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Ask HN: Where do you go to get recruiters to find you a job?

• johnwheeler 10y ago
  Hmm... this is an interesting idea. I could see it as a valuable service for my newly launched, HN approved, and shamelessly plugged website https://oldgeekjobs.com/ https://oldgeekjobs.com/ Thing is, I'm trying to target a certain type of Old Geek. My theory is if someone is 45 years old with solid ReactJS skills, it signals them being an autodidact with experience--the best type of programmer, all other things equal. If I could build a reputation for interviewing and evaluating such professionals, I could see a fun and profitable business in that.
  • bdcravens 10y ago
    Experience is one thing, but using age as a criteria is a minefield.
    • johnwheeler 10y ago
      Can you please elaborate? For employers, yes, but other actors? Interested to know your thoughts on this.
• mVChr 10y ago
  Do you have an up-to-date LinkedIn account? I spend so much time shooing away headhunters I'm sure several would jump at the chance to help me find work and make their commission if I asked. Many have premium accounts and alerts set up so that if you change your status to looking for work they'll pick up on it.
  • nicholas73 10y ago
    I have a LinkedIn account, but messages usually are not good fits and clearly are spam strategies. I'm looking for a recruiter that would focus on finding me a job, rather than finding a candidate for a job they have on file.
• deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
• griffinmichl 10y ago
  I was connected with my current company (reddit) through Triplebyte. They're a YC recruiting company that puts you through their own technical screens / interview before agreeing to work with you. The interview process is intense, but they connected me with some awesome companies (fast tracked to onsite interviews) and generally had my back through the whole process. Highly recommend giving them a shot.
  • asimuvPR 10y ago
    May you define intense? It would be nice to learn more about the process.
  • nicholas73 10y ago
    Thanks for your experience.
• watermoose 10y ago
  > P.S. I could interview well with a mid-senior electronics role or a junior programmer role. What do you mean by "electronics". Electrical engineer? Electrician?
  • nicholas73 10y ago
    Electrical engineer, past work in analog ICs, sensors, circuit boards. Not sure why you were downvoted, but I tried to make it up.
• Cognitron 10y ago
  LinkedIn is definitely an option. If you take the time to fill out your profile and write a summary, you should have recruiters messaging you. I get messages every week asking if I'm looking. I imagine it varies by region, but it's not like I'm in SV, I live in the Tampa Bay area. Also, the quality of the recruiters can vary a lot, so maybe talk to a few different people to see what they can offer. Remember, you're a valuable commodity to them.
  • ameen 10y ago
    Hey, I'm in Tampa Bay Area too. Mind getting in touch?
  • gbraad 10y ago
    Living in Beijing, and do not see the same engagement here.
• henryw 10y ago
  I've gotten interviews from big companies using the job section of their official websites. Just make sure to spend some time on your resume.
• eibrahim 10y ago
  Interesting timing because I am working on a service that does exactly this. Essentially I will be your agent. Tell me the job you want and your salary and I still get it for you. Help you schedule, cleanup your resume etc... in return I get 10% of your paycheck for a year. I am currently beta testing it with a handful of people but if interested email me at eibrahim@gmail.com
  • ufmace 10y ago
    Do people actually want to do this? 10% of your pay for a year is a hell of a lot of money for some glorified secretarial work. The market is saturated with experienced, well-connected recruiters who can do all of that and get paid by the employer outside of the candidate's income. What do you offer over all of the other recruiters out there who, from the candidate's perspective, are $10,000+ cheaper to work with, and why is it worth that much money to me?
    • bbcbasic 10y ago
      Yes recruiters can help you do this for free. 10% is a big hit.
      • einarvollset 10y ago
        Except: Recruiters usually take 17% (2 months) of your first year salary as a fee, you just don't see it. Better to have the recruiter not do that and take 10% and have that higher salary be your starting point for salary increases etc.
        • bbcbasic 10y ago
          No they take a percentage from the company. Generally a tech company won't offer a 17% signing bonus for coming direct. On the other hand, a company not using recruiters wont pay 17% more just because they are saving money. PS: I wonder why my GP comment is heavily downvoted? Maybe it sounds to pro-recruiter.
• orthogon 10y ago
  Why, craigslist.org of course! Seriously, half the posts on Craigslist are recruiters scouring major metropolitan areas for leads. Reply to enough posts on Craigslist, and recruiters will find you.
• Apreche 10y ago
  They come to you, and then you can't get rid of them.
• dsk139 10y ago
  I'm a software engineer that does recruiting for ~60 tech companies in NYC (seed stage to mature). If you're in NYC, or want recommendations for good recruiters I know in the SF Bay Area shoot me an email david at inboxhire dot com.
  • nicholas73 10y ago
    Thank you David, I'm in the SF Bay Area.
• ufmace 10y ago
  Set up a good LinkedIn profile with up-to-date resume and set your location as where you want to work, and the recruiters will come to you. Do the resume part first, so that when you set your location, you'll show up for any recruiters searching as new in that location and with a full resume ready to view. Go to any meetups or conferences you can find for tech stuff. You'll probably find plenty of recruiters, or at least people who can introduce you to some. I've got pile of recruiters messaging me on LinkedIn, and they almost all explicitly ask if I can point them at any other candidates who are looking. Bring business cards with your email, phone, and website, even if you have to get them made yourself. In my experience, doing any of this even half-heatedly is plenty to get you so many recruiters that you'll start wondering how to get them to leave you alone after you take a job.
  • watermoose 10y ago
    Agree with everyone that is saying LinkedIn. Even if you barely touch your profile, you'll very likely start to get recruiters within a few weeks contacting you. If you don't, you need to work on what information you are providing in your past history and description to ensure that you look professional and have all of the keywords/skills listed that matter. I would recommend getting someone you trust that works in the field to review it that won't hold back on opinions. Get other opinions as well. Then look at it as if you were a recruiter, a manager, and a future co-worker and make changes as needed. Then Google/Bing/DDG search yourself. What info do you see? Anything you wouldn't want others to see? Can you do anything to fix that? Finally, don't just wait around for recruiters. Actively network. Work on the skills you think you'll need to have. Read. Practice. Have your significant other or friend or anyone interview you. Get interview questions you can find easily on the internet and learn all of the answers and why they are the answers. It takes time to prepare.
• epmatsw 10y ago
  Try hired.com. My experience with them was nearly identical to working with a recruiter, but a lot less hassle IMO.
  • nicholas73 10y ago
    Thanks for sharing.
  • elcct 10y ago
    I haven't got anything through that service. From my point of view they are just collecting data and not doing anything.
• rubicon33 10y ago
  I've used Hired.com, and couldn't recommend them more. It was a great experience.
  • Ketz-san 10y ago
    Nice try, Hired.com staff ;)
• einarvollset 10y ago
  Genuinely surprised at the usual "muah muah, can't swat them away" chatter. Having basically the equivalent of an agent in your corner would be a very valuable service, but crucially this agent would need to have an impeccable reputation, hence any of the usual recruiters only "doing secretarial work" wouldn't work. They would need to be genuinely well connected professionals. I can see an ongoing relationship with salary increase negotiation support, a bi-yearly in person strategy session ("It might be time to move on") as well as genuinely going to bat for you in terms of your contract ("hey, let'a push for a 7 year exercise window instead of 90 days") Anyways. I don't know if such a service, but it seems like it should exist.
  • meddlepal 10y ago
    These types of recruiters do sort of exist. Basically instead of doing contract recruiting by just cold calling or emailing they put together a talent network. Over time they get parts of their talent network into companies as hiring managers and VPs. Once they hit critical mass they become much more selective about who is allowed into the network while also pulling from their network to move guys between companies and also to find out who they should develop new relationships with. If this sounds sketchy as fuck... it is. But it works, and you can basically tell the recruiter what you want to do and when that op shows up in their network he or she will advise you and help you get the deal.
    • yomly 10y ago
      Is this actually sketchy though? As everyone knows, hiring is difficult. It is time-expensive and the outcome of a bad hire can be catastrophic. So here we have a recruiter who is making it his business to make your life easier by making the process less time expensive and less risky, and we brand this sketchy? In forming a good relationship between their hiring partner and interviewees - they know who is likely to be a "fit" and who will not be. This is no different to HR screening CVs based on fit, the only difference is that recruiters of take a personal vested interest in the success. Every hire nets them commission. Every good hire strengthens their network, every bad hire weakens their network. If they are truly a network-based recruiter, they want every hire to be amazing. Yes, there will be weaknesses in this system. Yes, it leads a reduced hiring pool (if you opt-in to this style of hiring) and black-box hiring. The upshot is that as an interviewer and interviewee you save yourself time and find yourself a job that makes you happy, you only need find yourself the right recruiter.
• codeonfire 10y ago
  Why use recruiters? They just submit your resume to an employer like you could have done in 5 minutes. For that five minute action they want to collect a $10-20k fee. That comes out of your pocket. Plus they do ridiculous things like want you to drive an hour down to their POS office for a face to face like you are their employee. Their most recent accomplishment is dropping out of college and they will try to make you wait in the lobby for 20 minutes. Fuck. That.
  • nicholas73 10y ago
    That $10-20k only comes out of your pocket if you let it.
    • codeonfire 10y ago
      Like it or not, that fee affects ability to negotiate compensation. Given a pool of equivalently skilled people, the one that doesn't come with a fee is going to be able to negotiate and get the job.
  • dogma1138 10y ago
    The 10-20K fee doesn't come out of your pocket, if you are using a good recruiter they are actually more likely to get you a better deal. Most people don't know how to negotiate, recruiters do, mostly because more often than not their fee and reputation is somewhat dependant on it. A recruiter would usually find you a good fit especially if they aren't just some employment/vacancy agency but actually build their network. How much of a good fit and how long you stay at your job is tied directly to their reputation, recruiters that fill positions with people that don't stick around or worse don't even pass a probationary period don't get too many second chances. Overall the recruiter fee isn't even a major part of the onboarding cost, the time spent by everyone from HR to the tech guys on everything from defining the job to handling the interviews cost considerably more especially if you take valley salaries into account. The position not being filled or worse being filled by a contractor who often charges considerably more than the average daily market rate for a full time employee also costs the company money.
  • scarface74 10y ago
• quantumhobbit 10y ago
  I'd like to extend the question for engineers not in the Bay Area or other hubs. I've been approached by recruiters, but they generally back off once they find out I'm not willing to move to San Fransisco. I understand that there are more jobs there but it seems like recruiters don't want to acknowledge that the rest of the country exists. If I could find a software job out here in flyover country, you'd think that the professionals could too.
• geff82 10y ago
  In Germany, I use Xing (Linkedin equivalent) to get a new job whenever I want. You have to know the right groups for your field of work and get part of them(examples: the "Freelance"-group for contractors, the "Linux" group or the "Adobe AEM" group) Recruiters then go there and find you (or you easily see the recruiters and drop them a quick message you are interested in what they offer).
  • morazow 10y ago
    I recently used https://www.honeypot.io/ https://www.honeypot.io/. And the experience was quite good.
    • fauria 10y ago
      Thanks for the link! Any other recommendation for the European market?
• stale2002 10y ago
  Hired.com is great!
• patatino 10y ago
  I got my last job via recruiter and I really enjoyed the experience. We mailed and met twice before my first interview, he knew how much money I can ask for and was very open if he thinks it's the right fit for me or not. He checked in twice the first year and I didn't hear from him in over two years now. I'm pretty sure he keeps track if I'm still working there, but no phone/mail like "looking for something else?". Definitely gonna contact him the next time I'm looking for a job.
• JSeymourATL 10y ago
  > I'm in no rush to do an intensive job search on my own. The Talent Agent for Techies concept comes up 2-3 times a year on HN. As long as companies (with deep pockets) fight over supply, the business model for individuals won't work. If you're sufficiently motivated, research the small, boutique recruiters that serve your market/industry. Ask around for who has a good, established rep in the space. Understand that time is money to these guys, they don't cater to job-seekers. Make a friend. You might approach them by first asking how you might be able to help with a potential referral.
• liquidcool 10y ago
  I'm a developer/manager who does recruiting, but mostly in SoCal, and I see you're in the Bay area. Up there, you might reach out to Aline Lerner. She did the same, although I understand she is now focused on interviewing.io. Still, wouldn't hurt to ask her: http://blog.alinelerner.com/about/ http://blog.alinelerner.com/about/ Another way to do it is go on Indeed at look at relevant job postings from recruiters that are well written. I find I can tell right away when they are useless; it's clearly cut/paste straight from the client and has a total "job shop" feel. I don't know if you'll get an honest answer, but another good sign is that they have direct contact with the hiring manager. Feel free to reach out, happy to answer any questions.
  • leeny 10y ago
    Aline here. Wow, huge thank you for the awesome shout-out! I am indeed focused on interviewing.io, but I like to think it's a more efficient, productized way of doing what I was doing as a recruiter. You get free interview practice, and if you do well, you start getting invites to technical interviews with great companies, bypassing all the crap you'd normally have to do to get in the door. https://www.interviewing.io https://www.interviewing.io