I guess it's that time of the year, when we call out and make fun of really stupid recruiting techniques.

Exhibit 1: An email titled "Not a recruiting pitch (promise)", which contains a link to a webinar the sender recorded with a dude I have no knowledge of, or interest in.

Conclusion 1: gain 1 point for exceeding my expectations and actually not including a recruiting pitch right there and then. Lose 2 points for unsolicited self promotion. Gain 0 response.

Exhibit 2: An email next day "Sharing the talk I mentioned" with a link to exactly the same talk, which I am as uninterested in as I was yesterday. Honestly, if we were friends or at least passing acquaintances, this would be forgivable - if sender knew what I'm into and really thought this talk would be useful to me in some way. But from a total stranger sharing their own video, this is just rude.

Conclusion 2: Lose 4 points for continued self-promotion, and lose one extra point for not reading the room. Gain 0 response.

Exhibit 3: An email the day after, the only meaningful text in which is "PS : we're growing super quickly, are you open to a conversation about joining our candidly superstar engineering team?"

Conclusion 3: Aw, fuck, I knew it. Lose 100 points for breaking a promise, and lose 10 more points for damaging my faith in humanity like that. Gain 1 custom-made email filter to have all our future emails sent straight to garbage.