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Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

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Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#271

Post by s73v3r »

gambiting wrote: post #241
logfromblammo wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I certainly hope you meant to type £30k/year (~$45k/year). If you're only getting $30k (~£20k/year) as a software programmer of any kind, anywhere in the world, you should seriously consider finding a new employer, even if it requires emigrating. And remote jobs still exist. Canada has the 3rd largest video games industry in the world--after the US and Japan--and its growth has strained the available talent pool. So…

£20k/year is exactly what I'm on. My problem at the moment is that I've been working just a bit more than 2 years now, and I absolutely love what I'm doing. I'm part of the engine team on a game that will be one of the biggest releases of 2016, and learning a tonne every day. I got very flexible hours, private health insurance and 30 days of paid vacation days a year. It's just the pay that's abysmal. I've got two co…

Absolutely none of that makes up for the abysmal pay, though. You can easily get a software development job making much, much more than that, with most, if not all of the same benefits.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#272

Post by finance-geek »

ryguytilidie wrote: post #70
mbroshi wrote: post #34

I will admit I did not make it through this entire article, but it really did not ring true to me at all--just sounded like an unsupported, hostile, angry rant. >> “Fucked if we care” think the recruiters, “now grovel and be exploited”. ... >> You’re meat to them, a resource to be packaged and sold and exploited. Who's being exploited here? I think he's implying the programmers, but as someone who left academia for i…

Honestly it seems like the author has some serious problems. I know hundreds of recruiters having been at Google and Facebook and not a single one of them thinks like this at all. To say "now grovel and be exploited" about a process where the person will almost certainly end up with a fantastic offer for an engineering job in a comfortable office with great pay and great working conditions may actually be the least s…

Firstly, Google tells me outright they do not source from outside recruiters, which the OP is speaking about. Perhaps it is different at executive levels or outside the US.

Secondly, Google is a world-class, forward-thinking company so they are probably not representative of the rest of the millions of companies out there. That is like saying..."of course 100% of companies provide free lunch, after all hundreds of departments at Google provide free lunch." It is just silly.

Finally, the OP is not upset about ending up with "a fantastic offer for an engineering job in a comfortable office." How many engineers even have offices these days? Which company do you even work for?

The OP is upset about rent-seeking behavior of outside recruiters. Often, HR departments outsource the entire search to recruiters. Here in the US, the typical cut is 20 to 75%. For those recruiters who have negotiated higher cuts like 75%, it is usually due to an executive-level relationship...but they don't keep the full 75%, they then sub-source the talent from secondary or even tertiary recruiters.

Lets take an example -- the worker makes 100/hr, the tertiary (recruiter who actually found the talent) gets 25/hr, the secondary (who vetted from multiple tertiaries) gets 25/hr, the primary (who plays golf with the CIO) gets 25/hr. OK, perhaps the worker is well off at 100/hr, but this is a huge loss to the company -- three extra parties have taken a cut just because the HR manager didnt want to vet their own people.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#273

Post by finance-geek »

SandB0x wrote: post #147
JPKab wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's obviously very hyperbolic, but when you leave the sphere of elite IT (Google/Facebook) and head into the folks who are in other geographic locations (and not willing to move to tech hotspots) suddenly the skills in demand and the positions available become overwhelmingly large enterprise type IT jobs. The recruiters who are working for these companies are, to some extent, as the author describes. The real reason…

> The real reason the industry is so slimy on that end is because enterprise companies are too old fashioned to view technology workers as people who deserve to be paid salaries on par or exceeding middle managers. Therefore, the salaries simply aren't high enough to attract talent beyond H1B indentures and fakers who are horribly unproductive. This creates an IT department that isn't very good or effective, and thus…

This is absolutely on point. As I said in another comment, often, HR departments outsource the entire search to recruiters. Here in the US, the typical cut is 20 to 75%. For those recruiters who have negotiated higher cuts like 75%, it is usually due to an executive-level relationship...but they don't keep the full 75%, they then sub-source the talent from secondary or even tertiary recruiters.

Lets take an example -- the worker makes 100/hr, the tertiary (recruiter who actually found the talent) gets 25/hr, the secondary (who vetted from multiple tertiaries) gets 25/hr, the primary (who plays golf with the CIO) gets 25/hr.

So perhaps the worker is well off at 100/hr, but this is a huge loss to the company -- three extra parties have taken a cut just because the HR manager didnt want to vet their own people. If the skill-set is worth more than 100/hr, then the company cant recruit the right talent, and complains of "shortages" whereas in reality, the "shortage" is because too many third parties have their hand in the cookie-jar leaving too little to pay the actual market wage.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#274

Post by jsprogrammer »

gambiting wrote: post #241
logfromblammo wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I certainly hope you meant to type £30k/year (~$45k/year). If you're only getting $30k (~£20k/year) as a software programmer of any kind, anywhere in the world, you should seriously consider finding a new employer, even if it requires emigrating. And remote jobs still exist. Canada has the 3rd largest video games industry in the world--after the US and Japan--and its growth has strained the available talent pool. So…

£20k/year is exactly what I'm on. My problem at the moment is that I've been working just a bit more than 2 years now, and I absolutely love what I'm doing. I'm part of the engine team on a game that will be one of the biggest releases of 2016, and learning a tonne every day. I got very flexible hours, private health insurance and 30 days of paid vacation days a year. It's just the pay that's abysmal. I've got two co…

Will you at least get a portion of the sales on the game? If the game really will be one of the biggest releases next year, a 20k salary is likely nothing compared to residuals/bonuses that might accrue to you.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#275

Post by jsprogrammer »

finance-geek wrote: post #260
jsprogrammer wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like a good lawsuit against the recruiter.

Try proving it...the evidence is stuck in some corporate recruiter system.

The firm that said they had already received the CV and couldn't contract has all the evidence that is needed. Surely a firm would unite with a potential candidate to bring down scum recruiters?

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#276

Post by vox_mollis »

protonfish wrote: post #4

And yet they are our only weapon against business owners who are just as clueless but lack the incentive to pay a competitive wage. When it comes to salary negotiation, it's nice to have Shithead in your corner.

This argument doesn't scan at all. Employer's compensation maximum being equal, you'd be able to negotiate a 25-30% higher salary without the recruiter's cut being a part of total compensation.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#277

Post by mgkimsal »

bitwize wrote: post #188
LoSboccacc wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Oh. Okay. Well, do you know anyone who's looking and might be interested in this role?" this is the part I actually hate most. I'm not gonna do the recruiter job, especially not for free. they have to get over themselves and stop thinking they are giving out 'opportunities' like they are modern messiah

What's worse is how snotty some of them get when you tell them no.

Guess I've been lucky. I can't recall anyone ever being snotty or rude with me when I say 'no'. I usually just ask them to email me details. Usually they don't, but sometimes they do.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#278

Post by retbull »

toolslive wrote: post #163
lukasm wrote: post #13

Had really bad experience with recruiters in London - Lies. From "They have a free gym pass" to complete bs like salary and position. - Screwed up formatting of CV that I've sent (they wanted .doc) I've written that I have basic perl skills, recruiter changed it to good and destroyed the layout of CV making it unreadable. Good luck with perl question during the interview. - Constant phone calls with no new informatio…

I once (early 2000s) discovered during the interview the recruiter had edited the CV I sent. I showed my own copy and the interviewer and I ended up putting them next to each other and identifying the differences. It's better if you only hand out a pdf version.

pdf is still editable.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#279

Post by GFischer »

gearoidoc wrote: post #269
timrichard wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recall one phone call where the guy said "how much do you know about Ajax?" (pronounced like the Dutch football team). There was no reason for the guy to know any different, but it amused me at the time....

Haha, I'm a dev and I pronounced it like this for a while (knowing it was incorrect). Someone like me probably set them down the wrong path!

I live in Uruguay (South America), many developers don't speak English, and most that do don't speak it well (they usually do read and write decently).

You'd probably be hard pressed to understand what they're talking about :) - for example JSON is definitely JASON, and you'll be looked at funny if you don't pronounce it that way :) , and Ajax is pronounced like the Dutch football team.

If I don't hear it on a video or a talk, I'm probably pronouncing it wrong (and not knowing I am). I hope to get corrected if I do.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#280

Post by bitwize »

mgkimsal wrote: post #277
bitwize wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's worse is how snotty some of them get when you tell them no.

Guess I've been lucky. I can't recall anyone ever being snotty or rude with me when I say 'no'. I usually just ask them to email me details. Usually they don't, but sometimes they do.

I've had recruiters cop a very passive-aggressive tone when I told them I didn't know anyone interested in their position. It was weird.
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