Why ghosting a job interviewer is a bad idea

NEW YORK (FOX5NY.COM) - At some point in all of our lives, all of us experience someone standing us up. But in perhaps no other setting does the ghoster's decision to skip their appointment seem as potentially self-destructive as in the case of a job interview.

"I've been in human resources for 30 years," Barry Drexler of expertinterviewcoach.com said. "It happens."

Drexler argued that while most of us appear baffled by the concept of skipping a job interview, in this buyer's market, with more listed jobs than job-seekers, job-interview ghosting at least feels more prevalent than during any other time in history. (By the way, the digital age allows us to blast out more resumes to more places with less effort and fewer face-to-face interactions than ever before.)

"People are not as desperate," Drexler said. "And people aren't always as professional as you would like them to be."

Unexplainably ghosting on a scheduled meeting with a hiring manager should guarantee the jilter fails to receive that job. But Drexler also warned that it may prevent the job-searching ghost from receiving a job they want in the future.

"It's a small world," Drexler said. "You just don't know who knows who."

Hiring managers also change jobs, companies merge, and employers attend conferences. And Drexler said that HR pros, like the rest of us, remember those who stood them up.

"Yeah, it's awful, but it tells you about that person," he said, "and they're doing you a favor."