Why am I being rejected for being too Senior for roles that I know I can do?

While I'm not currently offering 1:1 coaching I do want to try and help more people who are job hunting by answering the questions I get from past coaching, in my DMs and conversations.

If you have a question you want me to answer, you can submit it here https://airtable.com/appHQDs2siBGRAgRV/shrVttPTCpAm7IlPs

Being rejected for being too Senior feels like an oxymoron right, like they are saying you're too good for the role but how can that be? I have first hand experience with this too, I went from being a Managing Director of a Recruitment agency (MD was for a short period) but I wanted something different and I knew that title was going to scare people off when I was going for individual contributor (IC, no management responsibilities) in my next role.

Before I go too far into this let me clarify that these are the reasons I've seen and not that I necessarily believe. As a Manager I have hired "mature juniors" more than once, I loved them too but when I'm the Recruiter on a role I'm not the final decision maker.

At the same time, there are times when if someone is really honest with themselves (and there's been a few times that I have got them to this level of honesty) that they are too Senior for the role and I'll explain what I mean.

Let me start with an example from years ago; Boris was applying for Sales roles but was being rejected over and over again. Sometimes he would get an interview but a lot of the time he wouldn't even get to the first call despite having 15 + years of sales experience.

Boris had been a VP of Sales for the past 5 years and in Management positions for the past 8.

The roles he was applying for were ICroles, sales targets, no one to manage just build pipelines and close deals.

Boris had been in and out of selling himself for the past 8 years but usually only for short periods while hiring and training. He couldn't give his deal history other than his teams total billings unless you went back 8 + years.

Eventually Boris found a role, he went in as a Senior Sales Executive and lasted 5 months.

Because he found a Sales Manager role and left as soon as he signed the contract.

That perception of "they've been in more Senior roles so they are going to want that again now or soon" is one of the most common reasons I've heard for rejection. If you have been in that scenario, you need to be able to clearly articulate why this role is right for you now rather than being what they think it is:

A role to pay the bills right now until you can secure the Management role.

Companies have either had their own version of Boris or heard of a similar story so if this less Senior title, responsibilities and pay is really what you want next and for longer than a few months, you need to be able to sell them on that.

The next most common reason goes back to Boris not being hands on in selling himself recently and this might be a harder thing for some people to swallow.

Just because you were great at your craft, doesn't mean you're still great. Maybe you're good or you can pick it back up quickly but the other people in the interview process, they are doing it now and have been for the past few years.

Like fitness or sporting ability, it can fade when you haven't been practising or using that skill everyday. It's not that you can't do it but it could be that the less Senior people you're competing with can do it better without needing that time to relearn.

The last one is the less often spoken about or admitted to reason from the Hiring Manager; you are a potential threat to their role and their progression.

Let's use Boris as the example, he's interviewing for a Sales role and the Manager can see that he has the knowledge to do the role but also more Management experience. That Manager has already been overlooked for a promotion once so adding another potential internal candidate for their dream role isn't on their priority list.

Is this fair? No but neither are most things in life (sorry for the Dad speech on life kids)

Is this in the company's best interest? No, most companies want density in their talent and multiple options for growth and contingency.

Does the Hiring Manager hold the company's interest over their own career goals? Rarely, if companies want to hire driven and ambitious people you have to factor a certain level of competitiveness and maybe sometimes greed happening sometimes. It's a dog eat dog world kids (sorry again, I just mowed the lawns so I am in full Dad mode right now)

If you're being rejected for being too Senior; these are the most common things you'll need to do:

• Address the step back ASAP with a rationale to why this role is what you want now and long term. For example, when I have been in that position I would include in my Cover Letter or messages to people I was reaching out to things like "I know my title has been XYZ most recently but that can be deceiving. I was the first hire in that team so I was hands on with all recruitment while building a team and even when the team hit 10 people, I was always managing 5-10 roles minimum and I would focus on the more Senior roles as the team grew. Managing others isn't a must have for me and to be honest, I quite enjoy not having that responsibility"

• Have a good answer for this question: "If a VP of Sales role was advertised tomorrow, why would you not apply for that role?" (Using Boris and his VP as the example, swap this title for whatever your current or most recent title is/was) The idea of this question is to understand if this Sales role is genuinely what you want or just a way to pay the mortgage until the role you really want comes in.

• Be nice to and stay in touch with everyone you've managed, existing networks are the most underrated and under utilised way of getting a job but that network doesn't exist if you're A) an asshole B) they haven't heard from you in 5 years

• Be realistic about your salary expectations. Just because your salary was $300k as a VP doesn't mean they are going to pay you the same or even above the rest of the team. The market dictates the salary not your previous paychecks

I understand if you've been in a job hunt for a while (long job hunts of 6 months plus are increasingly common for Seniors the past few years and I know many that have taken some comfort in knowing that it's not just them. I promise you it's not, it's the market) that some of this might not be what you want to hear.

Please remember I am giving this as advice to try to help you find a role and I'm speaking in very general terms, some Hiring Managers/Founders/CEOs might totally disagree with everything I've said here.

I'm also expecting at least one person to read this and think/comment that the only reason they aren't getting an interview is because AI is rejecting their resume. It's not and I'm going to show you what happens on the other side of your application very soon.