Grad-spam is the latest corporate email scourge as tens of millions of unsolicited and unsuitable job applications clog up recruiters’ inboxes in a torrent that threatens to outdo the unwanted ads for Viagra and pornography sites.
According to a piece in the Times, half of graduate job applications are now dismissed as junk because they have been bulk-emailed to at least 20 addresses, while a third have no covering message, were addressed to the wrong company or were littered with spelling mistakes.
The Times reckons that the problem partly stems from the Government’s rapid expansion of university participation, but points out that the quality of those leaving universities appears to leave a lot to be desired.
Employers claim that this apparent academic improvement is belied by the quality of the applications they receive. Nina Hampson, co-founder of Myla, the lingerie chain, said that the company was inundated with applications containing basic grammatical mistakes.
"Some of the applicants for marketing jobs have even used text style language saying things like, ‘I hope 2 hear from U soon’,” she said. “Do they think I would want someone like that promoting the company? It is crazy.”
