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Now You Need Game To Get A Job

100 Comments

Business Week recently published an article which discusses how you’re now being interviewed for much more than just competency and skill…

 Job interviews are becoming more like first dates.

[…]

…companies are making hiring decisions “in a manner more closely resembling the choice of friends or romantic partners.”

[…]

…“employers don’t necessarily hire the most skilled candidates.”

[…]

“I hired someone as a manager, and it created a lot of tension because he didn’t fit in. People tried to alienate him because they weren’t interested in him as a friend,” she says. And it also goes the other way. “I once hired a woman who really didn’t have the right background or experience for the job, but who I hit it off with during the interview,” says Rebecca Grossman-Cohen, a marketing executive at News Corp.

Human resources, the biggest impediment to American corporate progress, is now evaluating you like a potential sex partner. In this type of selection process, who suffers? Betas with no game.

Alphas with charm, sexy smirks, and the basic ability to make rapport with promiscuous HR women will get the job over shy guys in spite of having less technical skill. (I pity the game denialist who hopes that holding out will get him beautiful women and high-paying jobs!) The kicker is that HR has no shame about it. They are proudly announcing in media interviews how likability is a far more important trait than education or experience.

In an employment market in which many first-time employees relocate for work, offices are becoming surrogate families and social communities. New hires, especially young workers, want the secret Santa gift exchanges, the karaoke nights, and, increasingly, like-minded colleagues who share their values.

[…]

“A lot of times, cultural fit is used as an excuse” for feelings interviewers aren’t comfortable expressing, says Eric Peterson, manager of diversity and inclusion at the Society for Human Resources and Management. “Maybe a hiring manager can’t picture himself having a beer with someone who has an accent. Sometimes, diversity candidates are shown the door for no other reason than that they made the interviewer a little less at ease.”

What will happen to an economy where workers are hired based on their ability to give HR butterflies in their stomachs? We’ll end up rewarding networkers, charlatans, charming rogues, and social hanger-ons who don’t produce. There is only one result for a nation who takes this path:

Read Next: The Synergy Of Game And Money

100 thoughts on “Now You Need Game To Get A Job”

  1. I was just thinking about this in class today. Everybody was all anal about the next test, and I was thinking about how I needed to work on my game skills, so I could succeed in encorpera without really trying.

    1. Getting in the door is only the first step. They have to want you coming through that door next week too.
      That said – HR is destroying America.

  2. Oh man, have I ever seen this first hand.
    It’s style over substance in the work place, unless a man is at the helm making the hiring decisions.
    I was a very successful software consultant until I left it 10 years ago. However, at my last gig I was assisting the client by interviewing consultants and contractors for a project at a big five consulting firm. I would suggest fully qualified candidates (males) based on their technical accomplishments — not just empty buzzwords on their resumes. The client opted to hire a newly graduated dufus from a large university who possessed the corporate “look” and social skills. Of course, he wanted more than double the money than my choice. And, they gladly paid it.
    That was one of the reasons I left the biz. I had to deal with a bunch of useless pretty people and status mongers who couldn’t contribute to the work in a meaningful way.
    Yes fellas, you’ll have to game every female between you and the hiring manager(s)/decision makers. And, heaven help you if even ONE of those decision makers is a female. You’ll want to bring your A-game to the interviews, for sure.

  3. This is an entirely predictable result of the feminization of the workplace.
    I would like to say that this will confer a competitive advantage upon firms that retain more masculine cultures and hard-headed/results-oriented hiring and work processes…but probably not because many of the initiatives that feminize the workplace now have the force of law. Masculine cultures have basically become outlawed.
    We’ve gotten to the point where Game isn’t just necessary to score—you now need it just to put food on the table. What a country.

    1. The feminization of the electorate also means that you need game to win elections. Romney had no game; he lost.

      1. This is true. People don’t care about policies and issues anymore. It’s all about likeability and charisma.

      2. We’re being feminized through and through. “Competence” is a masculine virture, and it’s being replaced by being a “good fit.”
        Schools now often focus on “cooperative learning” where kids get into teams and the dumbasses mooch off the smart kids. Perfect preparation for a world in which you accomplishments belong to others, where innovation matters only if it gives credit to the “team”, boldness is a vice, and excellence is subservient to the ability to play along.
        We’d better change this shit and fast.

    2. Better companies are already routing around this problem, by centralizing hiring and using very clearly defined metrics for how to rank candidates for technically difficult jobs. The idea being that if a “team” or department does not get along with a competent hire, there’s something wrong with them, not him.
      So much of what constitutes “work” today is simply fluff, however. For all those non-jobs, only there by either some silly legal mandate or the need by some doofus higherup to feel important, who cares who gets hired. These guys (mainly gals, actually) are only in daycare anyway, rather than being expected to contribute much more than their presence.

  4. These corporations are dumb as shit. I was under the assumption that the key to maximize profits is to hire aspie beta nerds to do the grunt work, while alpha managers just schmooze clients.

    1. Until one of the aspie beta nerds realise they are being underpaid, and convinces the others that they could do much more as a team and dump the idiot manager.
      Or leave with all the ideas. And just disappear overseas to begin anew.

  5. This is all part of the “third worldization” of America. In places like Latin America and The Arab World, this is exactly how shit goes down. This is a return to a long standing historical norm, not something new.

    1. I assume you speak arabic and live in some Arab country (each one different from the other) to say such a thing, and you’re not the average Unitedstater speaking out of his arse about things he knows nothing about 😉

  8. As a contractor (IT but in communications) for the past decade with a dozen or so gigs under my belt, I’ve discovered that good social skills in an interview are incredibly important. A man with even a modicum of Charisma can easily get through interviews because so many guys (especially in IT) are woefully lacking in social skills. In fact, they come across as terribly awkward and completing lacking in confidence. I’ve interviewed enough of them, myself.

    1. If, in IT, the first thing the interviewer does is hand you a piece of paper with a problem to solve, leaves, and then comes back an hour later; you know 1) you’re gonna have a harder time bullshitting these guys, and 2)this is probably a company going somewhere. When you then, to be more comfortable sitting down, take your gun out and place it on your desk, and the interviewer don’t bat an eye; you know it’s probably a great place to work as well…

      2. “When you then, to be more comfortable sitting down, take your gun out and place it on your desk, and the interviewer don’t bat an eye; you know it’s probably a great place to work as well…”
        And this happens…… where?

      3. What about if the test is different between girls and guys?
        Companies already do this to make women feel welcome

  9. In my humble opinion, you can’t call yourself alpha and at the same time be totally dominated by those pink ghettos a.k.a. human resources.
    Women in the workplace…that’s like an oil spill in a blue lagoon, it poisons everything. For a manly man, there is but one path: kill them all. Oh wait, that’s the other one. In all seriousness: your best bet is to start your own business. Hire fellow manly men. Provide for yourself.
    Don’t be a slave to the feminine imperative. Don’t be that guy.

  10. Since I got my degree in civil engineering I’ve always worked in construction surveying or management. I’ve only been interviewed by area managers or department vice-presidents. If someone suggested to these guys that they let a twenty or thirty something woman with a communications degree be in charge of interviewing for field engineer, project manager or formwork design positions they’d fucking laugh.

    1. The problem is the girls club does the initial phone or in-person screen for “cultural fit.” If the candidate cannot pass the “female intuition” femtest, he will not get an interview.

      1. I work as a field PM for a large regional civil contractor. Nothing fancy. I brought my resume to an office at their equipment yard where laborers put in applications because I didn’t know any better. The union rep who was a guy took a look at my resume and introduced me to the department general superintendent. I had an interview with the superintendent and the VP of the department the next morning and I was hired a week later. I wasn’t vetted by any chick for a fucking cultural fit. Companies that build bridges and other gigantic structures out of concrete and steel don’t give a shit about “femtests”. Guess I’m behind the times.

    2. I think you’re on to something here. For jobs where lack of competence have actual bad consequences, organizations that hire and promote people based on their alphatude (outside of sales) will go under.
      So, a corollary to the incompetent hiring processes in today’s corporations, is that the jobs they mostly hire for, are jobs without consequences. Irrelevant, in other words.

      1. Dude, there are plenty of guys in construction management who fit every definition of alpha in the best and worst ways. They generally promote people based on how they perform. And believe me when I tell you that an upper level manager with 35-40 years of experience since he worked his way up from being a laborer at 17 can see right through any peacocking bullshit artist riding some other guys’ coattails.

  11. Being in Business and HR, I can tell you this is very true. However, if JUST HR is interviewing and recruiting you (over a exec or manager), chances are its not a ‘high end’ position and the salary of the job will probably be small. Also, a lot of HR workers don’t know this (since they dont give a sh*t about law), but if a unqualified person is hired over you (assuming you got the KSAs), there runs legal issues and payouts if you have a good lawyer.
    If a company is solely relying on their HR department to handle all those things, I would avoid the company, it won’t end well.
    But as everyone is suggesting, if you got game, use this towards your advantage.

    1. Yeah exactly. Who would leave the hiring process of any real job up to a file-shuffler whose position is part of a make-work CYA policy?

      1. That’s why I’m thinking this article is somewhat bogus. Recruitment rarely ends without the person who would be managing you interviewing you.
        I had an interview last month and HR interviewed me, along with the VP and the person who would be my supervisor. A successful company will use HR’s (or recruiters) input, but not make a 100% hiring decision from it.
        I think it also depends on the field. A engineer should NOT be going through HR, same with IT and even most STEM fields.

      2. Article is absolutely not bogus. HR women _routinely_ screen out men who don’t “feel” right. The feminine imperative rules the candidate shortlist.

      3. Mark,
        I just don’t see many jobs where HR is the only interview you get. If your only interview is with HR, chances are its a high task/low management job in an office where you make 30k.. That or like I said previously, its a job where the company is all whack and you shouldn’t even want to work there in the first place.
        STEM fields and even management positions may have HR prescreen your resume or do a phone interview to make sure you have the skills, but the actually interview typically is with a manager or a higher up…sure sexism can occur at those stages too..

      4. Nick, you mention you were first vetted by HR, -then- passed along to the VP to interview. You -were- vetted by women, and passed. You would not have the VP interview otherwise.

    2. This makes sense. That explains how gameless men are sometimes still able to get good high-paying jobs.

    3. I work as a senior director in a Fortune 500 company. STEM work, lots of mathematics. I’ve got team members in 6 time zones reporting to me.
      HR is used as a bullshit shield and for initial contact via phone. And they are necessary – there are few greater idiots then “Educated” Americans. HR is used as a legal shield – their job is to mitigate risk in the hiring process, and to serve as an appointment secretary for me. There are so many laws concerning the hiring process that it would be best that I not comment further.
      I write the job req, HR collects resumes, I can review them all (i do for senior gigs), or allow them to vet and I pick candidates I want to phone interview. HR schedules these, I call the candidate. I then select from those the handful I want to interview in person. References are verified, etc etc etc. A word of advice – the Internet never forgets. Those rants on that mailing list? Drunken posts in college? Very Entertaining.

      1. But if you make those rants under an assumed name, and your facebook profile is completely private …
        you can keep going 🙂

      3. I am also a Director, Fortune 500 and concur with this 100%. HR is there to: 1. Make sure the company is legally covered, and 2. To do the admin part of the hiring process.

  12. If I was starting a company, and had money to burn to run an experiment, I’d hire the best looking guys for the actual work positions, and then young hot stupid chicks for all the support positions, and have a very formal dress code. Mediocre at best requirements for education. Would the sexual tension help or hurt productivity?

  13. Welcome to the world, it has ALWAYS been like this. Face it: EVERYBODY can do any type of office job with just a few days of training. The degree or “skills” are just a way to tell you have some basic standards. Once you notice that most work done is useless and people hire other people as and for entertainment you accept that workplaces are ONLY there to maintain social structures.

  14. A) Companies are looking for that guy or that gal “with game” and “the look” that fits their respective corporate culture nowadays as this is dead on.
    B) If not that, then other types of corporations are looking for “that oblivious naive beta,” who can be easily manipulated into working all the damn time with no time off & who appears to have no social life outside of work.

  16. My mother works as a purchasing supervisor in a hospital. She isn’t a feminist, but tells me she’s compelled to overlook male applicants when she needs to fill a position, because the women who work under her don’t want a man working in their department, as it makes them uncomfortable and disrupts workplace harmony. (Read: they’d feel obliged to actually act professional and do their work instead of gossiping.)
    Not only do men applying for jobs have to face a girl in HR, but they might also be interviewed by their future boss, and maybe her boss too, and these bosses are probably women more often than not, anymore.

  17. I helped my buddy use game to get an apartment. The landlord had many applicants. I told him to ask the guy personal questions and listen closely. Form a bond with the landlord based something in common, etc.
    He got the place.
    I also use game to get 2 slices of pizza for the price of 1 at Whole Foods.
    And, at work, when I have to give presentations. I always get a hair cut 5 days before and wear fresh, pressed clothes. I speak like Martin Luther King. And, smile at all the old ladys and fags.

    1. “And, smile at all the old ladys and fags.”
      Spoken like a true pro. If I had a dollar for every favor fat old colored ladies and fags did for me after I butter them up, i’d be Mac McAfee in Belize.
      Takes some hard drink and strong pot to wash off the stench after work though.

  21. Corporations are almost PC feminist shit holes these days so this is not surprising at all. Very few people do real tangible productive work.

  22. You need social skills no matter where you go to really reach your potential, but you’ll put up with way less bullshit if you actually have economically valuable skills. The problem with our economy is that most jobs can be done by almost anyone and with almost no value added to the economy as a whole. So they default to a popularity contest.
    Also, you guys can bag on computer programmers but the going rate for the top ones is ridiculous. And of course, if you really want to start a business that’s the way to go for largest growth potential.

    1. This is because 99% of all computer programmers are total fucking idiots. Seriously.
      Never forget that the most important programming language is English.

      1. Yes, and if you don’t understand the nuances of language, you can’t program for nuts.
        So … all those women with communication degrees, must be pretty good programmers, right?
        After all they speak good English, ahahahaha …

      3. I agree, having struggled for years to get out of “software engineering”. But my skills gained there pay off in my current work involving CAD and machine design.
        GLad to see someone mention Forth, the most pleasurable language ever designed. I would wax eloquent but am typing on my wife’s “iPad”.

  23. I’m still in college, but I will say that I’ve had a few female teachers give me the benefit of the doubt when I was in between grades in the class or on assignments because they personally liked me.

  24. Eh, I dunno. I agree with the premise, that game/charisma/charm certainly goes a long way when looking for a job. But it’s pretty easy to find gameless men that have good jobs and make good money, and yet still can’t get dates or get laid to save their lives. So either some women are actually considering things like skill and knowledge when making hiring decisions, or there are more men involved in the hiring process than it might seem.

  25. The very idea of “the best candidate gets the job” is pure horse shit. It’s a myth.
    In today’s job market, it’s about having a certain Look and a certain Personality Trait that fits the company culture. The sad part is that this is a prerequisite requirement for an entry level position. We’re not even talking management or CEO here.
    All these jobs want is someone who looks like Tom Brady & Geisel and can bullshit the best on interview questions.

  26. People hire who they like.
    This is why it is imperative that we start are own businesses so we will no longer get “bitched” by the system.
    When these fucking jobs let you go, it’s as if you were never there to begin with. It’s like replacing a lightbulb or a roll of toilet paper. All we are to these companies are lightbulbs and toilet paper.

    1. That’s quite the insight, I recently got both of my part time jobs cut as if I never worked there. A lightbulb is exactly how I feel.

    2. Owning your own business is a great way to let others know …
      “Hey, you can go to someone else, pay double and be cheated …
      or pay me, and feel at the mercy of a beta”.
      It’s quite fun, and if they go elsewhere they come begging back to you.

  27. I just switched positions recently and even though the economy is in the tank I intentionally avoided positions I knew I could get because I’d be working for women. I’ve been lucky, two different firms in three years, both with male attorneys (plus one token female) and an all female staff. Definite hierarchy (a lot of the staff still referred to the older partners as “Mister ____”) that kept the office running smooth. It’s amazing how we all get along compared to the horror stories I hear from friends working with women.

  28. news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/carjackers-foiled-mysteries-stick-shift-215110818.html?.nx=count%3D5%26sortBy%3Dlatest%26exprKey%3DDescending%3Ab7640e0c-a2eb-3d45-93e0-e761a82351b1-1359504037897-f8470a93-c9c1-43b5-833a-8970adf6e23c%3Ab7640e0c-a2eb-3d45-93e0-e761a82351b1-1359504008911-5b22d01d-4271-462e-95ea-10d3087ca4a1%26isNext%3Dtrue%26pageNumber%3D11
    Meanwhile, continuing idiocracy in the once great nation. ;D

      1. Hmmm…. It was a link to a Yahoo article about 2 guys who couldn’t steal A car cause it was stick shift.
        I’d like to be a hacker but am quite innocent of the charge! 😀

  29. My cousin and her friends brought back applications from various health food stores where they were applying and the majority of the questions were “lifestyle questions” like;
    what do you like to do in your spare time?
    what is your favorite invention?
    if you were stranded on a desert island and could take only 1 book with you, what would it be?
    and oh yeah, what is your favorite product in our store?

  30. just go into IT. no game required.
    but dont forget to comb your beard and iron your tee shirt before the interview.

    1. You’ll be working under a clueless alpha boss, who thinks everything he bs’es the clients about, can be done with no effort by underlings with more education than him.
      You really think that work-life balance will exist for you in that situation?

  31. Yeah, that works until the job requires skills and competency. Not just marketing BS…
    Hiring a manager, having people skills is a no brainier. Its call hiring on qualitative basis instead of a check in the lovely self created HR box.

  32. Disagree. Firms are hiring engineers like crazy regardless of their industry and they arent exactly the most socially astute group out there. They have proven the ability to work hard, long hours and to solve problems but as a general group of people they are or were huge nerds, social recluses and certainly not alpha in the sense of the word. *Generally remember

    1. I’m getting a total different picture if I google around. Even the STEM majors are reporting more and more difficulties when applying for a job. They certainly aren’t hiring them ‘like crazy’. Not in the present economy.

  33. Yep,
    I would even go onto say that it’s required to keep a job as well.
    There’s a massive playing field inside the office which includes office politics, the ability to kiss the ass of your managers and get in with the executives.
    Because my game wasn’t on point within the office environment, my potential to produce outstanding work wasn’t weighed up as much as the people in my team who had better social skill despite not working as hard as i was to keep their jobs.

    1. The way to beat that is to do the impossible consistently. I was a trouble shooter (on contract) for a large aerospace firm. Panic time – “we need this project back on schedule in six weeks”. I did in in three most of the time. On a difficult project five. They forgot about my social skills. They even forgot about managing me. They just asked – “here is what we need – what can you do – what do you need?” Sometimes I worked in the cube. Sometimes at home. They WILL leave you alone if you can deliver. And BTW – I have zero degrees.

      1. At the water cooler, casually mention “In Forth, you can write a compiler in 3 lines of code”.

  35. I learned long ago, that the same skills I use to get women, are those that benefit me in business, and I credit my overall success in life to the life-lessons I learned in trying to understand how men and women interact, and what women want, rather than what they “say” they want.
    Of course studying body-language, human psychology and the hard-sciences has benefited me immeasurably in life.
    Of course, I run my own business – several actually – but the same skills I learned for picking up women, has served me well in business. You can’t go wrong learning how to influence, and interact with women – it will benefit you in ways you never thought of. So I’m not surprised to hear any of this – my HR department is mostly women, and I have had to educate them in technical terminology – but they are women first… The skills I learned long ago for picking up women, work just as well in the board-room…

  36. Roosh,
    your readers might want to see this. This is for all the common law deniers in the MRA! LOL!

    Speaking of keeping up with the changing times, how’s that Constitution looking? Perhaps a little outdated? Back in 1801 Thomas Jefferson thought it was looking a little stale….Discuss.Veruca.
    Posted by The Everlasting GOP Stoppers on Tuesday, January 29, 2013

  37. Want to test this theory out, legally add a female 2nd name and use that on your resume after getting a girl to help you redesign it. See how many interviews you get invited to and then subsequently get destroyed in. Dudes with the name “Shannon” or “Marion” probably have some insight on this.

  40. Networking isn’t actually all the important for entry-level jobs, qualifications still are.
    And HR departments have been trimmed down greatly since 2007.

  41. This is outside your expertise, Roosh. You have gotten like two jobs in your life, quit them, and travelled.
    This article isn’t 100% false. Certainly social skills are part of an interview. Otherwise they wouldn’t need to do it in-person. But inteview skills are different from seduction skills. Many company positions seek beta worker bees who are genial, cooperative, noncompetitive, self-sacrificing team players. This is pretty much the opposite of your solitary job personality reported in Bang. A cooperative eager beaver workmate is a far cry from the lone wolf alpha PUA stereotype.

    1. “Many company positions seek beta worker bees who are genial, cooperative, noncompetitive, self-sacrificing team players.”
      Absolutely true. It’s incompatible with an alpha attitude. If you want to achieve something, you’re better off at being your own boss. Or at least try to be.

    2. I’m not so sure. The ironic thing is that the ones who get perceived as lone wolves, or losers, can be guys who see the job as a job. Where they are there to work, apply their technical knowledge, rather than schmooze and get into people’s pants (figuratively speaking).
      The Alpha naturally schmoozes (not too eagerly, but the just right amount) and thus can thrive here.
      Betas can do well too, but only if they actively suck up, schmooze, pander to the whores in HR and managers once employed.
      Guys who simply go to work to, well… work, are shit out of luck.
      Ask me how I know.

  43. “Human resources, the biggest impediment to American corporate progress” hahaha all too true too often!!!

  46. “We’ll end up rewarding networkers, charlatans, charming rogues, and social hanger-ons who don’t produce.”
    The US has already been there for some time now. It’s the sort of development that does former tech giants like hp so many favors.

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