PRESS RELEASE: Job Applicants Are Owed A Duty Of Care Too

During the coronavirus, there has been a lot of analysis on job creation and of course much has been written over the last one year about the recourse of employees from employers who abuse their power, such as through wage theft. However, with so many people now seeking jobs, no one has addressed companies’ responsibilities to job applicants. It has not been looked at closely because any bad behaviour is often hard to prove and there is a question of whether job applicants are owed any duty of care.

Companies are assumed not to owe a duty of care to job applicants because no money changes hands and no contract has been signed. This is a mistake, as job applicants do invest and give “consideration” in the form of time. Sometimes hours and days worth to apply and prepare for a job opening. There is an implicit contract between companies and job applicants – applicants put in the time for job applications (cover letters, CV finetuning, emails, etc) and in return the company undertakes a fair review of the applicant’s background and potential, be treated with dignity and respect and dealt with honestly. Unfortunately, as Sophia Trayling learnt, this is far from how things actually work.

Sophia Trayling, who moved from India to Australia two years ago with her Australian husband and worked for an ASX 200 company for about a year consistently being ranked amongst the top 3 managers in Victoria, spent one and a half years pursuing around 15 jobs at her former employer, CBRE. CBRE is a Fortune 500 company in real estate, headquartered in the USA and operating all around the world.

“CBRE has a reputation around the world for great organisational culture, but the experience with CBRE Australia has really scarred me. They don’t seem to even understand the meaning of professionalism,” says Sophia Trayling.

One job Sophia applied for, the interviewer came in late and at the end of the interview when she asked what the next steps would be, the interviewer responded the job had already gone to someone else, but they just wanted to meet with her. She took time off work – time that can be quantified monetarily – prepared and assumed that she had a chance at the advertised job, but was not given the courtesy ahead of time to decide for herself whether it was worth turning up for a phantom interview for a phantom job. It means she was asked to come into CBRE and take time off from work, under false presences.

Over one and a half years, Sophia applied for a whole range of jobs from graduate entry “co-ordinator” to senior manager. She had formerly been an Assistant Manager at CBRE in India and a Senior Manager for a developer in charge of sales for two cities with a combined population of 22 million people, but Sophia was willing to have her former employer guide her on where to slot her in, depending on need. For junior positions she was told she was too experienced. For senior positions she was told she needed more experience in Australia. For middle manager positions, just given a “no.” When she asked the open question of what department and position/role she should aim at, perfectly reasonable under the circumstances, CBRE refused to respond, just saying to get more experience and keep applying. The last role she applied for, an entry level co-ordinator role, as recently as last month Sophia was told CBRE went for an Australian from the hospitality industry who verbally presented better but absolutely no real estate experience. So the all important critical experience in the real estate industry, of which Sophia had 6 years, was suddenly not even considered important. Keep in mind, Sophia had a client list and great relationships with senior business personnel from her home country, where Sophia could pick up the phone and talk to the CEO of University Pictures in India, for instance. She has built up a network in Australia and attends functions with senior overseas public officials. CBRE Australia either does not even trust her for an entry level job or it is blatant discrimination against an Indian who has permanent residency of Australia and relevant experience.

It begs the question of whether there was active discrimination but it certainly can’t constitute a fair review of her background and abilities. Interestingly, Australia does not have a very inclusive workplace culture amongst our global peers according to Global Workplace Providers Instant Officers (https://dynamicbusiness.com.au/topics/workplace/australia-not-ranked-in-top-10-countries-for-most-inclusive-workplaces.html) with the real estate industry rating the LOWEST for diversity. After seeing the CBRE Melbourne office, you would be hard pressed to find people of non white or non Chinese background given roles outside facilities management. CBRE Australia may talk the talk on diversity, but they certainly don’t walk the walk.

There is also a reasonable expectation in the job market for applicants to be treated with honesty. When CBRE was challenged by a joint letter from both Sophia’s father-in-law and husband over their poor behaviour, they responded with dishonesty. First Chief Operating Officer Lisa Cooper claimed Director of People (Vic) Gayle Brown had personally met with Sophia for a chat on her background and ambitions. When this was challenged with a CC to the global CEO Bob Sulentic, Lisa Cooper had to back down and admit this false claim was made due to “confusion.” Second, an Eva Gleeson claimed a job interview for a position had been given and no response had come from Sophia. When challenged to produce any evidence, Eva could not provide any and brushed it off with “technical error.” All excuses met the standard of CYA (Cover Your A*se) and only backed down after reply emails were CCed to the global CEO or head of Asia-Pacific Chief Regional Compliance Officer in Hong Kong. Such dishonest behaviour from an employer would be actionable by law. Unfortunately, companies are taking advantage of this gap in the law with job applicants assume they can act dishonestly with impunity.

Dignity and respect are fundamental human rights and in the professional sphere this would include not being ignored. CBRE advertised jobs in many different places, mostly relying on internal referrals. However, multiple people at CBRE suggested to Sophia that the best way in discussing where she might be able to get a job was communicating with Alva Durkin in HR. Over a period of five months, Sophia sent four emails and a LinkedIn request to the person everyone said she needed to speak with. Not one communication was ever acknowledged or responded to. When the Compliance Officer Eva Gleeson was asked for an explanation, all that was said is the communication standard did not meet the levels of expectation and it was probably due to this person’s “on-boarding.” Never mind it does not take 5 months onboarding to train anyone, another opportunity for truth gone out the window. However at the very least, you’d expect a personal apology would be given directly to Sophia, which would be the least amount of dignity and respect for a company to do. None came.

There needs to be a review in the laws in Australia as it pertains to job applicants. Interviews for nonexistent jobs need to be banned, companies should not be able to engage dishonestly with candidates and all applicants should be treated with the most basic of courtesies and dignities. Particularly during the recovery from the coronavirus, we need even more efficient, consistent and fairer hiring practices to operate. It is just not that job applicants are owed a duty of care too, but we can no longer afford such egregious behaviour by companies to continue.