Need your opinions on a job rejection reason I was given??

[ardentvix]

I interviewed with an agency (for an examiner position). I went through three rounds of panel interviews, with a total of about 14 people. I was well prepared for the interviews, met or exceeded all the qualifications/education requirements, did lots of research on the agency, and all the interviewers thought I was awesome, and said so! So after the interviews I sent a thank you, and two weeks later called to follow up.

Their reject reason? My salary at my current company was too low relative to what the starting salary was at the agency.

I had never heard of that reason before (in hindsight, I should have never disclosed my current salary -which is about 60k, their staring salary was around 95k). I was floored... so I kept quiet on the phone. The interviewer I guess got nervous and said more than he probably should have. Said that I was one of the top candidates but they couldn't justify giving me that type of salary boost and gave it to someone else who was already paid closer to their salary. Has anyone experienced this?

A friend of mine who works for the fed. govt says I should fight about this, but i'm not sure if that's a good idea either. Your thoughts?

[Anonymous]

That's ridiculous. Your current pay pay could be low for many reasons. I have hired people into roles with major boosts to income.

But I am not sure how you fight something like that.

[Anonymous]

The only thing I can think of is that if this one federal gov't agency to another, they couldn't find a reason to justify boosting you from, say a GS-7 to GS-11. They would have to give a reason based on a special skill set and they couldn't find that in your credentials.

That's all I can think of.

[Anonymous]

Need some context...did you interview for a federal job? Are you a current federal employee?

If you are currently a fed employee, there's not much you can do on the GS system.

If you aren't though...you have a legitimate complaint. Contact the IG or general counsel office in that agency. Or go right to OPM. That's not a good enough reason to not select you.

[Anonymous]

Ridiculous to go to IG or OPM. Agency has broad discretion absent EEO reasons to hire or not hire you.

They just didn't want you and maybe explained things badly.

Fed HR person

[Anonymous]

The IG investigates gross mismanagement, fraud, waste, abuse of power/privilege. OPM investigates violations of personnel law. This is neither.

If you are not a current federal employee (in which case you could not jump several GS levels) you received a poor explanation at best which is not a crime. Perhaps the HR person was trying to say that you were reaching too high. She did not want to tell you that it was too much of a stretch for you.

[Anonymous]

OP, so what if the interviewers told you that you were awesome? What the hell did you expect? To be told you were terrible? HELLO LAWSUIT!

[Anonymous]

i doubt lawsuit. the reason was not in writing, it appears.

[Anonymous]

Assuming you were applying to a Federal agency in the Executive Branch, it is a potential Prohibited Personnel Practice. 5 U.S.C. § 2302(b)(12) provides that an agency official shall not take or fail to take a personnel action if doing so would violate a law, rule or regulation implementing or directly concerning the merit system principles. One of the merit system principles is that personnel decisions, including hiring decisions, are based on merit. The question is whether there is some law, rule or regulation that would make it permissible to take into consideration the salary issue your have raised in the hiring decision.

Don't guess, just contact the Office of Special Counsel https://osc.gov/Pages/ppp-fileacomplaint.aspx.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, so what if the interviewers told you that you were awesome? What the hell did you expect? To be told you were terrible? HELLO LAWSUIT!

NP. Why would there be a lawsuit? I agree that usually candidates aren't told that they didn't do well (especially during the interview itself), but I think a lot of it is for politeness/tact reasons rather than fear of lawsuit. Contrary, if someone answers a question well or something, it's ok to give that feedback right there. I would not expect an offer just because I was told during the interview that my answers were good, but I also would not expect interviewers to say it if theyd didn't mean it. I know when I am interviewing someone, I would not say "great answer" unless I meant it, and I would not say "terrible answer" if it was, I would just move on to the next question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, so what if the interviewers told you that you were awesome? What the hell did you expect? To be told you were terrible? HELLO LAWSUIT!

NP. Why would there be a lawsuit? I agree that usually candidates aren't told that they didn't do well (especially during the interview itself), but I think a lot of it is for politeness/tact reasons rather than fear of lawsuit. Contrary, if someone answers a question well or something, it's ok to give that feedback right there. I would not expect an offer just because I was told during the interview that my answers were good, but I also would not expect interviewers to say it if theyd didn't mean it. I know when I am interviewing someone, I would not say "great answer" unless I meant it, and I would not say "terrible answer" if it was, I would just move on to the next question.

The reason for the claim is because the federal government has specific laws that say all personnel decisions have to be made on merit and the legitimate needs of the agency. Hiring managers have more rules to follow in the government than in private industry. I am not aware of you would receive too much of a salary increase as a reason for not hiring someone into the government on a competitive basis.