Candidature spontanée strikes again

I mentioned that I will be changing jobs in the fall, which means the University needs to find someone to replace me at my current job.

When I officially accepted my future job with my boss I mentioned that I would like to share the job offer, when written, with my network such as the French-American club. But there was no offer. Several weeks later I went to lunch with some of the professors and they mentioned how they "really needed to get on finding a replacement" for me. But still not job posting.

Another week later I learned that a woman who sent a 'candidature spontanée' was being interviewed for the job in 20 minutes.

And two days later she was offered the job after they interviewed exactly 0 other candidates.

The more I thought about it, the more I felt insulted. Any old person will due to replace me. No need to make any effort by interviewing more people.

I recognize that a large part of what I do is not that complicated, and with a Masters degree I'm clearly over qualified for the job. But when I went to London School of Economics to interview for a practically identical job, everything was way more serious and I didn't make the cut. LSE clearly thought it was important to find the right person, even for an admin job. At the University the policy seems to be "if you apply, you can work here". It's true that the conditions make it difficult to recruit really amazing people (low salaries and only CDD contracts), but LSE didn't have a huge salary for the cost of living in London and they still did a large recruitment.

The day I heard they were interviewing the one and only applicant I sent out a job description to the French-American club and a friend of mine with a lot of anglo/ex-pat contacts. I've gotten more than 10 responses and have directed them all to contact my boss.

The whole thing has made me a bit bitter about the end of my experience in my job, which is a shame because it didn't need to be like that. I've gone from fretting about making sure the transition goes well, to looking forward to the day I can dust my hands and say "Not my job".

Next year I plan on taking the prep classes for the concours, and I feel like there's nothing stopping me from applying for positions in other Universities/cities.

But on a positive note for any job-seekers out there: do lots of candidature spontanée. I have a feeling there are a lot of companies too lazy to actually seek out someone and want people to send them their CVs.