Why are technical recruiters so clueless? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#51

Post by takrupp » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:07 PM UTC

Top recruiters work in the highest paying industries, which rarely includes technology (except in the upper echelons). Most of these recruiters are from large firms, filling contract or lower level hires that net the firm maybe $10-20k and gets them personally a few hundred extra bones in their pockets. Its the McDonalds end of recruiting.

On the other hand, there is a small (as mentioned above) 1-2% of recruiters who work in really high paying sectors that really know their industries. They're like the Outback Steakhouse of their profession. They still need to work with a lot of candidates, but it pays for them to go to conferences, read industry material and even (gasp) learn programming themselves (Thanks Zed!).

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#52

Post by eru » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:08 PM UTC

run4yourlives wrote: post #32

tocomment wrote: post #2

I never understood why they stop communicating if an opportunity doesn't pan out? Why wouldn't they be interested in cultivating a long term relationship? That's what I think I would do if I were a recruiter. I'd keep in touch with say 200 people I know are really good and keep placing them as they switched jobs. I'm guessing at least 10 or 20 of those people would be switching jobs every year.

Because being good at your job would put you out of work. :-) If you place people into positions that they really fit with, odds are they would stay longer, ergo, less money for you. What you would need to do is sell yourself as an agent that is constantly evaluating new gigs for a monthly fee. I think that might actually work really well for devs that consult as a primary business.

How about negotiating a different pay-structure, that aligns interests better?

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#53

Post by takrupp » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:14 PM UTC

Timothee wrote: post #43

KoZeN wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love recruitment, I honestly do. Primarily because of the money I make! I loved working as a developer but there was a distinct lack of social and professional interaction that eventually led to me looking at other options. It was satisfying completing a difficult project and seeing it implemented but I get infinitely more satisfaction from finding someone their perfect job as well as landing a juicy commission pay…

No offense, but the fact that the money aspect is what you like the most puts me off a bit... it feels too much like the stereotypical "sales guy". However, it explains why I dealt with a couple of recruiters who touted their PhD in their email signature. I couldn't really understand why someone with a PhD would "end up" being a recruiter. But money can explain it I suppose. (they were still bad though)

The money is nice, and it is a "Sales" job, but their is some creativity to it. You are trying to marry a candidate to a client. They are both moving targets. Its a skill game, more than a "bang the phones" game that a normal sales job is.

There are a number of quants and C++ developers who made the move to recruiting, sometimes after talking to a recruiter and realizing that there is money to be made (usually more than they are making). I related to this: I did a lot of IT and web development work in my youth, and that always entailed being someone's bitch and not getting recognized for the work I did (Only the mess ups get noticed: Like being a goalie in soccer). In recruiting, you see the angles, work your relationships and make money. Its a one person job (mostly) and there is a lot of enjoyment in that aspect. At the end of the day you say "I did X placements, billed Y amount. Thats what I did", which isn't about the money as much as its about having a quantitative score that demonstrates your productivity.

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#54

Post by krane_6d7 » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:17 PM UTC

smiler wrote: post #14

I guess technical recruiters will never be any good until you find ex software developers to be technical recruiters - and I can't think you'd find many software developers willing to do that. I am convinced there are still many ways for recruiting to be fixed by disruptive startups

I think a recruiting firm with no technical skills should contract out preliminary interview process to actual software developers. Their task should be weed out any fakers and improve quality.

The paid compensation on a part time basis would attract developers to get involved. It would be one or two interviews per day which would not steal time from their day job and put some extra dough into their pockets.

Win-Win for both.

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#55

Post by wheaties » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:17 PM UTC

gaius wrote: post #15

edw519 wrote: post #10

Why are technical recruiters so clueless? Because they are a little less clueless than most HR departments. Are there any recruiters working in technology who get it? Yes. The top 1 or 2%. The bell curve of competency for recruiters is a lot steeper at the high end, so finding one who "gets it" is difficult. So when you do, keep them. Whether you're hiring or looking, they can change your life. The problem with this…

That's exactly it. The recruiters who "get it" are doing quant/C++ recruitment for investment banks, RoR/Flash guys doing marketing websites will never see them.

Actually I had some of those tell me to put the number of lines of code I've written on my resume "...because tech guys like that stuff." Honestly, it was a great ice-breaker when I said "The recruiters added that. I think it's a total shit metric." However, in hindsight, I wonder why. Was it just to get past HR or was it to impress the hiring managers. Over at the I-banks, the guys near the trading desks actually know quite a lot. The further you get away...

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#56

Post by kscaldef » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:24 PM UTC

clistctrl wrote: post #49

kscaldef wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, he's legitimately complaining about people spamming out recruitment emails without doing any research on the people they are contacting. For example, my resume on my personal website says "I am not interested in moving from Portland. Really. Seriously." My LinkedIn profile says "I am happily located in Portland, OR. Please don't bother me with job possibilities that require moving somewhere else." And yet, I woul…

to be fair, a telecommute job would not require you to relocate, so it seems pretty legitimate ;)

You should re-read what I wrote more carefully. Telecommute was grouped together with local jobs in the acceptable 5%.

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#57

Post by Goladus » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:27 PM UTC

tocomment wrote: post #2

I never understood why they stop communicating if an opportunity doesn't pan out? Why wouldn't they be interested in cultivating a long term relationship? That's what I think I would do if I were a recruiter. I'd keep in touch with say 200 people I know are really good and keep placing them as they switched jobs. I'm guessing at least 10 or 20 of those people would be switching jobs every year.

I know recruiters that do this.

You don't maintain constant contact, but you avoid burning bridges and keep the name in your contacts or linkedIn or whatever. When the right position comes up, you re-establish contact.

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#58

Post by ghurlman » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:42 PM UTC

nuclear_eclipse wrote: post #47

tptacek wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, because he knows the recruiter will have no idea what that means. She's just reading words off a page.

Reading? Don't you mean copying?

Hey, c'mon now... they also paste.

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#59

Post by warfangle » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:48 PM UTC

nuclear_eclipse wrote: post #50

davidw wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? I get called Dave, David, or even Davide (I live in Italy so even David might come out as "Dah-veed") and I really don't care as long as the person is nice and respectful and otherwise pleasant to communicate with (annoying recruiters don't really count). I mostly use it as a measure of how clued-in they are about me, but even some of the people who have mistaken me for a Davide (not the statue, unfortunately…

I don't care about slight misspellings or mispronunciation, (I get it all the time with the last name of "Reese"), by my biggest pet peeve is people assuming that John is short for Jonathon, even if/after they see my named spelled with the "h"...

Point, some spell it Johnathan. I, myself, spell it Jonathan.

Re: Why are technical recruiters so clueless?

#60

Post by snowmaker » Tue, Oct 05, 2010, 5:48 PM UTC

ZachPruckowski wrote: post #40

There's like a one-in-tens-of-millions chance of that working. But it takes 5 seconds to send the email, and I imagine "I recruited DHH" is worth millions. So you quickly wind up with math suggesting that sending that email was worthwhile in terms of $/hour.

From the email, it's obvious that the recruiter had no idea who DHH was and was just hitting a list of "ruby programmers".