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FWIW, I found my first development job by attending one of this guy's JUG meetings in the suburbs of Philly, and speaking to a CIO who was attending. My underst

FWIW, I found my first development job by attending one of this guy's JUG meetings in the suburbs of Philly, and speaking to a CIO who was attending. My understanding then was that Fecak was a recruiter and the JUG meetings were a way for him to get face time with developers and build credibility in the community. Can't really fault him for being opportunistic. At least he is TRYING to make the experience less painful for devs. The recruiter industry is in MAJOR need of a rehaul. I haven't posted a resume anywhere in over 3 years and I still get 5-10 daily junk calls. There have been times when I avoided departure from unfulfilling situations JUST because I dreaded the recruitment process. Fecak's idea is innovative but I think there are a lot of questions around how it would work. What's a reasonable fee? Will there be conflict of interest issues if he is submitting multiple candidates? etc?

fecak 14y ago
I guess I know you? Glad to hear you found work through the JUG. I obviously am a recruiter and still lead that JUG, and it is a way to build credibility. You could call it opportunistic, or you could say it is a way of giving back to the community (if I were a true opportunist, I'd blast my open jobs to the group, talk about them at every meeting, etc - and I don't do that). But I could see how some might get that idea. It certainly hasn't hurt my business, but at this point I don't need the extra edge of credibility that JUG provides. What is a reasonable fee? Good question! Perm placement fees range from 15-25% of base salary, but I wouldn't expect any engineer to pay that much. The key to think about is that even though an agent is getting some fee from the job seeker, there is nothing to prevent him/her from taking a few bucks from the hiring company as well - so in theory an agent could charge a low fee to the job seeker and a reduced fee to the hiring company, which would seem like a win? Conflict of interest is something I also hadn't though about (glad a dialogue is starting and I don't pretend to have all the answers). I would think that in representing candidates (and not companies) there wouldn't be too many conflict situations.

fecak 14y ago

I guess I know you? Glad to hear you found work through the JUG. I obviously am a recruiter and still lead that JUG, and it is a way to build credibility. You could call it opportunistic, or you could say it is a way of giving back to the community (if I were a true opportunist, I'd blast my open jobs to the group, talk about them at every meeting, etc - and I don't do that). But I could see how some might get that idea. It certainly hasn't hurt my business, but at this point I don't need the extra edge of credibility that JUG provides. What is a reasonable fee? Good question! Perm placement fees range from 15-25% of base salary, but I wouldn't expect any engineer to pay that much. The key to think about is that even though an agent is getting some fee from the job seeker, there is nothing to prevent him/her from taking a few bucks from the hiring company as well - so in theory an agent could charge a low fee to the job seeker and a reduced fee to the hiring company, which would seem like a win? Conflict of interest is something I also hadn't though about (glad a dialogue is starting and I don't pretend to have all the answers). I would think that in representing candidates (and not companies) there wouldn't be too many conflict situations.