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Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

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Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#1

Post by TXV »

I'm a Golang developer based in western Europe with around 5 years professional experience. I frequently receive unsolicited messages from recruiters, mostly on Linkedin, introducing this and that amazing job opportunity. Right now I'm happy where I am, but I won't mind hearing them out if said opportunity is especially compelling.

I'm not sure how to engage with them in an effective way. My goals are basically two: 1. avoid wasting time 2. avoid coming across as arrogant - they are doing their job and their time isn't worth less than mine.

To know if their opportunity is compelling I need to get some key information upfront, e.g. what's the client's budget. I don't want to even start discussing anything if it turns out that the client pays 25% less of what I'm making today. Of course money is not my only concern, but it's still a very easy way, and a very relevant one!, to filter out jobs that have no chance whatsoever to fit my definition of compelling. Another deal-breaker would be a company that doesn't allow any form of remote work. Also some of them absolutely want to talk over the phone and I don't feel comfortable with that.

So what's your strategy for dealing with recruiters? Do you demand employer information upfront? Do you ignore them? How do you interact? Thanks!

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#3

Post by 943_924 »

Trias11 wrote: post #2

I think nothing wrong in polite initial reply about the budget/pay/salary upfront with a firm notion that without that information no further conversation is going to take place. This will weed out flakes and save time for everyone.

Has that worked for anyone here? The most I get after answering a cold email/LinkedIn message with my salary requirements is something along the lines of "that's doable," and finding out later the client had an appetite for a senior with the budget for an entry level.

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#4

Post by tboyd47 »

My advice:

1) Don't ever interact with MPC recruiters. These are recruiters who do not have a contractual agreement with a client in place and want to use your resume to sell their own agency to new clients. 100% wastes of time.

1a) Don't do a lot of legwork (background checks, reference checks, official documents, etc.) before they even submit you. This is a way of filtering out MPC recruiters who are vetting you to become sales material for THEM, not for the job.

1b) Send them your resume in PDF, not DOC form. If they insist on DOC then this is a sign that you may be working with an MPC recruiter.

1c) If they insist on knowing what your current salary is, say you'll tell them if they reveal their bill rate for an equivalent candidate for this client. Again, this is another way of filtering MPC recruiters who will have no way of answering this because they don't have any clients.

1d) Build up a good spam filter to filter out MPC recruiters you've identified. They all share tactics and templates, so they're pretty easy to spot.

Essentially, just be a nice person and avoid MPC recruiters.

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#5

Post by jcroll »

tboyd47 wrote: post #4

My advice: 1) Don't ever interact with MPC recruiters. These are recruiters who do not have a contractual agreement with a client in place and want to use your resume to sell their own agency to new clients. 100% wastes of time. 1a) Don't do a lot of legwork (background checks, reference checks, official documents, etc.) before they even submit you. This is a way of filtering out MPC recruiters who are vetting you to…

What are MPC recruiters?

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#6

Post by tboyd47 »

jcroll wrote: post #5
tboyd47 wrote: post #4

My advice: 1) Don't ever interact with MPC recruiters. These are recruiters who do not have a contractual agreement with a client in place and want to use your resume to sell their own agency to new clients. 100% wastes of time. 1a) Don't do a lot of legwork (background checks, reference checks, official documents, etc.) before they even submit you. This is a way of filtering out MPC recruiters who are vetting you to…

What are MPC recruiters?

"Most placeable candidate". It's just the insider term for the strategy I described above where you find a good candidate and then use them as bait to dangle in front of clients.

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#7

Post by Trias11 »

943_924 wrote: post #3
Trias11 wrote: post #2

I think nothing wrong in polite initial reply about the budget/pay/salary upfront with a firm notion that without that information no further conversation is going to take place. This will weed out flakes and save time for everyone.

Has that worked for anyone here? The most I get after answering a cold email/LinkedIn message with my salary requirements is something along the lines of "that's doable," and finding out later the client had an appetite for a senior with the budget for an entry level.

Don't give the number first, insist of getting the number or no further reply.

Typical recruiter (or any saleman for than matter) wants to drag you into personal sales dance conversation - the key is to avoid wasting your time until they open the cards.

Just plain ignore typical "it depends on level", "lots of upside", "super competitive", "willing to match" or whatever they come up with and wait until specific reply upon your specific request.

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#8

Post by TXV »

tboyd47 wrote: post #6
jcroll wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are MPC recruiters?

"Most placeable candidate". It's just the insider term for the strategy I described above where you find a good candidate and then use them as bait to dangle in front of clients.

what stops these people from downloading mine or anyone's resume off LinkedIn and use that for their purposes? they wouldn't even need to bother contacting me first

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#9

Post by DoofusOfDeath »

> they are doing their job and their time isn't worth less than mine.

Is that second part really true, though?

As a thought experiment, suppose we're talking about scam-running telemarketers rather than recruiters. Would you still consider their time as valuable as your own?

If not, then what's the critical distinction between them and telemarketers who spam everyone that matches some LinkedIn query?

Re: Ask HN: How to effectively deal with recruiters?

#10

Post by toper-centage »

TXV wrote: post #8
tboyd47 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Most placeable candidate". It's just the insider term for the strategy I described above where you find a good candidate and then use them as bait to dangle in front of clients.

what stops these people from downloading mine or anyone's resume off LinkedIn and use that for their purposes? they wouldn't even need to bother contacting me first

Nothing. And they do already convert your PDFs to Doc for editing, often destroying part of your layout. At one job interview for a frontend developer position, I was very embarrassed to learn that the idiot recruiter had done that to my CV. My interviewer jokingly showed me how my CV looked all messed up - wrong alignment, missing icons, mixed up fonts, weird borders. All this because the recruiter wanted to remove my email address from the document...
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