An interview that lasted forever, but never began: The hiring process claims merit-based and rational decisions, but deep expertise has become something companies don't want to deal with.
The gap between language and reality
This gap doesn't remain an anomaly for long. Over time, it becomes the system itself. After 2.5 years of searching and hundreds of humiliating rejections, what stands out most is how detached and dehumanising the whole process has become. Companies often talk endlessly, preaching about people, culture, creativity, empathy, and thinking outside the box. Yet the reality feels unbearably hollow, politely wrapped in words masking a lack of empathy and genuine intent.
Job ads praise curiosity and depth, but when you actually bring that, it turns into "too senior", "too complicated", or "not quite what we had in mind". The system claims it wants thoughtful people, but in reality, the same people make it uncomfortable.
They want obedient people above all, who won't challenge any bad decision, as cheap as possible, goes without saying. Or better, not asking for any compensation would be considered a huge "nice to have" plus for the role.
How expertise quietly became a liability
Real system thinkers, the ones who see patterns and connect moving parts, tend to expose weak architecture. And that's precisely what most organisations don't want to face: that their comfy structure and blind short-term goals, not the talent and growth, are their main and only concerns.
And for someone who dedicated 25+ years to a successful and uninterrupted career, from visual arts and painting beginnings, through the digital era, UI and UX design, to a seasoned product designer, manager, strategist, and negotiator, with a lifetime of learning, adapting, evolving, growing and refining, this feels like betrayal on a personal level.
I've been told my whole life to grow, to learn, to master my skills, to become a respected expert one day. And I did that, finally. And instead of reaping the fruits of hard, honest work, I've been pushed down for being an expert. Overnight, my whole career became not just irrelevant but a deal-breaker, almost threatening and "subversive" to the system.
None of this is some hidden agenda. It's much shallower than that: repeated, deliberate and accumulated short-sighted choices.
Automation without intelligence
Most of it now runs on autopilot, guided by clumsy applicant-tracking systems that confuse keywords with competence. They call it "AI recruiting", but there's nothing intelligent about it, nor is it AI; most of these rudimentary keyword filters that feel like they were written in BASIC by a kid.
A competent system would recognise context, potential, and growth; it would read between the lines rather than hunt and count buzzwords. But either way, if you're really a seasoned expert who could see cracks, dismantle and build whole systems effortlessly, you're out of the game.
The system doesn't fail to recognise expertise. It actively removes it.
Competence without respect
Ironically, skills and experience have been highly respected and sought throughout history. And I'm not talking only about the recent decades. I'm talking about many past decades and centuries of basic common sense.
The Industrial Revolution respected skilled workers, despite the machines. Medieval times respected skilled blacksmiths, not to delve too deeply into other crafts and eras. Even the first societies respected seasoned hunters. But that changed. And it's here to stay.
And it's not just the IT industry. The broken system is most visible there because of the hype and noise. Still, the trend is present almost everywhere, on a different scale.
I wouldn't be surprised if vibe crystal-healing experts replaced top surgeons and medical specialists, since they're a better cultural fit and way more pleasant and satisfying to patients (subscribers) than those outdated, unpleasant professionals.
And that's where it all goes wrong. Too many shortcuts, not enough thought and depth. In the end, it marginalises the people who built whole systems on which everything stands today, or are yet to build new ones, but are cut out before they could do anything, and who could actually make things better.
The talent they "can no longer find"
And now comes the painfully ironic part. After years of filtering experienced people out, narrowing the range of acceptable profiles, replacing judgement with automated screening and treating seniority as a cost to minimise, the industry is openly complaining that skilled people have become difficult to find.
“Nearly 7 in 10 professionals (68%) reported difficulty recruiting full-time employees.”
SHRM 2026 Talent Trends research
The people did not disappear into thin air. The system became remarkably good at filtering them out, and now it's calling the result of its own bad decisions a "talent shortage". How convenient...
The baseline shift
Plenty of us are still out here trying to do things properly and bring lost common sense back on track. If not through this infantilised, shallow, self-indulgent industry it has become, then by making our own castles.
Which I'm working on now, seeing cold, hard math:
🞄 5+ years ago: Opportunities were offered almost weekly, with very substantial benefits and a respectful role.
🞄 The last 2.5 years: Countless generic rejections and ghosting, exploitation through meaningless and insulting tasks, a few pathetic calls, zero offers, zero empathy, zero common sense.
🞄 Thus, from my side: Zero BS tolerance.
Everybody knows the fight was fixed*
Should I press or should I go? (Self-portrait in a shattered lift mirror)
As for the industry, it is what it is. I can be mad, shout "Injustice!" and chase windmills. And that's exactly what they're hoping for us: to look ridiculous and validate their narrative about being "outdated" or "broken".
Instead, I choose a more stoic approach. I see it. I'll see if it can be fixed. Fix it, or move on. We're here, offering our knowledge, trying to help, and to survive, along the way. If they refuse, that's their call.
But this system, built overnight with too much confidence, is not stable and sits on glass foundations.
I'm pretty sure they'll need experts again, and very soon, but many of us won't be available anymore. They had their chances, thousands of them, and chose ego and fast profit every time. And I won't be there on demand to help them rebuild, just to be thrown down again afterwards. We've all already seen that pattern, definitely more than we'd like to.
It's not about some BS poetic, cosmic justice or revenge. Revenge leads nowhere, and justice... she is one very complex and capricious lady. It's about respect and treating people like human beings, and seeing a bit further than quarterly profits.
If basic respect, reciprocity, common sense, and manners that built civilisation are removed from the equation, everything else falls in a cascading domino effect.
Moving on, while I still can...
* Verse from "Everybody Knows", a song by Leonard Cohen (1988)