Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation • Hacker News Board

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#61

Post by moron4hire » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:05 PM UTC

jameshart wrote: post #30

US recruitment (at least around tech hubs) does seem a lot more civilized than the UK situation - most opportunities I see are directly advertised. I left the UK five years ago, and I still get most of my recruitment spam from UK agents. Someone clearly needs to educate those guys about aging their databases - someone who was in the market for opening level PHP gigs in 2001 is probably not still looking for opening l…

I think it depends on where you are. I've seen this sort of behavior a lot. Less so now that I'm in DC, but it was really bad back in Philly.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#62

Post by scottmwinters » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:06 PM UTC

While I agree with most of this article, its a bit extreme. I've never liked spam, but is it really that hard to ignore them? I've had a recruiting firm call me 4-5 times and send emails and I started getting a bit upset...but far from that extreme

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#63

Post by dommer » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:06 PM UTC

genericresponse wrote: post #39

dommer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes this is a rant. However, the first point is a good one. 95% of the author's [limited sample] where recruiters earning a large amount of money for doing very little technically.

You know, I like how there is this view out there that anyone who's doing classically "business" or "sales" work is not actually working that hard. I know some recruiters. They aren't the world's smartest people, but the successful ones work really damn hard. They don't make more than minimum wage unless they place people. These guys are cold calling, searching LinkedIn, crawling phone trees, and sending requests all…

I never said they didn't work hard.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#64

Post by gotchange » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:06 PM UTC

dates wrote: post #17

This is mostly an angry rant, pretty amusing to me how upset the author actually becomes at times, I think its quite harsh. I did like this idea towards the end of it: "To employers – ask your staff to help find new hires. Offer a bounty – enough to get their attention, say a fortnight’s salary. It’s a lot less than [a recruiter] would cost. And their incentives are all positive: no-one will hire an idiot if they hav…

Actually the solution he suggested might not be helpful at all as this recruitment methodology may lead gradually over time to favoritism, cliquism, cronyism, tribalism you name it in the workplace as everyone is vouching their friends and acquaintances to key and select positions inside the organization to help them cement and consolidate their power and hinders the progress of the organization as a whole in the process.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#65

Post by mavdi » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:06 PM UTC

Some valid points which could be made with a clear head too. I believe in market dynamics, the reason the recruiters aren't gone by now is that market still needs them.

The author's moral high ground is also funny. At the end of the day these guys are here to make a living, and making a living is indeed really hard. Somehow suggesting these guys are just born evil isn't right, given the same circumstances most of us would behave the same way. Lucky we are engineers in demand. So far.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#66

Post by PUSH_AX » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:08 PM UTC

mbroshi wrote: post #34

I will admit I did not make it through this entire article, but it really did not ring true to me at all--just sounded like an unsupported, hostile, angry rant. >> “Fucked if we care” think the recruiters, “now grovel and be exploited”. ... >> You’re meat to them, a resource to be packaged and sold and exploited. Who's being exploited here? I think he's implying the programmers, but as someone who left academia for i…

Are you in the UK and have you dealt with a large number of recruiters? I would be super surprised to meet someone who has a good sample size of working with UK recruiters who doesn't have similar thoughts on the subject.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#67

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:09 PM UTC

mbroshi wrote: post #34

I will admit I did not make it through this entire article, but it really did not ring true to me at all--just sounded like an unsupported, hostile, angry rant. >> “Fucked if we care” think the recruiters, “now grovel and be exploited”. ... >> You’re meat to them, a resource to be packaged and sold and exploited. Who's being exploited here? I think he's implying the programmers, but as someone who left academia for i…

[deleted]

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#68

Post by vollmond » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:09 PM UTC

RogerL wrote: post #14

One fairly recently cold emailed me 4 times in one day, the last email quite put out and angry that I hadn't responded yet; this was followed by numerous cajoling to censorious emails in the following days, and then a letter mailed to my home castigating me for not responding. And then more emails. He finally went away. Then there is the current one - scheduling an interview without my say so, I demanded she cancel i…

How can he get that irate at being ignored? Isn't that the standard response to cold emails? I ignore a lot more than I respond to.

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#69

Post by jodrellblank » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:10 PM UTC

joe-mccann wrote: post #29

https://twitter.com/actualrecruiter

https://twitter.com/erowidrecruiter

Re: Don’t Feed the Beast – The Great Tech Recruiter Infestation

#70

Post by ryguytilidie » Fri, Oct 16, 2015, 2:11 PM UTC

mbroshi wrote: post #34

I will admit I did not make it through this entire article, but it really did not ring true to me at all--just sounded like an unsupported, hostile, angry rant. >> “Fucked if we care” think the recruiters, “now grovel and be exploited”. ... >> You’re meat to them, a resource to be packaged and sold and exploited. Who's being exploited here? I think he's implying the programmers, but as someone who left academia for i…

Honestly it seems like the author has some serious problems. I know hundreds of recruiters having been at Google and Facebook and not a single one of them thinks like this at all.

To say "now grovel and be exploited" about a process where the person will almost certainly end up with a fantastic offer for an engineering job in a comfortable office with great pay and great working conditions may actually be the least self aware thing I've ever seen a human being write.

The author is a bad writer, is unable to support their points and shows the self awareness of a 5 year old. Why did this post get a single upvote? Is the whole "lets work ourselves in a furor over things we made up about strangers" not getting old to you people...?