actually, that brings up a really great point. This could be an interesting article. Considering how much the web focuses on 'conversion of web leads' and making the entire process seamless, you'd think you could quantify the candidates lost (and put a dollar figure on it) simply because the interface wasn't friendly and turned away candidates. However, all too often i feel that the goal for everyone involved but the hiring manager, is a seat filled.

Anecdotally, I was prompted 'Zip code required' on a multinational company talent portal. Tried to fix and submit for at least 60 seconds before finally had to modify the CSS to show the input so I could put in a value, as Zip input was set to display:none. I figured at least there would be less competition for the role.

It's possible that your application was the only one... in months... so nobody was even looking at these applications.

You did not get reply in the end, right?

not a peep :)

That's a killer idea for a front-end developer test.

Front-end developer may not want to work in the place that makes such silly mistakes.

If you deliberately made it that way and told your candidates, it might work well. If you're a web dev and can't figure out how to un-hide a field, then you don't deserve an interview.

Definitely intentionally, more of a gauge of problem solving ability. Fix the bugs, submit the test, get interview.

Similarly, I send my resume out as a PDF. If they ask for it in Word format, I know it's going into that kind of system. I may or may not send it in Word format, but it's definitely a mark against them.

I have questions for both you and IndianAstronaut, then. I see statements like this frequently. I also see people talking about desiring to work at places like Intel, Qualcomm, Nvidia, and other such large tech companies that violate one or both of your rules. I assume you are not in that group? Would you really turn down one of those companies of a recruiter approached you and asked for a Word resume or told you to fill out a Taleo profile?

I kind of hinted at that in my original post. If it's a named company that I explicitly desire to work for then I might be willing to jump through a couple of hoops. Generally speaking, though, the name on the sign is not a strong indicator of whether or not I'm interested in working there. I'm usually looking for some combination of salary, technology stack or cool project, and strong/intelligent team. Having a recognizable company name on my resume is a very very low priority.

If a recruiter approached me, then sure. The recruiter is at least keeping an eye on my resume. Otherwise I will not apply. Taleo is a black hole.

Same here! It's a definite alert.

Even more irritating is that recruiters don't appear to know the difference between C#, C, C++ and Obj-C.