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A reader writes in about her frustrating experiences trying to get hired at a JC Penney salon. She spoke to her prospective boss and got the impression that she would be good to go, but the automated application system keeps throwing her curveballs.
She describes her roundabout journey:
1. Applied online. Answered lot of strange questions, but I answered them honestly.2. Went in to salon with resume and spoke with the salon manager. He stated had not received my online application please check on it and call him. I need someone and you seem to be a good fit for the job. “You look like and seem to be the type of person I am looking for”.
3. Go back online a try to re apply. System tells me I can’t apply for 173 days.
4. Call JCP salon manager Still could not see my online application. Asked me to
come into the kiosk and apply again. ( This kiosk is just outside the door of the salon). At the end once again it told me you must wait a total of 171 days to apply again! Salon manager talked to someone in back office. ” You failed our online test!You can not retake this test for 171 days! Not only can you not work at the salon, you can’t work anywhere for JCP!” What? Am I an idiot? I did not think this to be the case but, computers don’t make mistakes…right? Still confused!!! The salon manager went above and beyond to try to help. He next went to the store manager who said “sorry I used to be able to override this but they took that away from us.” You might try contacting the home office in WACO TEXAS. He meant for me to check with Waco, not the JCP store.
This is insane! Clearly the salon manager wanted to offer me a position. But, I am done in by some crazy HR program which apparently has pegged me as what? An idiot, a serial killer, too smart to work for JCP etc…..
I checked online, too late for me, and found blogs on how to pass these online tests…. the main point “don’t be honest, tell them what they want to hear!” One of the sites was written by the person who either created or helped create the test!
Help, I am stuck in computer lunacy! Guess I could just sign up for welfare….or does that have a test also?
If a computer has ever blocked you from working somewhere, tell us about your battle.
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I tried to get a job at Network Solutions years ago. I guess I was too honest on the weird test they made me take.
Considering those tests tend to make sure that you don’t sit around and drool on yourself, its scary that you can fail them.
Here is a tip to passing one of those dumb test:
You see a co woker steal, what do you do.
1. Tell Mgr
2. Say nothing
3. Say I want a cut or I am telling
4. Punch him/her in head grab what he/she is stealing and run like hell.
The correct answer is 4 but to pass the test you would answer 1
Not a computer, but my wife (who is deaf) applied to work at target, and some guy in a wheel chair comes rolling up while we’re filling out the computer app in the store to talk to us. I can barely understand him, and he’s got so much drool pouring out of his mouth onto his shirt it looked great, and I was cool with that until he started talking. He found out my wife was deaf, and he said if she cant use a radio she cant work there. I said listen jackoff if they can make up a job for you i’m sure they can let her work without a radio. It didnt go over well, for some reason neither of us wanted her working there after talking to him.
Thanks for the insight.
either JCP failed their own test, or there as self-incriminating responses that you ruled yourself out of
keep searching, and there should be a fit for you somewhere
best of luck
my favorite: “I would take a day off because the weather is nice.”
Of course not! never. right?
Say you’re a person living with autism or major depression and sue the $h!t out of them.
Two days ago same thing happened to me. I retired after 28 years as a customer service rep with a major communications company and have been bonded, At the end of the test there was a statement that due to my answers I don’t qualify to be a JCP employee. You don’t keep a job for 28 years by being an untrustworthy, incompetent employee. Their loss !!!
Does it deduct points for over-use of exclamation points?
I applied once to work for a major retailer, and the online portion wanted to offer me an interview and to click on the provided calender to find a date and time to come in.
I could schedule anytime in 3 months, which I thought was weird, and I rifled through the 3 months and there were no available times.
Sorry I wasted my time with that application.
You have to look at these tests the right way.
They are not personality or aptitude tests. They are intelligence tests.
Are you smart enough to mark the answers that they want to see? That is the test.
I have had some experience with these testsl
1. Assuming you did not admit to theft…you may not have failed.
The test may have determined that you might not be a good fit for the position….and yes. it may be wrong.
2. As for lying….most of these tests are written to determine deception…..which would probably be an immediate knock-out factor,.
“2. As for lying….most of these tests are written to determine deception…..which would probably be an immediate knock-out factor,.”
No, they aren’t. Not well, at least.
I have had some experience with these testsl
1. Assuming you did not admit to theft…you may not have failed.
The test may have determined that you might not be a good fit for the position….and yes. it may be wrong.
2. As for lying….most of these tests are written to determine deception…..which would probably be an immediate knock-out factor,.
Online job applications have become a crutch for HR departments. It’s allowed HR people to become more like glorified secretaries, merely mindlessly parroting what the great-god-computer tells them, rather than act as any sort of actual trained professional.
This is not unlike the written psychological tests they give to prospective police officers. You need to tell them what they want to hear and keep all of your answers consistent. Honesty is definitely NOT the best policy with these.
I was working for FedEx Kinko’s a few years back and the store manager wanted to move me up a step from the position I was working. The details may not be perfect but this is more or less how it happened. To get the promotion I had to complete some training on a computer over the store’s intranet. Following that was a 20-30 minute test which you had something like 60 to 90 minutes to complete. I got all the way to the submission page very confident that my score was perfect or near it when we lost connectivity and my session timed out. Because it was a timed test, I wasn’t able to resume or finish it at a later time, I would have to retake it. No biggie, right?
Wait, nope, it said I already took the test and time had elapsed before I finished, automatic fail, I wasn’t eligible to take the test again for 90 days.
The store manager spent at least a couple hours calling different people at district and corporate and got nowhere. Nobody would reset the test, nobody would approve the promotion, I was stuck in my position for at least 90 days because a huge corporation like FedEx can’t keep it’s intranet running consistently (it was always going down anyway).
To top it off, the job I was aiming for was filled 2 months later when the district manager transferred someone newer and dumber than me from another store, who had been able to complete the test. By that point I was planning on leaving, that just solidified it for me.
You’re in a desert, walking along in the sand when all of a sudden you look down and see a customer. It’s crawling toward you. You reach down and flip the customer over on its back
The customer lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over. But it can’t. Not with out your help. But you’re not helping.
A – Help the customer right itself.
B – Give the customer encouragement. “You can do it!”
C – Pretend to be engaged with another customer and walk away.
D – Offer to call over another JCP employee to ‘help’ while you leave.
E – Hold it to the ground by planting one foot firmly on its chest.
Reaction time is a factor in this so please pay attention. Answer as quickly as you can.
[Loud ticking digital clock on screen counting down]
I once got hired at a retail store despite my honesty on the application. My friend worked there and recommended me to her boss (store manager) to take her place as a cashier when she left for college. I applied and got an immediate interview (he read my application as we talked). I got hired on the spot and was promoted to an assistant manager position within a month.
Some time later we were talking about job applications and I mentioned how I was surprised that it didn’t come up in the interview how I had answered on the question that asked if I had ever stolen anything from an employer (pencils, pens, paper, etc.). I answered yes, because in the past I had “misappropriated” supplies from former employers. I was curious to see how an honest answer would play. I was ready to defend my answer by stating that everyone has at some point taken company property in some form or another. Would you rather hire someone who was honest enough to say they have done it, and is resolved to not do it any more, or someone who would lie and say that they never have? However, he overlooked that question during our interview. After my revelation, he informed me that if he had seen my answer, he would not have hired me, that it would have been against company policy to do so. So here’s a store that’s trusting me to oversee millions of dollars of inventory that wouldn’t have trusted me to be a bottom rung stockboy if this guy had read one line on my application.
So, yes, tell them what they want to hear.
“Would you rather hire someone who was honest enough to say they have done it, and is resolved to not do it any more, or someone who would lie and say that they never have?”
Yeah, megacorporations and chains don’t think like that.
The tests see if you’re customer service material. They ask the same 10 questions over and over by rephrasing them. I don’t know how you could ever fail one.
I’ve taken these tests before…in the time when I was desperate to get a job (a few years ago). There’s two types of people this is designed for: Those perfect corporate drones and people resourceful enough to cheat the test and answer perfectly. Never passed one of these myself.
Given the types of companies that use these (haven’t had to take one after getting a degree), and the type of people I interact with when I visit those stores. I am glad I didn’t pass, that’s a confirmation that I’m not like the idiots working at those stores. That’s a very good thing IMO.
FWIW, they probably told you “Plano” rather than “Waco” as JCP’s home offices are in Plano, a suburb of Dallas. Not that this has any bearing on your (in)ability to pass their screening–just more of an FYI.
With all the comments on here about lying to pass the test I think it is safe to assume that the test WANTS liars. That would mean that JCP has been taken over by the government. Swell.
“1. Applied online. Answered lot of strange questions, but I answered them honestly. “
There’s the mistake. Lie. Tell them what they want to hear.
Personality tests are about your sales ability, not honesty. You’ll never ever get the job if you answer honestly, even if you’re the best candidate for the job.
Ha. I just got hired to Hell-mart. I am very anti-hellmart. But, I took the stupid assessment test passed. Then on the interview I was asked by 2 different people, 5 questions each basically asking the same question written a different ways.
Hey, jerb is a jerb.
My opinion, you escaped with your conscience intact. Do you really want to work for a company which vigorously supports Israeli efforts of ethnic cleansing? Every purchase pays for a bullet to murder an innocent.
Similar screenings (most are provided by either Unicru or Kronos): Shaws Supermarkets in north east, Penney (as cited), Staples, Best Buy, Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes, the now defunct version of Citcuit City, etcetera. Most stores refuse (AND managers are told to refuse) paper applications (if you can even find any paper applications these days). One MAJOR issue: I get dropped out of one process when the system recalled my ss# and re-entered certain details which had changed – I was not offered any opportunity to correct the situation. I feel that we are definitely being tracked. On those dumb screenings, many issues are ambivalent: to keep a good workforce, you should try to work things out between yourself and an upset employee, yet if you aren’t ignoring the problems, you can be considered to be wasting company time on ‘personal matters’. The real underlying effort was intended to see if you matched a certain position, yet use ONE screening for several levels in the employer: a good manager has to have slightly different characteristics from a subordinate stock clerk.