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Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

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Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#11

Post by pc86 »

Disclaimer: I've used recruiters to find every job I've had other than the first one.

> I'd rather talk to a company directly.

Why? What benefit do you get from that? You're not like to negotiate a higher salary than you would without the recruiter, and you're not in a better position to get hired either (over the total spend of an employee's lifespan the recruiter commission is a drop in the bucket). Some companies I've worked for place candidates they receive through external recruiters higher than self-selected candidates because they've already presumably gone through some sort of screening process.

A good recruiter will understand what you're looking for and won't put crap in front of you. That doesn't mean you'll get the perfect hand-picked job, and they'll probably challenge you on some of your assumptions, but if you're a .NET developer they're not going to try to get you to take a PHP job.

But here's how I generally go about looking for a new job:

1. Email bosses I've had who I would want to work for again and let them know I'm on the market. Just a quick "Hi _______, I wanted to let you know I'm ready for a change from my current environment. If you hear of anything I'd love to take you out to lunch and discuss the opportunity." LPT: They will buy the lunch 95 out of 100 times :)

2. Email recruiters I've used in the past and send them an updated Word resume, salary/commute requirements, and what I want v. my current job (bigger, smaller, different sector, whatever).

3. If I'm very gung ho I will go on Ladders, Indeed, etc but the above typically hasn't taken very long to find something.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#12

Post by ChuckMcM »

One of the actual uses for LinkedIn.

Generally you probably want to work for people you like and respect. If you know some people like that, then finding out how to reach them on LinkedIn is a good way to let them know you are interested in working with them.

Sometimes they won't be interested in working with you, its a fact of life and you have to let that go. Sometimes they are open to the idea but they don't have any budget. And sometimes they will get you interviewed and move you over right away.

If you are in the "any job but this one" mode, you are at a disadvantage. If you don't know what you want to be doing then people will have a harder time knowing if you would work out well in their position. Its painful when there is a job available but you know it isn't what you really want to be doing, do you suck it up and work there because its a job? do you turn them down? Depending on your financial status it can be a very tough call.

When folks ask me "should I look for a new job?" I have two pieces of advice regardless, one is that you should always be considering new opportunities, and two you should think about what you jobs you like doing while you are not under pressure (say being unemployed) because it helps you be more honest with yourself on what you like and don't like.

Recruiters can sometimes get your name in front of a manager at a company you want to work for when you don't know anyone there. But generally their value is more to hiring managers than the people they represent.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#13

Post by StavrosK »

mdorazio wrote: post #7
googletazer wrote: post #2

Googling "the name of the company you're interested in + careers" usually does that. Or you can go on linkedin and search for internal recruiters from that company, but you'll be wasting time.

Agreed on the wasting time part. I've actually had significantly better response rates from companies when going through a recruiter instead of applying directly to the position on the website/linkedin/whatever. At least with a recruiter you get someone with an active interest in getting your resume in front of a hiring manager, as opposed to your application disappearing into the sea of 100+ applicants vying for key…

Your comment seems to be contradicting itself. You say that looking for a recruiter is wasting time, but a recruiter is the best choice. Which one do you mean?

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#14

Post by vladgur »

k__ wrote: post #9
PaulHoule wrote: post #3

A counterpoint to that is that if a company is hiring a recruiter they are serious about hiring somebody. There are some places where they bring in a huge number of candidates, interview them, and then never hire anyone. For instance, at a local Uni, they had a position open for 2.5 yrs. If there is a recruiter involved there is a sense of urgency at least.

other reasons for hiring a recruiter: desperation, laziness, no idea about hiring at all

I beg to differ. Hiring is hard. Internal recruiters play an important role in helping your company grow. For technical recruiting, recruiters are essential if you want to grow your eng team beyond single digits unless youre prepare to have one or more engineers devote their full time to fielding applications and screening candidates.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#15

Post by usumoio »

Disclaimer: I have used recruiters and I work for the company I'm about to recommend

That said, I do recommend these guys:

https://www.vettery.com

I'm a developer here. We're a hiring marketplace similar to Hired, but we've got a more human touch which includes getting to talk to our in-house team. I'm impressed with how hard our team works and this is the thing I've built that I'm proudest of.

If you want some middle-ground between a recruiter and doing it yourself, give it a look.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#16

Post by Jemaclus »

I despise recruiters with the fiery passion of a thousand suns, so I try to avoid them as much as possible. That leaves me (and you) with a few viable options:

1) Use a matching service like interviewing.io or TripleByte to get connected directly with companies. (Effectiveness: Questionable but promising)

2) Use a job listing site like Indeed.com to find positions that you're interested in applying to. (Effectiveness: It works, but is like throwing mud on a wall to see what sticks -- hard and not very lucrative.)

3) Use Indeed / AngelList / whatever to find companies that are hiring, then use LinkedIn or some other method to find the hiring manager directly. Email them directly with your resume and cover letter (since it's effectively a cold-call, make that cover letter damned impressive). (Effectiveness: works great, in my experience)

4) Use your network. Email old bosses and coworkers and let them know you're on the market. If you've left a good impression, they'll usually be more than happy to do whatever they can to get you into good companies. (Effectiveness: fantastic, assuming you have a network in the first place.)

There are tons of other ways, but those are the strategies I've used. In the mean time, study up for your technical interviews. Good luck!

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#17

Post by klenwell »

How common is it for recruiters to "inject" themselves into the process? I ask this for a couple reasons.

I interviewed for a position a while back where the person interviewing me at the end asked, "What firm sent you again? Was it Firm A?" when I had been sent by someone with Firm B. I'll also get contacted by recruiters from different firms for the same position.

There have also been a couple cases recently where I've been submitted for a position by a recruiter, interviewed with a company, and got a pass or didn't hear back at all. And then I'll see the position show up a couple weeks later on a site like StackOverflow Careers. I got the impression that a recruiter jumped on an opening they came across and just kind of threw me in there and the company hiring decided they weren't getting much in return for the potential money they'd be laying out. I was pretty well qualified for one of these positions, so I wondered if they wouldn't have been more enthusiastic if there hadn't been a recruiter between us.

My conclusion after about a year of working with a number of recruiters in my area (Southern California) is that the industry is dominated by a few big firms (I refer to CyberCoders as the McDonald's of recruiters, but that may be being too generous) and has a lot of turnover. I suspect they have most their success placing more junior developers in less critical let's-get-this-seat-filled kind of positions. I've come across a few that I would call real professionals. Unfortunately, they always seems to be focused in areas or locations that don't line up with my own.

I still look at a number of recruiters emails each week. But now I only respond if I am convinced that they have an actual working relationship with the company they claim to be representing and aren't just trying to win some race against the rest of the rodentalia out there.

I also put together a page on my wiki for Recruiters to which immediately I refer them any time I am contacted:

http://klenwell.com/is/Recruiters

This has been helpful in quickly filtering out the most callow practitioners.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#18

Post by peteretep »

Hi, I'm a recruiter.

Look for job aggregators like Adzuna, Indeed, etc, which scrape all jobs on the web. When you see results, it should be easy to work out which jobs are posted by recruiters, and which have been posted directly by the company.

In my (massively biased) experience, you are better off applying for a position when you've been put forward by a recruiter:

* The recruiter knows what the client's salary range is, and wants you to get paid as much as possible (as the role is commission based) - they'll be able to make sure you're getting a good deal out of the client

* The recruiter is a professional sales person, and will chase the hiring manager for feedback, technical interviews, etc etc, in a way that as a direct candidate you'll come across as too pushy if you do yourself

* The recruiter will genuinely have a good view of other similar jobs you may not have found that you'd be a good match for.

* The recruiter will get much much more candid feedback about you than you'll ever get directly from the client

... and a whole bunch of other factors.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#19

Post by Justen »

pc86 wrote: post #11

Disclaimer: I've used recruiters to find every job I've had other than the first one. > I'd rather talk to a company directly. Why? What benefit do you get from that? You're not like to negotiate a higher salary than you would without the recruiter, and you're not in a better position to get hired either (over the total spend of an employee's lifespan the recruiter commission is a drop in the bucket). Some companies…

> You're not like to negotiate a higher salary than you would without the recruiter

This is a bit facile because it depends on if you know how to ask, the financial standing of the company, if you can actually find a recruiter that'll go to bat for you, and a dozen other things that can affect the final outcome. I think the average outcome to expect however from the recruiter side of things is that they would rather make a deal now, than spend time negotiating for you. The same can be said for real estate agents. This is admittedly anecdotal from my experience, but I think a lot of people will agree.

Re: Ask HN: Do I have to go through recruiters nowadays, how do you find new jobs?

#20

Post by peteretep »

klenwell wrote: post #17

How common is it for recruiters to "inject" themselves into the process? I ask this for a couple reasons. I interviewed for a position a while back where the person interviewing me at the end asked, "What firm sent you again? Was it Firm A?" when I had been sent by someone with Firm B. I'll also get contacted by recruiters from different firms for the same position. There have also been a couple cases recently where…

    > I got the impression that a recruiter jumped on an opening
    > they came across and just kind of threw me in there and the
    > company hiring decided they weren't getting much in return
    > for the potential money they'd be laying out. I was pretty
    > well qualified for one of these positions, so I wondered if 
    > they wouldn't have been more enthusiastic if there hadn't
    > been a recruiter between us.
I mean, I can't speak for all situations, but generally the costs are accounted for differently, and unless the company is absolutely cash-strapped, they just weren't that interested in you.

    > But now I only respond if I am convinced that they have
    > an actual working relationship with the company they
    > claim to be representing
In the EU they're legally required to be upfront with you about this.
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