Some thought about Emirates

I have been reading a lot of posts from people who did not make it to the finals and they ask why. Below is what I think Emirates MAY be looking for.

Disclaimer: These are not company-based policies but purely my conjecturing using common sense and what is left of my knowledge of psychology.

This is what I wrote in response to a claim made by one of the person who applied for Emirates and who thought it was unfair that he was not chosen to the second round of the selection process in Australia where more than 300 applicants showed up for the initial screening...


The only thing I can add is what I have experienced during the assessment day in Japan. More than 150 candidates came to the preliminary assessment – everyone looked smart, smiled and had all the required documents, all hoping to make it to the second stage. And yet less than a third of them were selected to the second round. While I do not think that Emirates have, at this point of the selection process, a certain list of "tick-off" criteria, I think that the only principle they may utilize when having to deal with such a large number of homogeneous people (all look cute, all with docs, all friendly and nice) is their first impression of a candidate. Admittedly, Osaka screening had had half the number of people of what you, guys, in Australia had; however, time-wise, the recruiters had as much (or rather little) time to preselect the lucky ones in Japan as anywhere they hold assessment days.

Come to think this way - if you have a choice of 10 products and you can only pick 3, most likely your decision will be based on what appeals better to you at first glance. I suppose, at this stage, recruiters just scan through the CVs (having 2 minutes at most per an applicant) looking for something eye-catchy (e.g., person A speaks 4 languages; person B has 5 years of customer service experience, person C has MA in Hospitality). If there is nothing in your CV that has a potential to impress at first glance, then chances of being remembered (and, and therefore, wanted) are slim (consider person D speaking 1 language, person E having a 2-month experience, and person F just having high-school diploma). Now, this does not mean that persons D, E, and F are not qualified for this job or are less smart. But rather that in the pool of 10 people, persons A, B, and C have more chances to stand out. And in absolute fair terms, if people in past worked harder to have these advantages, it is fair enough if they derive benefit now over others who invested less time/energy into what they have on their CVs.

In such cases of having a simple CV, trying in station where there is not such a large number of applicants may be more fruitful (needless to say, more costly, but then if you do not want to pay for traveling to such places, try to change CV in such a way that you are not just "one of the many" but "one of the few.")

Also, trying to be TOO friendly is something that may cause a reverse impact. I have seen many people trying to impress with their killing smile, and oh boy, did they kill... When one has to see 300 smiles, it is pretty easy to "decipher" those who are fake.

These would be my 2 cents coming from studying psychology for half a year :-)