see businesses, not just yTen, prey upon struggling artists just irritates me.
Thank you for posting. Browsing the craigslist jobs board regularly over the course of the last year leads me to believe that there is no lack of companies ready and willing to exploit the unemployed for their own profit. Unfortunately, the occasional legitimate employer posts on craigslist, likely unaware of the board’s reputation as a haven for spam and scams.
I’m not familiar with yTen, but I have had the misfortune of interviewing with a potential employer that, I felt, did not give me the time nor courtesy that my qualifications warranted. I don’t expect anything extravagant, but I’m a firm believer that courtesy, manners, and etiquette are never out of style–not even when the economy takes a dive. Fortunately, that experience has been the exception to the rule, but it’s human nature to tend to remember negative experiences more clearly than the positive.
I hope that your next interview is a much more positive experience and that you find work soon. I’ve been looking for over a year and a half now and have had trouble getting interviews even for positions for which I’m overqualified. I’ve even considered posting a “bounty” promising to pay a percentage of my first paycheck to whoever helps me find full-time employment.
I failed to mention that I enjoy your site! Did you code it or is it custom Joomla? If you’d like the exposure, I would like to give you a tweet “pimp”.
Aside from that, I think just maintaining a positive attitude in this terrible economy is the most important thing. I’ve hit my lows and rebounded better than ever, and I’m blessed that is the case. I know many people in many fields that are unemployed and in total despair, losing homes, spouses–you name it. Luckily, I’ve recently noticed an uptrend in high quality job postings, so hopefully this won’t be a jobless recovery for too much longer.
Good luck on your own job hunt and keep up the good work here on this website!
Thanks! I used a combination of WordPress, Gallery2, and WPG2 for the site. I use a number of WordPress plugins, including Twitter Tools, Smart YouTube, and Sociable. The theme is Aspire by InfoCreek. Putting all the parts together was fairly simple, if a bit time-consuming. Updating is easy, though, which is important. I created a few hobby web sites using HTML a few years ago, but WordPress makes things so much easier I haven’t designed a web site from scratch (with the exception of my resume web site) for a long while.
The site is dedicated to whatever catches my interest rather than a single topic, so it might be a bit difficult to summarize, but positive publicity is always appreciated. If you post or e-mail your Twitter account name, I’ll be sure to follow.
Thanks again for the kind words and I wish you the best on your job hunt as well.