One of the extraordinary things about recruitment agencies is that you know what kind of pain is about to come your way, and yet there is nothing you can do to mitigate it. Whilst I continued my evil escapades, putting myself in glorious mismatches with would-be do-gooders, the absence of a marketing expert to project my nefarious wonders to the world was a significant gap.
I expected one week—at most two—but it took nearly a month before I received a grammatically atrocious email from my recruitment agent. As usual, she had made every effort to demonstrate her contempt for her clients. Not only was the grammar nearly illegible, but the attached document was dated the day after our first meeting. To emphasise her disdain, she had even highlighted the date in bold, in case I missed it.
I opened the attached document and began to read the candidate summaries.
Candidate 1
This candidate has never done marketing before, let alone digital marketing. She will be an advantage to any business and will likely be the best employee you have. She is currently enslaved to a witch with a great evilometer rating, having won several awards over the past decade. The candidate was enslaved after falling foul of purchasing a love potion, so she is highly gullible, which means she might not mind the ridiculously low wage you are offering.
Again, to emphasise the point, she knows nothing about marketing, which will suit you, as you know nothing about running an evil corporation. She has a tenuous yet extremely strong link to evil because of her regular one-to-one time with her enslaver. I’m reliably told she has a great ear for evil, as her mistress was her character reference. All in all, she sounds like a great candidate. You should hire her immediately.
Candidate 2
This candidate is currently running his own business, where he gains employment with megalomaniacs who operate under extremely naïve conditions and then exploits them for all of their money. Therefore, I believe he is well-suited to your business for the following reasons:
- He will most certainly accept a job offer.
- He has strong experience in the evil business.
- I think he has a social media account, but he doesn’t use it, which is ideal, as it means he will never be distracted while on the job.
My recommendation is that you hire him immediately.
Candidate 3
This candidate is looking for part-time employment. She currently works as a full-time marketer for the well-known superhero Superlative Man. I understand you have recently been acquainted with him, so it will be easy for you to obtain a character reference.
She has supported Superlative Man in creating a sponsorship empire, making him very wealthy. Her experience with evil is very strong, as Superlative Man regularly boasts to her at length about his exploits fighting evil. She is extremely expensive, and rumour has it that Superlative Man has an agreement with her that if she ever finds other employment, he will “smash their faces in, no matter what it takes,” as an employee-retention strategy.
I highly recommend this candidate, as I don’t particularly like you.
Candidate 4
This candidate is extremely experienced in marketing, especially in the evil industry. I have received many character references reporting that this person will most likely not try to rob you. A minor detail is that this candidate is currently living off-planet, but as this is a marketing job, remote working should be fine.
I did the maths, and their planet is only two light-years away. With modern email as it is, this should be no barrier at all. I figure it will probably take you two years to do anything worth talking about anyway. You should recruit this candidate immediately.
Candidate 5
This candidate was perfect. Unfortunately, I wrote this report two weeks ago, and they have since found alternative employment. This is entirely your fault, and I urge you to act more quickly in future.
Final Note
As I mentioned in our face-to-face meeting, the kind of candidate you are looking for is a unicorn. Also, I wanted to make the following insulting comments about you in the form of bullet points:
- I don’t like you. Even before I met you, you had a silly name, and even if you didn’t, my total professionalism would force me to treat you with the utmost contempt.
- Employment is so old-fashioned. Why can’t you be civilised and find someone—or even a group of people—to enslave? Employee benefits are a pathetic incentive. Offer a servitude package like a modern visionary. With a servitude deal, you are forced to look after all of their needs.
- I don’t like you. In case you thought the second bullet point was meant to be helpful, I needed to re-emphasise this point.
Kind regards,
Echinacea
Being in the evil industry, one must maintain a stoic demeanour—it wouldn’t do to show outward emotion—so it was fortunate I was reading this in the privacy of my own home. If I had feelings, which I definitely don’t, I would have been very upset… I mean, angry. I would have been very angry.
Even more frustrating was the fact this was an email. I didn’t even have the dubious satisfaction of crumpling a letter in manly anger. I simply closed my laptop and ambled around my flat, trying not to cry.
