Internal Memo: The Five-Minute Candidate Disposition Protocol

**FROM:** Office of Talent Velocity, Gormless Systems

**TO:** All Hiring Managers and Embedded Recruiters

**SUBJECT:** Rollout of the Five-Minute Candidate Disposition Protocol (FMCDP)

Effective Monday, all candidate interviews will adhere to the FMCDP framework. Research confirms that hiring decisions are largely emotional and formed within the first twelve seconds of interaction. The remaining four minutes and forty-eight seconds are therefore administrative waste.

**Protocol Summary:**

1. **Second 0–12 (Snap Judgment Window):** Interviewer forms an impression based on lighting, camera angle, and whether the candidate's background suggests a personality. No questions are asked during this phase. The candidate will likely be speaking — this is normal and can be ignored.

2. **Seconds 13–60 (The Ritual Question):** Ask exactly one technical question selected from the pre-approved Disposition Matrix. Candidates who answer correctly but were flagged negatively during the Snap Judgment Window should be told the answer was "not quite what we were looking for" — a phrase legally tested to be non-actionable.

3. **Seconds 61–300 (Disposition & Disconnect):** Deliver the outcome using the standard script: "No, you're not the candidate we were looking for." Do not elaborate. Do not take questions. End the call. If the candidate asks for feedback, remain silent for three seconds and disconnect. Silence is feedback.

**FAQ:**

*Q: What if the candidate is actually qualified?*

A: The protocol accounts for this. A qualified candidate who receives a negative Snap Judgment score is likely overqualified, which presents retention risk. The protocol is functioning as designed.

*Q: Won't this generate negative reviews on Glassdoor?*

A: Glassdoor reviews are an externality and not carried on Gormless Systems' balance sheet.

*Q: What if we accidentally pass on a great candidate?*

A: The candidate pipeline is functionally infinite. If the market tightens, we will rebrand FMCDP as "Legacy Disposition" and introduce FMCDP 2.0, which will include a second question.

**Implementation timeline:** Immediate. All existing interview schedules should be truncated to five-minute blocks. Candidates already in the pipeline who exceed this window will be dispositioned retroactively.

Questions? Direct them to the FMCDP Slack channel, which is monitored by a bot that will mark your message as read.

From the Satire Desk at goodbye, interview. All companies and people in this memo are fictional. Satire is always labelled and never names real companies — the true stories do that on their own. Spotted an error of fact in our non-fiction? Corrections.