The Student Room Group

Lack of Black and Asian workers at HMV???

I hardly see much ethnic minority workers working at HMV even though their application clearly state they 'welcome' them. I don't know the exact ratio of all the backgrounds in their workforce but I'm pretty sure its bad and unnoticed somehow.

No matter how many times I apply for HMV and no matter how well and long I spent and do the application, I cannot even get 1 interview for a PART-TIME SALES ASSISTANT (Bank Manager) job and I'm non-white.

I have deep interest in the products and tonnes of knowledge even giving examples on application form and willing to work on any day and time yet rejected everytime.

I don't know who makes these decisions but this is a racist company no doubt.

They even have this "ethnic monitoring form"??? asking for your age, background and gender but I had enough of this form and instead chose "prefer not to say". But even then they probably make a bias decision based on my unenglish name :smile:

I don't understand what's so difficult about this "sale assistant" job. It appears if HMV is making it sound like its some sort of Bank manager, Business consultant etc role or something. What's so difficult about a sales assistant? - all you be doing is using the till, helping customers, counting and stocking items and stuff.
(edited 9 years ago)

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Reply 1
Unfortunately I'm afraid you might be right but true or not its ILLEGAL for any hiring recruiter to base job applicants on person's age, race, religion and gender. Interesting to know the stats on HMV current employees and what the proportion of white, black, Indian etc is and I probably thing its nowhere near to those other retailers.

If you go to places like Wilkinson, Debenhams, Next etc you will immediately notice that they recruit people from all ages and backgrounds but HMV is mainly white and young. I totally disagree HMV is all white as that is nonsense obviously there are ethnic workers but proportion wise probably something like 90% white and 10% others which is still very bad. Interesting nonetheless.

HMV is a rubbish place to work anyway and there are much better and successful retailers should go for instead. HMV was actually in administration last year and luckily brought out. So realistically in future it is unlikely to exist due to poor sales and everyone now buying music, films etc online from Apple, Netflix, Amazon etc
Reply 2
Feel like I should put my 2 cents in as a hmv employee. There is no discrimination at hmv when it comes to employment. I've worked in 4 stores over a 2 and a half year period and I've never heard of a manager using someone's race as an excuse not to employ them.

The number of non-white staff members normally depends on the location of the store and therefore the demographic of the population. For instance I currently work in Basildon, Essex where the population is primarily made up of white English people. As a result most of our staff are locally based white English people. Contrast that to my first store in Beckton, East London where the staff were very mixed, Black, White, Asian, much like the local area. The same was true when I worked in central London at Piccadilly Circus. You name a nation and we probably had someone working there from there. hmv is not a racist company.

The problem with finding work at hmv is when vacancies come up they are normally filled very quickly either by experienced former staff or current staff transferring from other stores. That being said once you get your foot in the door and perform well you're sorted. The best time to apply is for Xmas temp vacancies around about late September/early October. Nearly everyone I know in the company (and that's a lot of people) started off as a Xmas temp and that includes people who are now management. If the stores budget allows you may even get kept on after Xmas.

Online applications are normally forwarded to store managers who then assess them on the strength of your answers to the questions asked within. Again race or creed plays no part. If you've applied for a store vacancy maybe follow it up by visiting the store and asking to speak to the manager. Not only does that show you're keen, it'll also give the manager a chance to get to see you in person rather than as an application form.

Hope this helps
Reply 3
Original post by owenb4
Feel like I should put my 2 cents in as a hmv employee. There is no discrimination at hmv when it comes to employment. I've worked in 4 stores over a 2 and a half year period and I've never heard of a manager using someone's race as an excuse not to employ them.

The number of non-white staff members normally depends on the location of the store and therefore the demographic of the population. For instance I currently work in Basildon, Essex where the population is primarily made up of white English people. As a result most of our staff are locally based white English people. Contrast that to my first store in Beckton, East London where the staff were very mixed, Black, White, Asian, much like the local area. The same was true when I worked in central London at Piccadilly Circus. You name a nation and we probably had someone working there from there. hmv is not a racist company.

The problem with finding work at hmv is when vacancies come up they are normally filled very quickly either by experienced former staff or current staff transferring from other stores. That being said once you get your foot in the door and perform well you're sorted. The best time to apply is for Xmas temp vacancies around about late September/early October. Nearly everyone I know in the company (and that's a lot of people) started off as a Xmas temp and that includes people who are now management. If the stores budget allows you may even get kept on after Xmas.

Online applications are normally forwarded to store managers who then assess them on the strength of your answers to the questions asked within. Again race or creed plays no part. If you've applied for a store vacancy maybe follow it up by visiting the store and asking to speak to the manager. Not only does that show you're keen, it'll also give the manager a chance to get to see you in person rather than as an application form.

Hope this helps


That still doesn't mean that the managers aren't racist. The ones I have been applying for are all white workers.
Reply 4
Theres loads in hmv manchester.
Reply 5
@Owen: Since you work(ed) at HMV then how would you go about answering their questions on application form with silly questions "career aspirations"???

interest in products - music, games etc???

interview questions???
Its mixed at my HMV.
Reply 7
Original post by ldsbabe
Theres loads in hmv manchester.


Any old (40+) workers? NO!!
'I'm not english and they're not hiring me, they must be racist!'
Reply 9
I'm not saying there aren't any ethnic people working there of course there are but stats wise its probably like 85% of white workers with 85% of them being below 40 years of age.

Not surprised they were struggling financially last year. They hire based on age, gender and race rather than quality and knowledge of the individual.

But even with a lot of their current employees they're a bunch of liars and don't really provide a first class service and lack knowledge in the products HMV sells.
My Asda has loads of South Asians working there and I live in a fairly white area. Should I complain and say they are racist towards non-Asians? I haven't' stepped into a HMV since downloading music became popular. Back then Britain wasn't as devoid of white people as it is today.
Reply 11
Original post by Dario Naharis
My Asda has loads of South Asians working there and I live in a fairly white area. Should I complain and say they are racist towards non-Asians? I haven't' stepped into a HMV since downloading music became popular. Back then Britain wasn't as devoid of white people as it is today.


Yes! unemployment is a serious matter in UK and people desperate for jobs. The point is that basing job applicants on names, gender, race, age etc is against the law.

I have a friend (white female) who also did an application to HMV whose application form was average way below mine in terms of quality and still got called for an interview lol
Reply 12
Mabye you just don't have enough experience.
What do you suggest that we have no whites allowed on the applications? I remember this happening years back over a fireman job because it's a job mostly whites seem to apply for. I see positive discrimination as dehumanization of white people which is one of the 8 stages of genocide.
Reply 14
Original post by Gay1113
I'm not saying there aren't any ethnic people working there of course there are but stats wise its probably like 85% of white workers with 85% of them being below 40 years of age.

Not surprised they were struggling financially last year. They hire based on age, gender and race rather than quality and knowledge of the individual.

But even with a lot of their current employees they're a bunch of liars and don't really provide a first class service and lack knowledge in the products HMV sells.


Whoa whoa hold on there dude. I was being nice an trying to help you and you've basically just insulted me and a lot of my friends based on assumptions of a company you've never even worked for and stating them as fact. If you want to test me on my product knowledge then by all means pay me a visit and call me a liar to my face.

You're pretty much saying every single one of our 140 stores should have an one person of every race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual preference, age group, hair colour, eye colour, beard length and shoe size? You simply cannot run a business like that. You employ the best person for the job. On the 40+ age group the assistant manager of my local store is well into her 40s. My supervisor is in his mid 30s. There's several guys at our Oxford Street store who are way above 50. One even needs crutches to walk. Also guess how many 40+ people have handed me a CV in the last 2 years? None. Zero. Zip. Zilch. If they're not applying for it, we can't employ them. And we're sure as he'll not doing anything to put them off of applying.

I've been in your position. I spent a year out of work too. You start thinking the world is against you and making up conspiracy theories about why you didn't get a certain role. Have you ever considered that you didn't get the job because someone better got it? There's always someone better than you. Therefore you must make yourself better.

Take my advice. Go into the store you've applied for, speak to management saying you've applied and talk to them. That'll say more than any application form. And if they stone cold reject you then scream bloody murder on the shop floor and call them a racist right to their face. I'll tell you one thing, with the attitude you've got you're be lucky to get a job anywhere.


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Original post by owenb4
Feel like I should put my 2 cents in as a hmv employee. There is no discrimination at hmv when it comes to employment. I've worked in 4 stores over a 2 and a half year period and I've never heard of a manager using someone's race as an excuse not to employ them.

s


Not trying to imply that HMV are a racist organisation or anything, but even if someone was not being employed on the basis of their race, you would never hear about it. No-one is going to openly admit to that.
Reply 16
Or perhaps you're just not right for the job and you seriously need to take a hint?...
Reply 17
I'm not trying to be controversial or anything. All I'm saying is that when it comes to the structure of HMV workforce, its very unnormal compared to all the other retailers. If you look at retailers like WhSmith and Wilkinson their workforce is very multicultural black, white, young, old etc but HMV is mainly white, tend to go for more females and young.

@Owen: I'm not accusing every HMV employee lacking knowledge but there are a lot who simply don't know things. Why does HMV have this ethnic monitoring form then? Its not only race they base their applicants on but also gender and stuff.

At least people like me and many others who are on benefits actually trying to look for work. Hate it when people in general and those job centre staff accuse people like me of being a scrounger and accusing us of being the problem. Its about time the country and corrupt government admit that there are just not enough jobs and job market is at an all-time low. Everything including education system in UK is all wrong.

Its not the unemployed that's the problem its the businesses that are the problem.
Reply 18
Original post by kmcg97
Or perhaps you're just not right for the job and you seriously need to take a hint?...


Of course since I'm a male with a non-english name hence I'm down the pecking order in candidate list.

I'm not forcing them into a job. All I'm saying is that no matter how well I'm doing with my application its still no good enough for an interview. I even have retail experience even though sometime their application states retail experience is not absolutely necessary. But experience or not, how are people who are 16 years of age suppose to get jobs when they were in education? law says you need to be 16 to work but many businesses say they prefer experience. Catch 22.
Reply 19
Original post by Gay1113
Of course since I'm a male with a non-english name hence I'm down the pecking order in candidate list.

I'm not forcing them into a job. All I'm saying is that no matter how well I'm doing with my application its still no good enough for an interview. I even have retail experience even though sometime their application states retail experience is not absolutely necessary. But experience or not, how are people who are 16 years of age suppose to get jobs when they were in education? law says you need to be 16 to work but many businesses say they prefer experience. Catch 22.


You keep referencing this... why are you kidding yourself? You've heard first-hand evidence from employees that there's zero racism. I don't know whether you're trying to garner pity or get us all to agree but you just look rather stupid.

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