Further Adventures Of The Unemployed

THIS WEEK, I applied for a job as a “Field Supervisor” with a company called Taylorgrown. This is what their advert said:

FIELD SUPERVISOR
Enthusiastic Person with good communication skills required to manage our student workforce for a ten week period starting mid May. This is a varied and stimulating position which would suit an organised individual with the ability to motivate their team. Good hourly rate available to the right applicants.
Applications in writing to:
TAYLORGROWN LTD, Tarrylaw, Balbeggie, Perth, PH2 6HL.
Or email: info@taylorgrown.co.uk

From what I could find out via Google, they apparently grow and pack carrots for supermarkets. So I sent off this letter, accompanied by my CV:
“Dear Taylorgrown,
I wish to be considered for the vacancy of Field Supervisor, advertised in today's Courier.
I've previously managed and motivated teams of students, teachers, tourists and journalists.
Every Saturday and Sunday morning, I currently have to "manage" 22 highly unstable and emotional adults, and have so far done so in a manner which has earned me respect and plaudits.(I'm a referee with the Dundee and Forfar Amateur weekend leagues......)
I've worked as a journalist, TV presenter, chef, adventure tour guide, nightclub doorman and driver. I currently freelance as a Teacher of English as a Foreign Language.
I'm fit, enthusiastic, an excellent communicator, and possess a clean driving licence.
I attach my CV, including photo, copy of CELTA teaching certificate, letter of reference and testimonies from satisfied clients."
Before continuing, if you haven’t done so already, you should have a quick look at my CV, otherwise the full, grotesque effect of what is about to unfold will be lost.
Two weeks after writing to Taylorgrown, this email arrived in my inbox:
Dear Mr.......,
Thank you for your quick response to our advert, we appreciate your interest in our company. I regret to inform you that in this instance your we will not be calling you forward for an interview. I wish you every success in your future career.
Yours respectfully
Mrs. Lynne Brudenell B.A. (Hons)
Office Manager
There were several warning signs: the formal tone, the need to use the title Mrs. before her name and the gratuitous use of fancy initials after it. But I still had an urge to find out why my experience as a teacher, journalist and all-round good egg had failed to get me so much as an interview for a job which seemingly had my name written all over it: “enthusiastic person with good communication skills…..organised individual…….with the ability to motivate”, etc, etc.
So I emailed Mrs. Lynne Brudenell B.A. (Hons) the following:
“Thanks for your reply. I wonder if you can help me. I've applied for lots of "supervisory" jobs in the past few months, and sent out what I consider to be a very impressive CV. However, I'm never invited for an interview, which is beginning to make me wonder whether there is some glaring anomaly with my CV which I have failed to notice. Any advice or recommendations you have would be much appreciated.”
Mrs. Brudenell, bless her, obviously has quite an inflated sense of her own importance as an office manager on a farm that grows carrots. Instead of just firing a one-line email back, she chose to telephone me.
She wasted no time in pointing out certain deficiencies in the quality of my CV. Her first observation was this:
“I’ve never seen a photograph on a CV before.”
Then silence. I thought she had stopped mid-sentence, or forgotten what she was going to say. But no, that was the first fault she had spotted. The use of a photograph on a CV.

"Erm," I said. "What about it?"

"I've never seen it before." She made it sound as if I’d Sellotaped a stool sample to the page.
“Oh,” I said, not really quite sure what else to say. “Erm, anything else?”
“Yes, I see you’ve written Teacher, Adventurer and Gentleman at the top.”
Again, an uneasy silence. Was this a criticism, or merely the preamble to the revelation of an even more flagrant breach of CV etiquette?
“You don’t need that,” Mrs. Brudenell continued.
“Anything else?” I ventured, suddenly wondering whether a quirk in atmospheric conditions had somehow resulted in crossed lines with a Presbyterian schoolteacher from 1875.
“Well you’ve obviously got a lot of experience, qualifications and testimonies from previous employers. But your CV is a bit jokey. I don’t think it should be.”
I ascertained that Mrs. Brudenell’s BA (Hons) was in Humanities and then put the phone down on her before she could berate me over my reckless use of the semi-colon. I wondered if electricity or the combustion engine had made it to Taylorgrown yet.
In a world of war, cancer and Davina McCall, my sufferings as a job-seeker(see CV or not CV? and Anatomy of a Job Interview) are pretty insignificant.
It’s just a shame that in a world already depressingly over brimming with corporate automatons and humourless imbeciles, I discovered the existence of yet another one this week.
This week, Jack Havana recommends....
.....sprouts instead of carrots.