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Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

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Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#131

Post by chpmrc »

daveFNbuck wrote: post #122
chpmrc wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We will only release data about companies, not individual recruiters. We will then use their name to (try to) get their contact details and send them a link to the data so that they can be more aware of how their actions affected (and how many) people. What we're doing should ideally benefit both sides, not just us. Hence why I said we should make this more clear, as in: we're not going to publish the names of the in…

You're currently collecting this data under false pretenses. If you care about unprofessional behavior and giving people bad experiences, you should remove the line about releasing all the data to the public from the start of your survey.

No we are not. We are clearly stating that the data will be publicly available EXCEPT for those fields where the opposite is explicitly indicated. I really don't see how this could be more clear.

EDIT: by the way we updated the related field so that it's clear that the recruiter's name might be shared with the agency (but without releasing anything else about the entry to avoid tracing it back to the candidate). If you have any suggestions on how to communicate this better we would really appreciate it. Thanks!

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#132

Post by chpmrc »

dsr_ wrote: post #66

Dear people who are in charge of hiring processes (there will be some of you in this audience, I'm sure): External recruiters are generally expensive and bad. By using them, you reduce the quality of your reputation. They charge 25% or more of the first year salary per placement. If you are big enough to afford it -- that is, you're making more than four hires a year -- use an actual employee as your recruiter. Make…

Hear, hear!

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#134

Post by paulgrant999 »

reaperducer wrote: post #102
lowercased wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just went through a process audit with a major financial company. they were vetting our setup to connect and grab info from them for use in a product. The auditor flipped out when he learned that "developers" would potentially have access to our live production database (not theirs mind you - our own). "This is unacceptable, developers can write code and could exfiltrate data". "Umm... someone needs to be doing datab…

Wow. Just wow. Because I've actually seen this happen elsewhere (not financial), and I thought it was a one-off.

Oh lord.

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#135

Post by akeck »

chpmrc wrote: post #130
akeck wrote: post #108

I understand the motivation, but this seems like a lawsuit magnet.

We've already done our research, of course, but before releasing any data we will lawyer up properly and make sure we're not in violation of any law or regulation ;)

Even if you get cleared initially, you may spend a significant amount of time and cash proving that "clearance" in lawsuits. Time is your most important resource. A year in litigation is year of your life you're not getting back. At some point, you may have to decide if it's worth spending time on litigation or other things. Pancreatic cancer made this clear for me. One moment a family member had years to go. The next moment they only had six months. Six months and a few weeks later, I collected their ashes from the crematorium.

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#136

Post by daveFNbuck »

chpmrc wrote: post #131
daveFNbuck wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're currently collecting this data under false pretenses. If you care about unprofessional behavior and giving people bad experiences, you should remove the line about releasing all the data to the public from the start of your survey.

No we are not. We are clearly stating that the data will be publicly available EXCEPT for those fields where the opposite is explicitly indicated. I really don't see how this could be more clear. EDIT: by the way we updated the related field so that it's clear that the recruiter's name might be shared with the agency (but without releasing anything else about the entry to avoid tracing it back to the candidate). If y…

Your front page still says

> We are collecting stories from devs all over the world and plan to release all data to the public (for free!) so that no more fellow devs will have to suffer

If I filled your form out, I would expect that all the data I entered would be released to the public. You then turn around and contradict that in the form, making it less clear about what I should expect. You need to be consistent in both places, and link to a more detailed explanation on how this data will be anonymized and shared.

This also makes it less clear whether other fields will be shared publicly. Is field 7 going to be public or is it just something I'm sharing with you? I'm honestly not sure about that now.

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#137

Post by carlmr »

Jeremy1026 wrote: post #93
carlmr wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>2) People grow and improve. I don't want to be judged for my work or my behavior from my early days in the field. How are you going to be sure this isn't unfairly capturing the worst moments of someone's career just because they are new at it and haven't learned any better yet? Or are currently in a bad company which forces/encourages this kind of behavior. I wouldn't mind recruiting company reviews though. Because…

Only one on my blacklist is Cyber Coders. They just sent me a listing for a Davenport Machine Operator four states away, based on my skills. My skills are all in software development. No idea why this recruiter thinks I'd be a good fit for operating a giant piece of machinery.

I thought Cyber Coders hire directly?

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#138

Post by chpmrc »

devonkim wrote: post #67
chpmrc wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We actually asked ourselves the same questions. The natural evolution of this tool would be to allow for reviews of recruiters/agencies. Regarding point 1) there are ways to fight unjustified negative reviews (e.g. "I didn't get a job, this agency sucks!"), similarly to how they do on websites like Yelp. This is more of a community guided effort (unless we start actively moderating reviews, which is an option). For n…

I was working on a similar system for more general reviews and found that compared to fraudulent positive reviews negative reviews have a lot less incentives except against public figures and tend to be more honest as a result. With that said, protecting both the submitter and the accused of defamation can be accomplished partially with community moderation and aggressive redaction of as many identifying names as pos…

All great points! I think we will have to face similar challenges.

We're working on different options. One is along the lines of Glassdoor which allows companies to respond to reviews.

If you have any references regarding the first paragraph I would be very interested, thanks!

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#139

Post by chpmrc »

daveFNbuck wrote: post #136
chpmrc wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No we are not. We are clearly stating that the data will be publicly available EXCEPT for those fields where the opposite is explicitly indicated. I really don't see how this could be more clear. EDIT: by the way we updated the related field so that it's clear that the recruiter's name might be shared with the agency (but without releasing anything else about the entry to avoid tracing it back to the candidate). If y…

Your front page still says > We are collecting stories from devs all over the world and plan to release all data to the public (for free!) so that no more fellow devs will have to suffer If I filled your form out, I would expect that all the data I entered would be released to the public. You then turn around and contradict that in the form, making it less clear about what I should expect. You need to be consistent i…

What's more clear than being explicit about which fields will be published and which not? IMHO adding that to the main page is redundant and a waste of time and space.

Specifically about field 7 are you suggesting we rephrase the description? If so how?

We can definitely work on a page that explains the process in more detail once we decide exactly how to proceed.

Re: Ask HN: Dontrecruit.me – A website to collect stories about bad recruiters

#140

Post by chpmrc »

akeck wrote: post #135
chpmrc wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've already done our research, of course, but before releasing any data we will lawyer up properly and make sure we're not in violation of any law or regulation ;)

Even if you get cleared initially, you may spend a significant amount of time and cash proving that "clearance" in lawsuits. Time is your most important resource. A year in litigation is year of your life you're not getting back. At some point, you may have to decide if it's worth spending time on litigation or other things. Pancreatic cancer made this clear for me. One moment a family member had years to go. The nex…

I'm sorry to hear that. I've had experience with a family member having cancer myself and they lasted only 3 months. It's a trade-off: fighting for something you believe in and enjoying life. If we realize it's not worth it we will drop everything in a heart beat.

That's why we hope to collect enough data to justify why we're doing it and that it's a bigger problem than we thought.

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