What HR Is NEVER Allowed To Tell You (A Recruiter Explains)

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:00]I want to tell you about one of the ugliest situations I've ever been involved with as a recruiter. I had a candidate come in for a role and it was a person who was reasonably qualified.

[00:00:07]He had worked for a competitor which was actually a huge plus. Our company was really interested in that and he went through the interview relatively normally all the credentials that we were looking for. And in the interview he started to casually name drop that he knew a few people like oh you know that one person over there in that department. Um I actually used to work with him. We go way back. Started naming a couple of people. So, I did what any recruiter would normally do. Mentioned it to the hiring team. I took a note of it and turns out people actually did know this guy. And quietly, without this candidate knowing, the person who worked for us gave a backdoor reference. The backdoor reference actually wasn't very good. And the candidate promptly got rejected. And about a week later, once the rejection hit the guy's inbox, I got a series of very animated calls coming in. This guy had completely lost his mind. And he was threatening to sue us.

[00:00:58]and he was saying, "I know that so said something about me and he he was like demanding from me to tell him what was specifically said about him and he wanted to know why he was being rejected and if it was that guy, he was going to get to the bottom of it and he was going to make some phone calls and all this stuff." Well, got really ugly really fast and I actually had to get our legal team involved and basically weeks and weeks worth of time. Probably I don't know how much our attorney's fees were.

[00:01:23]But this was over just a simple hiring decision, just a simple rejection for a candidate for what was considered to be kind of a mundane role and we ended up just moving on and hiring somebody else eventually. But that right there is why HR will never tell you the real reason why you didn't get the job. They know exactly why. They tell the recruiting teams not to share the reason why. The problem is is that the last time somebody got honest feedback, it ended with attorneys. Hey everybody, welcome back to my channel. If you're new here, my name is Brian, the founder of Life After Layoff, and I'm a 20-year corporate recruiter with companies like Amazon, FedEx, Cornferry, Ford Motor Company. And today, I'm going to be walking you through what HR actually can and can't tell you, and more importantly, why. Now, the thing that most people get wrong about human resources is that human resources is not there for you. And I know that this sounds harsh, but honestly, there's a lot of good people who work in human resources who genuinely want to help employees, and I've worked with them throughout my entire career.

[00:02:17]But the institution itself, so the human resources function exists to protect the company from liability. That's their singular job. And once you understand that or once you kind of intuitively know that, a lot of things that used to feel very confusing or frustrating start to make some intuitive sense. We don't have to like it, but it is the reality.

[00:02:37]So every interaction you have with human resources, every policy they enforce, every handbook that they update, every conversation they document, it all runs through that filter.

[00:02:47]What's the company's exposure here? How do we manage risk? So here's why you'll never get real feedback after rejection.

[00:02:53]Suppose that you apply for a job or promotion, you go through the interview process, and then you don't get it. So you reach out to the recruiter or the human resource department. They're two actually different departments. and you ask for feedback and you usually get something back completely useless like we went with somebody whose background is a closer match or we encourage you to apply for future opportunities. And it's not that they're being lazy per se. It's literally policy. And in fact, our team of attorneys instructs us to do that.

[00:03:20]It's not even the human resource department. It's the attorneys that tell the human resource department to put in this policy that then feeds it down to the recruiting teams and then the hiring managers, too. We're all instructed to do this. we're not allowed to give this specific feedback. But the thing is they know exactly why you didn't get it. The problem is is that the moment human resources gives you a real reason, they are now creating a paper trail. And the paper trails can be challenged. So maybe you didn't get the job because the backdoor reference came back bad like the guy that I referred to earlier.

[00:03:49]Maybe it was a budget issue that came back as an internal hire that kind of slipped in at the last minute. Or maybe the hiring manager just didn't click with you in the interview and couldn't really articulate why. And I talked about this idea of being a cultural rejection in a recent video, and they probably should check that out if you want a little bit more kind of insight into how that works. So, the answer is always going to be vague. Now, if you want real feedback on why you didn't get the role, your best shot is building a genuine relationship with the recruiter before the rejection even happens. And then they may frame the feedback is something of, "We're not going to tell you why you got rejected for this role, but here's some suggestions we can give you going forward for other interviews in the future." And that's actually how I would reframe it to the recruiter if I was asking for feedback. Don't frame it as, hey, why didn't I get the job? But rather maybe try asking, is there something that I can do in the future to be a little bit more effective with how I present myself. You're not always going to get the feedback, but at least it's a better way to present it and allows the recruiter to be able to kind of wiggle with you a little bit and kind of skirt around that requirement. Now, the next thing that the human resource department is not going to be able to tell you is the salary range situation.

[00:04:51]Every company has salary bands. I've talked about that on this channel as well. And there is a structured range for every single role, every level, every department. Human resources knows exactly where you sit within those bands. And they know where the top of that range is and what they're realistically willing to pay people. And they know how your pay compares with everybody else in the department, all your peers, and they are specifically trained not to share any of that with you. Now, there are some states that have passed pay transparency laws that require companies to post salary ranges on job listings, which sounds great in theory, but here's what actually happens in practice. Companies tend to post a range so wide that it's essentially meaningless. So, they'll say 30,000 to 220,000 for the same role, which is only satisfying the legal requirement that they have to put on the job posting, but realistically that tells you nothing about the role. They're not going to pay at the very top of the range and they're realistically not going to pay at the bottom end of the range. So, you kind of have to figure out and kind of extrapolate that's going to be somewhere in the middle. But there's two main reasons why they do this. One, they don't want competitors to reverse engineer their compensation structures.

[00:05:56]They typically like to keep that stuff very close to the vest. And two, and this is probably the bigger one, is they don't want their own employees comparing notes because it causes all kinds of problems. Because when employees start talking about what they're actually making, some of them are going to realize that they're significantly underpaid relative to new hires. And there is a whole phenomena about that where somebody stays in their job for too long and they kind of work through merit increases to the point where they hit the top end of the range. But to attract somebody from the outside, salaries kind of jump up faster and somebody could jump in to the middle of the range that's way less qualified, way less tener than you and actually be at nearly the same level as you even though they just started the company. And those kind of conversations are a nightmare for human resources to manage. And so you can kind of imagine how that might go. A lot of companies will try to encourage people not to talk about salary, but people do talk about salary.

[00:06:45]And when you're publishing it on a job posting, it certainly gets people chattering. So the range that's publicly published stays pretty wide, but the real numbers stays internal. They're keeping that stuff really close to the vest. That's one of the things that was under lock and key when I was in human resources. We didn't even share it sometimes with hiring managers other than when they actually needed to know.

[00:07:05]So essentially, you're left trying to figure out your market value from the outside while human resources already has a full picture and they know exactly what they're willing to pay you on the inside. Now, let's talk about something else that human resources refuses to tell people. And this one is actually kind of a benefit to most employees.

[00:07:22]It's with reference checks and background checks. So, when a company calls your former employer for a reference or background check, human resources is usually only going to confirm your name, your title, your dates of employment, and that's really about it. And that's most of the time with most of the companies that I've worked at. They know plenty more.

[00:07:40]They've got an entire employment file on you. But the problem is the more they say, the more exposure they create. So in other words, the company's saying that you're ineligible for rehire or that you got fired for a particular reason. You're effectively blacklisting that somebody and that somebody can now potentially sue you. Likewise, you give a negative performance reference to a third party and that blocks them from getting employment, you're likely looking at a potential defamation claim depending on how it's worded. So companies are really close vested with that as well. Same thing goes with sharing salary data. If a company is asking you, "Well, what's the most recent salary that they were paid?" most companies are going to say, "Go pound sand." Because they're not going to disclose your personal financial information to some random third party or a background check company. So, human resource departments have found that the safest answer is almost always the shortest answer. So, it ends up being name, title, dates, and that's literally just about it. And most companies now instruct all their managers to not give personal references either. So if a personal reference comes into a manager and a lot of these major corporations, they're actually not allowed to even give them. So that can be a challenge for an employee who needs references.

[00:08:48]That's why relationships really do matter. But really, everything is supposed to get funneled through HR so they can answer the questions in a very controlled and consistent way. And honestly, this is probably one of the few HR practices that actually works in your favor because it means that in theory, a manager that didn't like you can't quietly torpedo every single opportunity you have going forward legally. The next thing I can't tell you is the true open door policy. And we've all seen this in the employee handbooks.

[00:09:14]Our doors are always open. We encourage open communication. But here's what actually happens when you use it. If you go into human resources to file a complaint about your manager, the conversation feels productive. of human resources seems sympathetic with you.

[00:09:27]They're taking notes and leaning in and asking you really good questions. They may even conduct an investigation on your behalf and you leave feeling like something might actually change. Well, the conversation definitely gets documented and that documentation goes right to your manager's manager.

[00:09:41]Depending on how your company handles it, your manager is going to find out that somebody raised a concern. Now, they won't always know that it's you specifically, although sometimes they will. But in small teams, it's often pretty easy to figure out who was the offending party. Now, I'm not saying never go to human resources with a legitimate concern because sometimes you have to and sometimes they actually can solve problems for you. But go in knowing what you're walking into. Just be eyes wide open because that conversation is basically on record and anything you say and do can be used against you at a later time. And it's HR's job in that room to manage the company's risk, not necessarily to fix your situation. So, they're going to assess this of where does my risk truly lie. Is it with the employee? Was it with the manager? Is it with the overall situation? And then they'll take action based on that. And then we have the PIP.

[00:10:28]Now, I'm going to keep this one short because I've covered this before in recent videos, but by the time you're on a performance improvement plan, the decision is usually already made. Not entirely, but usually. Because the PIP is not a development tool. It's a documentation tool and it creates a paper trail that companies need to protect themselves legally when they decide to let you go. So the 30, 60, or 90-day timeline gives human resources what they need on paper. Now, if you find yourself on a PIP, I would recommend that you start looking.

[00:10:57]Doesn't mean you should automatically quit your job, but you should at least have your options kind of in front of you, ready to go. Not because it's impossible to survive one, because I have seen people survive and actually thrive after being on one. But the odds aren't in your favor and you should be at least proactive and ready to make a move if you need to. Okay, so what do we actually do with all this? Well, none of this means that human resources is automatically the enemy. Although I know a lot of people will probably argue with me on that one. It really doesn't. And I've worked alongside some really good HR people in my career who legitimately wanted to do the right thing with employees under the constraints that they were kind of put under. The institution has specific limits built by design. So I want to be really clear about that. And sometimes a good human resource department is kind of limited by what their actual job title is. So good people do work inside of those limits, but the limits are real. So I maybe encourage you to stop expecting things from human resources. It was really never built to provide you know the real rejection feedback, salary transparency, advocacy in a conflict with your manager. It's not that the individuals don't want to help, it's that there's an institution that has really tight guard rails on and those guardrails exist for a legal reason and they're not for personal ones. And sometimes people like to think that it's a personal thing. What you can do is protect yourself accordingly. Document all your interactions. Keep your records of your performance. Track your wins.

[00:12:24]Conversations with your manager. Know your state's pay transparency laws. And understand that in any situation where your interest in the company's interests are in conflict, human resources job is to protect the company. And that's going to be the case 100 out of 100 times. I think knowing that changes a lot about how we might want to navigate it strategically. So, I'm not here to defend human resources. I know that they do get a bad rap and sometimes it's rightfully earned, but they're not always the villain. the the system is just built the way that it is and most people spend their careers assuming that human resources is this neutral party or the police of the organization that you can go to to have them fix your problems. And if you want to know exactly how to manage your career inside of these systems, how to protect yourself and how to build a track record that speaks for itself regardless of what human resources does or doesn't share, it's actually in the ultimate career blueprint and I built this course around how to navigate all of this stuff. So, the link is in the description below. Anyway, I hope you found this video to be enlightening and helpful. What's been your interaction with human resources? Let me know in the comments below. Appreciate you watching.

[00:13:28]We'll see you on the next one.