Can you follow instructions?

I had a library patron recently that kept having me help him with online applications. Most of the time people have problems with how do do things on a computer. For this gentleman that was not the case out of the 15 times he asked for help, I'd have to say 12 were for things that basically amounted to not being able to follow the instructions on the application.

Later that day I heard stories from other people at both jobs the library and Barnes & Noble about people that filled out applications incorrectly or asked a question during an interview did not answer the question. It brings me to a story of when I applied for UPS back in 2001. I showed up and there were 100 people applying. The HR person told us to carefully read ALL instructions and fill-in every box. If something did not apply to the applicant put "NA" or "not applicable". She told us that if we did not completely fill in the application or did not follow the instructions on the form she would put us in the back of the room and would be interviewed last. Only a few moments after handing out the applications five guys shot up and walked to the front of the room. The HR woman looked them over, said these are not correctly filled out, and handed them back - pointing to the back of the room. I was one of 20 asked to come back for a tour and additional interview at 3am the next day. Of the 20 people, 4 showed up and during the tour one said that she was no longer interested. They hired the three of us that finished the tour and a year later I was the only one still working there.

I know that there are a lot of people that need education or additional training for better jobs, but some people seem down right unemployable. Not being able to follow simple instructions or perform the basic task of filling out an application legibly makes it hard for you to get a job at even the lowest of playing places, and on top of that I hear people turn down jobs for manual labor. Hmmm

As I was writing this the same guy came up and asked again for help he had typed the website address in the Google search box. When we got to the website he needed he didn't know his zip code to find locations near him.