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Programmers: How do you find jobs without the help of recruiters?

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Programmers: How do you find jobs without the help of recruiters?

#1
I've had about 5 jobs over the past 6-7 years, some full-time, others contract. All of them have been from recruiters and they all suck.

I love programming but hate the industry. Whenever I talk about the problems that I'm having in the 9-5 world of programming, I'm almost always told to move jobs, avoid recruiters and that there's always perfect job out there for me... but where are they?

How do you go about getting a job, without a recruiter?

Re: Programmers: How do you find jobs without the help of recruiters?

#4
Recruiters as in independent agents that contact you or help you find jobs? not that there's anything wrong with them, but I tend to apply directly to companies and search Linkedin, other (professional) social networks or ask friends about openings.

Some recruiters will cheat you into applying to positions you don't want, but you are responsible to ask your interviewers the right questions. Recruiters can sometimes help negotiating better terms or solve conflicts, so not all are worthless.

Re: Programmers: How do you find jobs without the help of recruiters?

#5
Bluntly, many of the better employers are going to balk at your work history. 5 jobs in 7 years is kind of a red flag. Employers (both good and bad) prefer someone who will stay for several years; the better employers get to be choosy enough to get that. A recruiter can't do much to fix that.

As for your actual question: There are better recruiters and worse recruiters. Don't avoid them all, just learn which ones are worth dealing with.

I recently (January/February) did a job search. I reached out to some recruiters I trusted from previous experience. I also went looking on Indeed and Monster. (Those were better ten years ago than they are now.) I posted my resume on Indeed, which got me spammed by recruiters that threw everything remotely technical at me, even though most of them were things that I explicitly was not looking for. I forget where the actual job came from - from a recruiter I reached out to, or from Indeed.

It's a numbers game. You need to look at maybe 30 openings, maybe more. To find those 30, it can help to have someone shoving openings at you - someone like a recruiter. But of those 30, you need to weed out most of them quickly (say 20 out of the 30). They're a bad fit, or they're bottom-of-the-barrel businesses just looking for a body who can kind of do the work. You need to develop a sense for which ones to rule out.

The number of places that you should seriously pursue you can probably count on one hand. But you may need help finding them, and it may take time. Don't be so desperate to get out of your current place that you just take the best offer you get this week - you'll wind up somewhere else lousy. Take the time to find a good place.

Re: Programmers: How do you find jobs without the help of recruiters?

#8

Bluntly, many of the better employers are going to balk at your work history. 5 jobs in 7 years is kind of a red flag. Employers (both good and bad) prefer someone who will stay for several years; the better employers get to be choosy enough to get that. A recruiter can't do much to fix that. As for your actual question: There are better recruiters and worse recruiters. Don't avoid them all, just learn which ones are…

I change jobs every 6 month. Not a problem depending on task and Pay. Plus you can always '' lie ''. Which most do right?

Re: Programmers: How do you find jobs without the help of recruiters?

#10

Bluntly, many of the better employers are going to balk at your work history. 5 jobs in 7 years is kind of a red flag. Employers (both good and bad) prefer someone who will stay for several years; the better employers get to be choosy enough to get that. A recruiter can't do much to fix that. As for your actual question: There are better recruiters and worse recruiters. Don't avoid them all, just learn which ones are…

OP mentioned some of the jobs were full-time, and some contract. Assuming a few 3,6 months contract jobs (not uncommon) it is not necessarily a red flag.

I mention this because I see many people reading contract jobs and evaluating it in exactly the same way as a full-time position. Many wonder, how come they list several jobs at the same time? less than a year? and discard the candidate.

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