No Ghosting

I am in the middle of interviewing at companies and waiting for a response is the worst.

A company said they’d get back to me by Wednesday and I haven’t heard a message from them yet.

I feel dread. I wonder what the person is thinking. Sometimes I resent them. I feel unwanted.

Do you think trust goes up or down in this scenario?

Trust falls.

The monkey mind has some fearful thoughts. “They’re taking a while to respond, maybe they don’t like me?” It’s only human to start wondering.

Even the logical brain has some misgivings. They told me they’d respond by Wednesday, but are not replying. Can I trust them next time they say something?

Trust clearly goes down in this scenario.

No matter how difficult it is to respond, you should try to respond quickly.

If you can’t give a thought out reply, it might be better to say something along the lines of “I’m out right now, but will get back to you about this soon. Thank you!” Or empathize with the other person, “I know it’s challenging to wait and hear back and we are trying our best to come up with an answer. Unfortunately, we’ll need a few days to think this through. Please let me know if you have any other questions in the meanwhile and our apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused.”

Even if it’s difficult to reply, come up with a nice way to frame things. Explain the situation. Use this as an opportunity to build trust w/ the other person.

Respond quickly and build trust. Respond slowly and lose trust. You choose how you want to play it.