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I really dislike the lack of expertise typical recruiters have with the technical jargon and requirements of our industry. I've had many poor recruitment experi

I really dislike the lack of expertise typical recruiters have with the technical jargon and requirements of our industry. I've had many poor recruitment experiences where the recruiter couldn't accurately explain the role, requirements, or why they thought I was a good enough fit to contact me in the first place. My github simply hits the right keywords and that's good enough for them. This has been made worse by not being able to explain the interview process. I specifically asked, many times to various recruiters, what I would be quizzed on or what I should prepare myself for. Few could tell me anything beyond, "some technical questions about algorithms and data structures." Inadequate. The interviewer proper would ask random questions about memory architecture, optimizing the brute-force KNN algorithm, or simply how to reverse a string. Meanwhile I was studying binomial coefficients, heaps, tries, and the standard sorting algorithms. I have github projects that implement lattices for a logically monotonic distributed programming language. For someone such as myself this is unacceptable and leads to some dead-end interviews that are a complete waste of time. I blame the way we "funnel" the "dregs" of candidates and have little to offer in terms of solutions. I agree with the author that companies seem reluctant to do actual head-hunting. I always assumed that if you contacted me for a job there would be a reason: you like some of the projects I host on my github or have seen my contributions to various open source projects -- that you already have an idea of my skillset and abilities and want to get to know me. Recruiters are more inclined to match keywords and send me through the process... they're not incentivized to get to know me at all. All I can suggest is to not use a recruiter or at least choose one carefully: choose one that knows your industry well and can tell a min-heap from a max-heap. edit: fixed wording implying a specific github project was some sort of library or system when it implements a single programming language, not languages.

michael2l 11y ago
I dislike this expertise as well, but lets get at what you are saying, that a recruiter should have some sort of programming background to know how concepts actually are used versus the sorts of mixed metaphors one comes up with in the absence of that understanding, which are often quite comical. This just isn't realistic. Most recruiters are doing this job in some sort of entry-level commission-only type role, and if they had any sort of basic IT skills/understanding are likely to have better offers to do something in that arena. Some recruiters do learn a good bit and are more successful over time and make a good living, but most people try it for a bit and don't do well enough to keep at it. Combining the sales ability with technical ability is a bit rare, but for people who have both you can do pretty well both in recruiting and in other lines of work as well.
- agentultra 11y ago
  I understand it is probably an unreal expectation. If you actually did know your min/max heaps and could implement them you'd be better off being a programmer. Never the less it is counter-productive to know nothing at all as we agree. That's why I don't have any good solutions. It doesn't seem like there are any. Unless we can find magical unicorns who know enough about programming and software development to be competent enough to assess the abilities of programmers themselves... or at the very least understand the process enough to be able to answer their questions.

michael2l 11y ago

I dislike this expertise as well, but lets get at what you are saying, that a recruiter should have some sort of programming background to know how concepts actually are used versus the sorts of mixed metaphors one comes up with in the absence of that understanding, which are often quite comical. This just isn't realistic. Most recruiters are doing this job in some sort of entry-level commission-only type role, and if they had any sort of basic IT skills/understanding are likely to have better offers to do something in that arena. Some recruiters do learn a good bit and are more successful over time and make a good living, but most people try it for a bit and don't do well enough to keep at it. Combining the sales ability with technical ability is a bit rare, but for people who have both you can do pretty well both in recruiting and in other lines of work as well.

agentultra 11y ago
I understand it is probably an unreal expectation. If you actually did know your min/max heaps and could implement them you'd be better off being a programmer. Never the less it is counter-productive to know nothing at all as we agree. That's why I don't have any good solutions. It doesn't seem like there are any. Unless we can find magical unicorns who know enough about programming and software development to be competent enough to assess the abilities of programmers themselves... or at the very least understand the process enough to be able to answer their questions.