THE APPLICANT’S POINT OF VIEW 363 
last will be interviewed first. This may seem like a very 
trival matter, but it is really one of the utmost importance 
to the applicant; for a late comer who gets ahead of him 
may receive the very job which he himself might have re 
ceived. To be compelled to lose an opportunity for work in 
this way can not but strike him as being essentially unfair. 
Even when a candidate who has suffered such an inci 
dent does receive a job, he does not forget the bit of unfair 
ness which accompanied it. In fact, the degree of impartial 
ity and fairness which an employment office exercises in the 
selection of its workers may be symbolical to the appli 
cant of the character of the entire organization, and may 
color all his subsequent ideas of that organization. It 
therefore behooves the employment office to be impartial 
in its dealings even in a matter apparently so trivial as 
taking care to interview applicants in their proper order. 
In some places applicants are given numbered slips as 
they enter the employment office so that their sequence 
may be more carefully observed. A simple measure like 
this, particularly in places where the daily number of 
applicants is large, is a very genuine recognition and ac 
knowledgment of the applicant’s point of view. 
A second fundamental characteristic of all applicants 
is their self-esteem. Any attempt to adopt the applicant’s 
point of view must reckon with this force. From the 
most superior to the most ordinary candidate, self-esteem 
is a pivot point around which many actions and attitudes 
revolve. To show how this force may come into play 
during the course of employment interviews, we may take, 
as an illustration, the adequacy of the service. Some 
employment offices are almost always empty and all new 
comers are disposed of with the utmost dispatch. Other 
offices are always crowded with applicants, and it fre-