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Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

alexchesser.medium.com

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Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#381

Post by wnevets »

lbriner wrote: post #169
Kalium wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Hey ____. Before we move forward, can you provide me with the company name, a job description, and the expected compensation. Regards" I've found that this makes 80-90% of recruiters go completely silent. For some reason, asking for this basic information scares off the vast majority of recruiters. I'm genuinely unsure what I - or they - get out of dragging this out into a screenful of blah blah blah.

One of the most common reasons is simply that they don't want you to go direct to the company in question and bypass their commission. If they give you too much, it is very easy to do and many companies will recruit directly and the recruiter would have no legal basis to do anything about that. On the other hand, because of commission, it is in the recruiter's interest to get you as much money as possible so you migh…

> it is in the recruiter's interest to get you as much money as possible so you might get a better offer via them than you would if you went direct.

Unlikely. Its way better for the recruiter to focus on the quantity of hires rather than trying to increase the salaries of a smaller number of them. It takes way more work and makes them less money to help increase your salary by 20% than just finding another role and hire.

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#382

Post by conro1108 »

obmelvin wrote: post #230
kodah wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've made it my policy to never work with a recruiter that isn't affiliated with the company they're hiring for. This is a massive privilege. A lot of companies interview in a way that I couldn't pass years ago, so I depended on external recruiters to get me jobs. This was basically how I made a living in the South without a CS or CE degree. The universal truth I see throughout every career advice thread is always…

Yes, it's interesting to see how many people here are 100% against 3rd party recruiters rather than recognizing there are those good and bad at their job - just like anything else. My best friend from growing up had a 3rd party recruiter go completely out of their way to help him, and he was very appreciative of that.

I think it's possible to recognize that 3rd party recruiters can be good or bad at their job while also coming to the conclusion that the bad outweighs the good to a degree that it's not worth the time to figure it out.

It's certainly a privilege to be in a position where you'd still have an excess of inbound job opportunities even without 3rd party recruiters. But if that's the position you're in, it's one of the more effective strategies I've seen to increase signal:noise.

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#383

Post by convolvatron »

cletus wrote: post #180
milkytron wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There are lots of techniques recruiters will use to waste your time. Why is this? Why do they insist on wasting a candidate's time when answering some simple questions via email is much more efficient? I've talked to HR people about this, and the answers I've received are not satisfying. A common response is that they want to get to know you, hear how you speak, determine if you might be a good fit. BUT, shouldn't…

> Why is this? Why do they insist on wasting a candidate's time when answering some simple questions via email is much more efficient? That's easy: they want you invested. The sunk cost fallacy works. Think about it another way: being a recruiter is being in sales. Sales people love pipelines (funnels) so if you think about the recruitment stages a simplified view might be: 1. Email candidate 2. Candidate responds to…

no. i think its more. i mean yes this is true.

i've had lots of recruiters that really thought their value was to harass me me by phone. even though I've emphasized repeatedly that there isn't anything more that they can do personally to help me...the insist on calling me nearly ever day to 'see where my head is at'

i'm pretty sure i've lost out on some decent positions in the past because i got so sick of spending 30 minutes here and there talking to the same idiot that said 'dont _ever_ call me back you asshole'

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#384

Post by TameAntelope »

vanusa wrote: post #379
TameAntelope wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Violent agreement is just a term for when people seem to be disagreeing but actually aren't. [0] If that is completely counter to your way of being, then it's possible your way of being isn't compatible with the concept of constructive argument. And I'm confused about where I said anything about certainty. I'm not talking about how all companies operate all of the time, I'm talking about how some companies operate an…

I'm not talking about how all companies operate all of the time, I'm talking about how some companies operate an unfortunate number of times. In between these opposite extremes -- your language clearly indicates that you think this level of what we might call "aggravated bias" (hiring not just someone in your network; but hiring them over a more qualified candidate, presumed to exist and be interested in your opportu…

> Such that in your mind, "including referrals in your hiring funnel" == aggravated bias (in the sense above), basically.

Can you show where I said anything approaching this? I do not believe this, nor do I believe I said or even suggested this to be the case.

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#385

Post by jpmoral »

XorNot wrote: post #320
actually_a_dog wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, I find work "friends" to be even more ephemeral than school friends. Nobody I've ever worked with in the past has ever contacted me after I left the company we worked for. At least school friends are around for a more or less guaranteed period of several years. Edit to add: I have initiated contact before and been well received. Nobody contacts me. It's tiring to have to do 100% of the work to maintain these rela…

I've had the same experience. I have no idea how this advice is working for people in most job markets - it certainly doesn't seem to be a thing in Australia.

I'm in my second role in Australia. Can't say whether it's a thing but people from my previous role (people still there and people who have moved on) definitely keep in touch with each other.

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#386

Post by rendall »

I dunno. I've been a SWE for almost 20 years now, and I just got a recruitment email for "Senior Manager of Partner Relations". I'm honestly not sure what that even is, but it's definitely not code monkey. Email included all kindsa reassurances, which, even if I were in the field of "Partner Relations", would make me pretty nervous:

We do not conduct fake interviews

We will not ask you for references unless you are being considered for a job

We will give you feedback the moment we get it from our customer

etc.

Do I really have to "not ignore" this recruiter?

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#387

Post by vanusa »

TameAntelope wrote: post #384
vanusa wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not talking about how all companies operate all of the time, I'm talking about how some companies operate an unfortunate number of times. In between these opposite extremes -- your language clearly indicates that you think this level of what we might call "aggravated bias" (hiring not just someone in your network; but hiring them over a more qualified candidate, presumed to exist and be interested in your opportu…

> Such that in your mind, "including referrals in your hiring funnel" == aggravated bias (in the sense above), basically. Can you show where I said anything approaching this? I do not believe this, nor do I believe I said or even suggested this to be the case.

I'm asserting the practice among those in power of favoring relatives, friends, or even friends of friends over other, more qualified candidates is a contributing factor to that diversity problem.

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#388

Post by chana_masala »

dvtrn wrote: post #29
anonygler wrote: post #26

Strong disagree. I've made it my policy to never work with a recruiter that isn't affiliated with the company they're hiring for. Recruiting farms like Cyber Recruiters (yuck) will do everything in their power to waste your time out of sheer incompetence and disinterest. I've "doubled" my salary plenty of times through this policy. But the real secret sauce is referrals. Companies always prioritize a strong referral,…

Recruiting farms like Cyber Recruiters (yuck) will do everything in their power to waste your time Or share your data. I made a throwaway, but not obnoxious email on my domain just for recruiters a few years ago, so I could try tracking who I was talking to. Via three consecutive third-party recruiters I started getting cold calls and e-mails from recruiters I’d never contacted, never met, or never before engaged wit…

I legally changed my name two years ago and I still get recruiting emails addressed to my old name. It hasn't been on LinkedIn for equally as long, so I can only anticipate that my data was sold and my old name is cached in some database.

Re: Career advice nobody gave me: Never ignore a recruiter

#390

Post by tgtweak »

Taking this post to publicly shame a recruiting technique I was victim to:

I entertained a reference check call by a recruiting firm (not standard but he was a good coworker and it was a serious position with a serious company). The interview was normal and standard fare except the last question which I found off-putting and dishonest: "Are you looking to fill any positions?"

Although I was, it's not the kind of professionalism I expect from any company representing mine so I politely declined and ended it there. My friend got the job and all's well that ends well.

Fast forward 3 months and I get cold called by the same company asking me if I would consider a position at XYZ inc (new company, unrelated to the first).

I was blown away that a company would think this is acceptable, and that information given for reference checks by employees are somehow automatically made into leads owned by the recruiting company. I escalated to legal at serious company and explained in no unclear manner how serious of a matter this was, to which they terminated the hiring agreement over.

So just a reminder please vet your recruiting companies before you mandate them to represent your company.

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