this post was submitted on 18 Oct 2025
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No Stupid Questions

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Its the dumbest fucking advice I've found since everything is centralised and run from head offices but they dont seem to understand thats not a thing

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[–] HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 2 points 13 hours ago

Good clothes used to be expensive and a signifier of wealth. Someone who could wear a suit likely had money and someone who had a fashionable suit likely had more money. Over the past generation, as clothing became cheaper and large parts of the richer segments have up on dressing well, the value of wearing a suit dropped.

Wearing a suit is still valuable in some circumstances, but nowhere near as much as before.

[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 35 points 2 days ago

Because that's how it worked for pretty much everything back in the day when your chances of getting a loan from the bank depended on the impression of trustworthiness you projected on the bank manager when you asked for it, rather than some obscure algorithm running in the bank's systems that didn't take in account any feedback from an actual human.

Amongst large companies automation removed humans from the loop, at least at an early stage, so now your machine processable input and/or information about you extracted from some other sources about what you've done so far, matching whatever the algorithm is configured to favor is all that matters. Sure, beyond that you'll almost certainly end up with a person making a final decision (for hiring, not for bank loans), but you first have to pass that big initial automated hurdle that's supposed to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Amongst other things this has killed "being judged as having potential" as a way to get a foot on the door, unless you have a high score on a metric supposedly correlated to it such as good grades at a supposedly elite university, since unlike "impression" such metrics can be mathematically evaluated and compared by algorithms.

Mind you, when looking for work in smaller companies that haven't outsourced their hiring, impressions still work since your first point of contact is going to be a person whose opinion counts rather than an algorithm or a person too low on the pecking scale for their judgement to be taken in account.

[–] Alenalda@lemmy.world 26 points 2 days ago (2 children)

You can get into a lotta places wearing a hard hat and reflective vest while carrying a ladder.

[–] Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works 9 points 2 days ago

Or a clip board with some technical papers on it, in case you don't want to lug a ladder.

[–] Dead_or_Alive@lemmy.world 14 points 2 days ago (2 children)

It depends upon the setting and what you want. Showing up to a McDonalds shift in a suite and tie trying to get the CEO job. Not so much.

Showing up to your first office job and meeting with your bosses in a nice polo or button down shirt and slacks looking professional, yes. It signals you are eager and want to succeed. Which will go a long way.

Of course you still have to put the work in. But your boss will be more likely to give you more training/work/promotions if they know you want to learn and work over someone who doesn’t give a shit.

[–] BoxOfFeet@lemmy.world 16 points 2 days ago (1 children)

No, they aren't talking about for an interview. They are talking about going in someplace in a suit and asking for a job. My mother insisted I did this when I got out of college. It only took a few receptionists looking at me like I'm crazy to be reaffirmed that this was a dumb idea. Even places that did have openings told me to apply online.

[–] IndridCold@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 day ago

They are talking about going in someplace in a suit and asking for a job.

I'm GenX. In my entire working career over the years I've seen random people come in off the street, CV in hand, looking for a job not advertised. Not one of these people were ever hired.

Actually, now that I think of it. One guy was. My friend worked for a porn shop in the 80s that had video peep booths in the back. It was his job to clean these booths. A homeless guy came in looking for a handout and my friend hired him to clean the booths for a few bucks a day. Dude would come in every day and spend 10 minutes wiping spooge off the floor.

So I guess if you aspire to be a cum cleaner, this technique might work.

[–] BoxOfFeet@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

Never mind. I read some of their replies. You are correct.

[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 31 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (4 children)

Because life was literally that easy for them.

If they had a pulse, they usually got the job

You were guaranteed if you also dressed like the fancy people on television.

[–] Cassanderer@thelemmy.club 7 points 2 days ago

The world has changed for sure. They still have their positions but how they got them no longer works. The pay no lomger buys either.

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[–] Postmortal_Pop@lemmy.world 229 points 3 days ago (6 children)

My dad was a big believer of this when I was younger. Finally I humored him and had him drive me around town as I went into every buisness ask for a paper application. I printed and stapled 30 resumes for the trip, got dressed up, on the way into town he was so smug about how I was finally "really trying to get hired". Four hours later, we'd been to nearly 50 businesses, I'd gotten two paper applications and only 16 of my resumes were accepted. Everyone else said to apply online or "we only hire through the temp agencies". My dad for his part took it way harder than me. I think he actually realized that's not how it works anymore because he never suggested it again and took me seriously when I said I'd been putting in applications online.

[–] marighost@piefed.social 65 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Congrats on getting your dad to change his mind, even if begrudgingly.

There are so many people in his generation that simply do not understand what this job market is like, what navigating Indeed or LinkedIn is like, or how people apply for those jobs anymore. Very little human interaction happens applying for jobs these days.

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[–] sopularity_fax@sopuli.xyz 60 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (4 children)

The part that gets me is they surely cant have had any recent success with it. Like, the first time they ever get to following their own advice in the modern day, they inevitably realize its bullshit. They voted and used their positions or authority in society to literally make it so that wasnt a thing that would ever be possible after them, shareholders dont care for opportunity or paying to train anyone or giving any rando a chance anymore

That would conflict with all the big cash payoffs

[–] TrojanRoomCoffeePot@lemmy.world 52 points 3 days ago (4 children)

Have you heard the expression 'pulling the ladder up after themselves' in relation to Booomers, and the housing/labour market?

[–] Cassanderer@thelemmy.club 4 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

Blaming the generation for losing to the 1972 biz roundtable plot would utterly condemn our own as things are getting way way worse right now.

Their and our sins were not stopping a ruling class power grab.

We need to organize. They are organized.

[–] TrojanRoomCoffeePot@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

1972 biz roundtable plot

I'd appreciate some illumination on this point, having never heard anything about any specific business reorganization in '72? America specifically, or was there some kind of global shift that I'm not recalling?

[–] Cassanderer@thelemmy.club 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The major Business Leaders huddled up and made a long game plan that included infiltrating unions with organized crime, corrupting both political parties, capturing Regulatory Agencies, changing economic measures like the inflation rate to understate it which truly has been their biggest coup that is not even recognized by most of the population, also the unemployment rate only counting people collecting unemployment insurance Etc, capturing the Judiciary and stacking judges and prosecutors with their hand-picked groomed candidates from the Federalist Society type organizations. Fomenting the fear of the other and creating a police state to set Americans against each other, and so forth.

Fixing elections deserves a mention as well although I do not know if they explicitly worked towards that at that time but definitely gerrymandering type stuff.

Their biggest goals were to get rid of the New Deal programs like Social Security, but all of them, unemployment insurance, disability, workers compensation, to go back to the good old days when the old or injured or handicapped would be thrown out in the street to beg and or die.

[–] TrojanRoomCoffeePot@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

I'll be damned, I've been reading about the tendrils of this scheme for decades. What's the skinny on its main organizers, are they explicitly identified as members of any particular named groups in a more specific than general way?

Edit: Nevermind, there's a literal Wikipedia entry, they get zero points for their organization naming skills.

[–] Cassanderer@thelemmy.club 2 points 1 day ago

I don't know if the Wikipedia even has the specific info on that part of it, it is still an ongoing organization. And there have been other sort of subsequent meetings where they have further refined their machinations but that was the Genesis of it as I understand it.

[–] IronBird@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

there is one consolation atleast...consolidation makes this problem easier to fix, in theory

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[–] Cassanderer@thelemmy.club 2 points 2 days ago

For sure. Tbf though, things have gone to hell even more in our generation. Is it their, and now our, faults for not stopping a business plot hatched in 1972 at the biz roundtable to subjugate and impoverish workers and remove protections?

To some degree, we need to do more for sure. But divided we will not, we need organization to combat the organized biz plot(s,) and blaming the boomers by the same logic would as of yet utterly condemn our own generations.

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[–] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 3 points 2 days ago

Kinda wholesome

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[–] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 8 points 2 days ago

You need to know someone who works there I find. That way they actually read your CV.

[–] IdontplaytheTrombone@lemmy.world 27 points 2 days ago (2 children)

That's what they did the last time they searched for a job. It used to work.

[–] Clathrate_Gun@lemmy.zip 11 points 2 days ago

This.
It’s old advice that used to work, and it worked very well.

[–] innermachine@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

It still kind of works in some industries. I got my last 3 jobs, and 2 of them "weren't hiring", by walking into the joint and asking to talk to the boss and saying I can start in 2 weeks I juat have to give my current biss notice. In demanding industries, showing up in person makes an impression, another app on a stack of applications gets you nowhere. Lots of people apply, few can talk the talk and walk the walk or actually do the work. I the auto industry you show up and impress the foreman or manager with your knowledge and your pretty much in. I know people that work in welding and a construction that this also works for. I also have siblings that are white collar that this absolutely does nothing for. Supposeit also depends on how much of a giant corp you work for, as I never work for monolithic corporations. If I can't meet my boss I can't work there.

[–] agent_nycto@lemmy.world 20 points 2 days ago (8 children)

Ok, I agree with you, I do, buuuuut

If someone shows up to an interview wearing pajamas, they are probably less likely to get a job. So you do have to dress up a little bit, depending on what the job is.

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[–] Nemo@slrpnk.net 107 points 3 days ago (2 children)

They believe that because that's how it used to work (and still does in some industries). That's their lived experience.

[–] amino@lemmy.blahaj.zone 35 points 3 days ago (1 children)

it definitely didn't work that way for Black boomers

[–] Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 68 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Maybe not in general, but it IS the reason that if you look at photos of the million man march, they're all dressed up. Reason being, they were afraid any media coverage would paint them as degdnerates, thugs, and vandals. It's much harder to paint that picture if they're marching in unison wearing 3 piece suits, and their sunday best.

This in the middle of the summer when that was wildly uncomfortable.

[–] shawn1122@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I mean, that's just smart, wearing Western formalwear to convince white Westerners that you're human.

I think the point does stand that this advice needs to be considered in the racially accepted or disenfranchised context Boomers lived in.

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[–] TrojanRoomCoffeePot@lemmy.world 60 points 3 days ago (5 children)

Lived experience and/or delusion. Many can't seem to absorb that the labour market didn't stop changing in 19-fucking-73, and it shows.

I couldn't believe how dogshit so much of their advice was the last time I was searching for new work, and how irate they were that I wouldn't take it - because it was useless and/or hazardous to my financial stability in the situation at hand. That coffee drinks-avocado toast shit seemed like satire at first, but some of them actually believe it, and had I been spineless/stupid enough to allow them to push me into the courses of action they were insisting on I think that it might have killed me.

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[–] LodeMike@lemmy.today 48 points 3 days ago (3 children)

That's what happened to them. If they were white.

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[–] Archangel1313@lemmy.ca 30 points 3 days ago (3 children)

This works for small businesses. Sending them an email will just wind up in spam. But show up in person, and you might get to talk to an actual person. This distinguishes you from some random, semi-anonymous piece of paper or text header.

If you're applying at some gigantic mega-corporation, then none of that matters. They won't have time to see you anyway, and will only look at your application if they specifically asked you to give them one.

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