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Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

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Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#201

Post by Hnrobert42 »

lordnacho wrote: post #147
Hnrobert42 wrote: post #13

I am on the other side of this. As a hiring manager using recruiters, I am annoyed by: - lack of diversity in candidates. (not just virtue signaling. if all I see are nearly identical resumes, I assume the recruiter is just phoning it in.) - candidates “just a little out of your price range” who are 30% over the top end of my budget. - “confidentially” telling me what other offers a candidate has because then I know…

The diversity thing is really hard to do anything about. I think I've seen maybe 10-15 relevant (in the loosest sense: person was a dev of some sort, not a career switcher) CVs from a woman over my entire career. And I did hire three of them, compared to dozens of men and thousands of CVs. Perhaps my estimate is wrong or something, it's hard to keep track of this number, but I do tend to give it an extra good look wh…

It may be hard, but that is their job. They are supposed to find me the very best candidates. There are plenty of professional groups, alumni associations, meetup groups, etc. devoted to diversity in tech. If they can’t even find a few women, then how can I trust they are really looking everywhere to find the very best?

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#202

Post by Hnrobert42 »

garmaine wrote: post #24
Hnrobert42 wrote: post #13

I am on the other side of this. As a hiring manager using recruiters, I am annoyed by: - lack of diversity in candidates. (not just virtue signaling. if all I see are nearly identical resumes, I assume the recruiter is just phoning it in.) - candidates “just a little out of your price range” who are 30% over the top end of my budget. - “confidentially” telling me what other offers a candidate has because then I know…

> - “confidentially” telling me what other offers a candidate has because then I know they are also leaking my offers to my competitors The only problem here is that they're claiming confidentiality which is obviously not true. Workers and their agents should be playing offers off each other.

These recruiters are not agents of the workers. My company, not the candidates, pay the recruiters.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#203

Post by uncomputation »

I don’t mind everything being calls, in fact I find more security in that since they are generally harder to “fake” than emails or other text-based media. i.e. A high quality call gives me higher confidence in the company than a high quality email. What I have always been frustrated by is recruiters - with no technical experience - being the gatekeepers of technical positions. I have always felt if I could just call the actual team or whoever for the position I am interested in, it would be better. I find it annoying when recruiters have just been coached on the “surface level” of a technica problem without ever having genuinely solved it or been in my shoes themselves.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#205

Post by trcarney »

MillenialMan wrote: post #112
cerved wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not saying the company name because they don't want you going there directly and applying without them getting their hefty bonus

This is still sort of bananas to me. I can't imagine applying to a company without... Well, knowing and investigating the company. How early in the process is this information normally revealed?

In my experience, you submit your resume to the recruiter, they pass it on to the company, and if the company wants to go further, the recruiter will give you the details.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#206

Post by garmaine »

Hnrobert42 wrote: post #202
garmaine wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - “confidentially” telling me what other offers a candidate has because then I know they are also leaking my offers to my competitors The only problem here is that they're claiming confidentiality which is obviously not true. Workers and their agents should be playing offers off each other.

These recruiters are not agents of the workers. My company, not the candidates, pay the recruiters.

Some of us actually have agents which represent us to recruiters.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#207

Post by spuz »

Hnrobert42 wrote: post #200
spuz wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is more to the original comment than this though. I'm interested to know how they measure diversity when reading a CV and how they judge a recruiter to be "phoning it in" or not. I know what the phrase means - I just don't understand the meaning in this context.

I mean if all the candidates are only from big companies or went to the same school or are all white men (this part I only figure out on videocalls), then I assume the recruiter isn’t fishing very many recruiting pools. I want recruiters who do more than search LinkedIn. They should be tapped in to local technology groups, alumni associations, professional groups, etc.

Thanks that makes sense.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#208

Post by Mc91 »

I have been working in IT for 25 years. In the early days independent recruiters, especially good ones, were very helpful.

Nowadays I am not sure what a lot of them do. Almost any job they know about, I already know about, as it is posted on Linkedin and in other places. A lot of them seem to be people one or two years out of college.

Annoying things - pitching me jobs I do not have the qualifications for (like a C# job if I have worked in a Javascript stack) and if I defer they say "why not give it a try". So in the older days I relent, apply, do not get it for the reason I had told them, and then they don't want to talk to me any more because I couldn't close the deal.

Suggesting to me I come to their office and meet them, despite only having given some vague words about some possible openings. Springing a surprise tech quiz on me when I arrive at the office (happened once).

While their usefulness has gone down, the one useful thing they still give is feedback on how the interview went. Of course, having been on the other side of the table and interviewing people, sometimes there is nothing wrong with someone - they are mediocre, just like the last three interviews, and the next person who comes in was suggested by the best coder on the team as a great coder, and they come in and impress us all as well - so they get the offer, not you.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#209

Post by Booleans »

e38383 wrote: post #16

Calls. Everyone wants to talk or even video chat. It’s the most annoying thing, not only by recruiters; everything is a voice/video meeting nowadays instead of mail or text.

I just say "please send me the job description" instead of agreeing to a call. If it looks like a good fit then we can arrange a call.

Re: Ask HN: What things that tech recruiters do, annoy you the most as an engineer?

#210

Post by wilmoore »

What the entire recruiting industry (this isn't unique to recruiting industry) fails to understand is, if the process isn't time optimal and fair, then engineers will eventually learn the nuances of the industry and build something more automated, time optimal, and fair. If you've been an engineer for more than a few years and have been paying attention, you probably already know this.
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