16 ms·

Never Trust what Recruiters Say

57 points by smartial_arts 14y ago

eksith 14y ago
HN seems to have killed it :/ Google doesn't seem to have a cache either, since the post is brand new. Edit: Very old nginx/1.0.5... methinks it's time to upgrade. There were a lot of improvements to this version even in 1.1.0/1, including performance http://nginx.org/en/CHANGES http://nginx.org/en/CHANGES
- damncabbage 14y ago
  Cache here: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ablog.nimblegecko.com%2Fnever-trust-what-recruiters-say%2F&sugexp=chrome,mod=4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ablog....
- smartial_arts 14y ago
  Sorry folks! Desperately trying to fix it now...
  - runarb 14y ago
    Tried WP Super Cache?
    - smartial_arts 14y ago
      No, I haven't. Had no reason, really, just trying to fix it on nginx/php-fpm level at the moment.
      - grandpa 14y ago
        If it's an interesting fix, please consider doing a post like "What I learned from getting slashdotted by Hacker News".
        smartial_arts 14y ago
        I am by no means a devops guy, and this is just a quickly whipped together t1.micro instance with haproxy/nginx/php-fpm/wp/whatever, that's been built using tutorials of questionable quality (as it turned out now) that I found online. So there probably won't be too much value in a post like that. All I did was setting some sane parameters for Fast CGI stuff in nginx, some for php-fpm and the db.
  - rogem002 14y ago
    I'm guessing you have root control of the server? Install Varnish, it's a reverse proxy that caches request results in the RAM.
hakaaaaak 14y ago
Site is down, but as for the title from the OP, I agree to some extent. I think recruiters are a decent way to find some of the jobs that aren't found via indeed.com alerts, fog creek's careers 2.0, top*jobs.com, dice (nasty), execunet, HN, etc. But on the bad side: Once you are on the list, they will look up your work number and call you if you just put your employer's name on your resume. The only way to get them not to do this is to remove employer names from linkedin.com experience, which you shouldn't do, so it is inevitable. They will not pay attention to requests not to do this. They equate pay rate without benefits for short-term contract to salary rate full-time with lots of benefits. If you decide to give them pay rate expectation (not always a good idea), give them both your salary expectation and a much higher contract rate that assumes a 3-6 month contract- divide your annual salary expectation by 1000 and that is your per hour, in general. Why they are what they are: Average larger sized recruiting companies take almost anymore to get on the phones, and those companies burn them up and move to the next, so it isn't the actual person's fault in many cases. They are given visions of dollar signs when hired and see us like an untapped oil field, and they don't know what they are doing. They want to make the "sale", so they are going to fudge it, and when they later feel used and like the scum of the earth because they got stepped on by us, they quit and someone takes their place. The ones that can justify running through us like we are numbers to be manipulated stay, so it is natural evolution that is not in our best interest. Advice for those really serious about using a recruiter: Don't treat them like scum and spend the time with them, even though it might take 10x or more of your time. Let them take you to free lunches and breakfasts. Don't lie to them, but don't tell them everything. They will remember and appreciate the love and will at least maybe write good notes on you and keep you on the hot list so when something comes up, they might call you first. What I do: I am an introvert, so I push all conversation to email that I can and don't take calls, ever, until there is an opp I'm interested in that I know is in the right salary range, right location (not just city), and right job description. They still email positions that don't match all the time, but I don't like the idea of lunches, etc. with someone I don't know about positions I might never want.
- Nursie 14y ago
  I really don't get the divide-salary-by-1000 thing. Is this a US rule? In the UK I'm taking home enough from a contractor rate that I would need to nearly double the salary part of calculation to have the same income.
nagrom 14y ago
While it is down, the summary of the post is something like: Don't give recruiters access to your reference contacts before an interview. If they are looking for them, there's a high chance that they are simply looking to use them for leads; in fact the job advert that you looked at is most likely a fake. If asked for reference information, politely tell the recruiter that it would be best to follow up on references after the interview process; if you feel awkward about being pressured, explain that you don't want to exhaust your contacts until there's a high probability that you take the job.
- smartial_arts 14y ago
  Thanks for that, nagrom!
- kropson 14y ago
  Fits my experience. I got a callback from a recruiter and he wanted me to drive about 30 min to talk to him. Needing work, I agreed. During the "interview" it was obvious that he just wanted me there to mine me for my contracts at some of the larger companies I worked at. I left extremely annoyed since I traveled there at my own expense and they had nothing for me. To this day I won't return phone calls or emails from that place.
- stephengillie 14y ago
  Even if you're actually getting a real job, the recruiter will still use your references as potential leads, and will pressure them into being recruited.
- Stwerner 14y ago
  I made it about 3 days at my first job out of college as a recruiter, and I can confirm this at least at the small company I worked for. It was actually part of the training to pitch to applicant's references because they were much warmer leads.
- brown9-2 14y ago
  Why would someone need leads for a job that doesn't exist?
rcakirerk 14y ago
The guy never trusted an old version of nginx -> http://d.pr/i/U2UP http://d.pr/i/U2UP
- smartial_arts 14y ago
  I should've updated that long ago, but everything was working - I never had anything like that happening, so there was no pressing reason to upgrade, I guess. It should be better now, well, I hope.
  - smartial_arts 14y ago
    Now it dies at ~80 users instead of ~50 before upgrade. Oh well.
pooriaazimi 14y ago
[OT] Page is down. It's incredible how many people (even on HN) don't know it! You can get Google's cached version of a page fairly easily. Just type cache:[url] in Google search bar and press enter. e.g., cache:http://blog.nimblegecko.com/never-trust-what-recruiters-say/ redirects to http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&tbo=d&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fblog.nimblegecko.com%2Fnever-trust-what-recruiters-say%2F&btnK= http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&tbo=d...
robdoherty2 14y ago
Another trick that recruiters use: Ask you where else you have interviewed, and even get names/contact info from you if they can. Then they call that place and tell them that they have a stack of resumes of way more qualified people than you. You may never hear back from that place for two reasons: 1) they think you sold them out to a recruiter, 2) they believe the recruiter and start interviewing new people. Bottom line is that recruiters will sell you out any chance that they can get. As much as they may seem like your friend, you are not their client, you are the product they are selling.
- smartial_arts 14y ago
  Or they think that you were a recruiter who applied for the job with a fake CV (yes, that happens as well) and ignore you from now on.
noarchy 14y ago
Once a recruiter decides that you're of no use to them, they'll stop answering your emails and phone calls. I've seen this happen to others with astonishing regularity, and had it happen to me some years ago. The initial contact is cordial, there is even some hopeful talk about a position that allegedly exists. And then suddenly, contact is cut off. Just as bad is the common practice of advertising a phoney job position just to get a pile of resumes and contacts. I suspect that this might even be some kind of fraud, legally-speaking, but I don't know if these people are ever pursued for it.
orangethirty 14y ago
I've had recruiters pull fast ones on me back when I started programming professionally. There is a special place in hell for these people. Such jerks! This just drove me to create my own mailing list for job offers. The aim is to keep it clear of recruiters. If you want to check it out and receive job offers directly to your inbox (where you can look at them without logging on and dealing with the BS of most site out there) click (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5150829 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5150829) to see the HN thread. Not spamming, just giving back to the community.
fecak 14y ago
Speaking in absolutes about recruiters is never useful (see what I did there?). Recruiter here with 15 years in the biz, and I've written lots on my jobtipsforgeeks.com blog about the perils of working with recruiters. I'm also working on a book with a similar theme that will expose some of what recruiters do, in order to help tech pros to at least be aware of things recruiting concepts such as 'candidate control' or why recruiters ask certain questions certain ways, or the differences between retained and pure contingency recruiters. Knowing a recruiter's motivations is key, and there is not enough transparency in the market today. I personally don't use references as a source of candidates and only call a reference when clients request them (most of my candidate pool comes through past candidates that I trust). Regarding compensation, what the comments here seem to be forgetting is that you as a candidate have every right to turn down a job, and in almost all cases the recruiter makes more money by getting you a higher salary. In contract situations this is usually reversed, where every dollar they can negotiate you down is another in the recruiter's pocket. Some posting of fake job ads certainly happens by lower end firms, just as hiring companies keep ads up all the time to grow their network of candidates. It's somewhat dishonest, but not sure how it hurts job seekers (not advocating it, but seems a somewhat victimless crime). Recruiters are trained to ask everyone for referrals, and early in my career I probably did. Now I realize that if you treat candidates well, with honesty and respect, and if you provide candidates with something for free, they will refer their friends (with the friend's permission) without me aging to ask. The free service I choose is information - my blog, a monthly newsletter of tech articles, discounts to conferences and events that I negotiate for my network, inside information on companies, etc. Many recruiters are simply not good at their job, but every industry has some of that. Find a good one that doesn't ask you for things, and that actually provides you with good information and service, and avoid the bad ones. It really is that simple. Use recruiters that your friends recommend and set parameters and boundaries (don't send my résumé anywhere without permission, only contact me in this way, don't call references until x, etc). If they don't respect your wishes, drop them and don't recommend them to your friends.
- bearmf 14y ago
  Correction: most recruiters are terrible at their job. It is much worse than any other industry except maybe real estate brokers in New York :) In finance, it seems fake jobs are posted by every recruiting firm. And no, this is not the same as a company advertising positions all the time at their website. In the latter case the probability of hiring someone for the position is at least greater than zero.
known 14y ago
Unlike in Capitalism, Globalization demands you to be an "Highly Skilled Wage Slave" to get a job.
lifeguard 14y ago
Two important points of context for my comment: I am talking about software jobs for a skill set below 'mastery'. Recruiters are a waste of time because: 1. They do not know anything relevant about the technologies you are skilled in or the technologies required by the employer. 2. Part of the 'value' they add for employers is to vet candidates before they are interviewed by the employer. This consists of doing a web page background search, calling your references, and giving you a pee test. Also see #1 for why this is a waste of time. 3. You will be legally bound to a three way relationship between the recruiter co. and your new employer. There are no benefits to you in this binding agreement. 4. You may actually be paid by the recruiting agency's payroll department (contracting). Faxing time sheets to a fax machine no one bothers to fill with paper at the agency office is a waste of time and energy. To put it another way, you won't be able to talk to the payroll department directly if you have any issues. 5. You add another layer of useless management and bureaucratic complexity via the recruiting agency. Rarely do recruiters stay up to date on a project/position's projected end date. Once this resulted in a key card being disabled because the original end date had been reached -- but the project was still active. I have seen that the recruiters for staff positions are a little better and you get paid direct. I have also known gifted programmers who just hate to deal with people and negotiate, so recruiters are useful there. But to advance in your career, you are going to need people skills so you might as well start developing them now. To sum up, there are a lot of bad recruiters who ruin it for everyone.
- lsc 14y ago
  >1. They do not know anything relevant about the technologies you are skilled in or the technologies required by the employer. This... this shocks me, every time. I mean, in my experience, it's usually true, but damn. What, then, is the value the recruiter brings the client? I mean, sometimes they function as body shops, where the company pays them and they pay you, and the company then doesn't have to worry about labor laws and stuff, that becomes the body shop's problems, but I fail to see how that would justify the huge markup (and, generally speaking, but not always, lower quality) - Labor laws really aren't that bad. Do the standard things you do when dealing with programmers that get paid $90K+ per year, and you are in compliance with most of it. I mean, besides that, they are keyword matchers; personally, I don't think keyword matchers are particularly useful, and in any case, they are not particularly difficult to implement. But then, in defense of the recruiters (or, at least a reason for a developer to use recruiters): >3. You will be legally bound to a three way relationship between the recruiter co. and your new employer. There are no benefits to you in this binding agreement. Generally speaking, recruiters bring in a bunch of sub-par recruits. Way worse than if you had asked the people around the office to bring in friends (and worse than having someone in the office go over the resume slush pile.) What does this mean? this means that if you are a sub-par programmer, and you failed that google interview your buddy got you, or if you are a good programmer who, for whatever reason, looks like a sub-par programmer (say, for instance, that you had a [mental] health issue impacting your performance for the previous year, or just had a run of bad luck and have been unemployed for a while and don't know anyone to get you interviews) then recruiters can be a godsend. Recruiters are a fairly sure sign that the standards for the job will be low. The competition will be weak. And sometimes? well, comeon, most of us have needed to hit the bunny slope at least once in our career.
teapartyJim 14y ago
I am a technical recruiter with almost two decades of experience. I have literally placed thousands of IT professionals. People with bad experiences with recruiters are usually the bottom 80% of candidates - those we cannot help (employers only pay us for the top 10%, MAYBE the top 20%). Of course, no one thinks they are in the bottom 80%... Like every industry, 80% of the recruiters are lousy, and give the rest of us a bad name, so there is great truth in what is written here. HOWEVER, ask yourself, why is this happening to me? Why are agencies in business if we offer no value? The basic laws of capitalism would have forced us out of business if we did not create value. So if recruiters won't work with you, why is that? Remember, as a candidate, YOU are getting our work FOR FREE. You invest nothing but your time, and perhaps, some of your knowledge. We are taking a risk on you, risking our ability to earn a living, risking our relationships with our clients in the desparate hope you are not a lousy candidate, all by exposing you to the network of professionals we have invested large quantities of time and money in developing, so yeah, we expect you to give something back in the form of leads or references. What is wrong with that? Perhaps you would prefer to pay for our service? Believe me, we are expensive. Finding a good recruiter is easy - trust your gut, and find one who has been doing it for at least a year. The lousy ones are generally weeded out by then. Only trust those you are referred to, or are willing to meet you in person, and only those recruiters that partner with you. Also, help the recruiter help you. If you are confrontational, unprofessional, or otherwise difficult to work with, no good recruiter will invest any effort in you. Why would we take the risk?
- pandaman 14y ago
  Do you really have any people genuinely looking for your services and not cold-called or lured with the false job ads? I agree that somebody who is seeking your services for free has to be grateful and accommodating your requests. But as somebody who is being offered a service I have not requested I don't care how much you invested.
  - teapartyJim 14y ago
    Yes, we do. Every day.

57 points by smartial_arts 14y ago

HN seems to have killed it :/ Google doesn't seem to have a cache either, since the post is brand new. Edit: Very old nginx/1.0.5... methinks it's time to upgrade. There were a lot of improvements to this version even in 1.1.0/1, including performance http://nginx.org/en/CHANGES http://nginx.org/en/CHANGES

damncabbage 14y ago
Cache here: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ablog.nimblegecko.com%2Fnever-trust-what-recruiters-say%2F&sugexp=chrome,mod=4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ablog....
smartial_arts 14y ago
Sorry folks! Desperately trying to fix it now...
- runarb 14y ago
  Tried WP Super Cache?
  - smartial_arts 14y ago
    No, I haven't. Had no reason, really, just trying to fix it on nginx/php-fpm level at the moment.
    - grandpa 14y ago
      If it's an interesting fix, please consider doing a post like "What I learned from getting slashdotted by Hacker News".
      - smartial_arts 14y ago
        I am by no means a devops guy, and this is just a quickly whipped together t1.micro instance with haproxy/nginx/php-fpm/wp/whatever, that's been built using tutorials of questionable quality (as it turned out now) that I found online. So there probably won't be too much value in a post like that. All I did was setting some sane parameters for Fast CGI stuff in nginx, some for php-fpm and the db.
- rogem002 14y ago
  I'm guessing you have root control of the server? Install Varnish, it's a reverse proxy that caches request results in the RAM.

hakaaaaak 14y ago

Site is down, but as for the title from the OP, I agree to some extent. I think recruiters are a decent way to find some of the jobs that aren't found via indeed.com alerts, fog creek's careers 2.0, top*jobs.com, dice (nasty), execunet, HN, etc. But on the bad side: Once you are on the list, they will look up your work number and call you if you just put your employer's name on your resume. The only way to get them not to do this is to remove employer names from linkedin.com experience, which you shouldn't do, so it is inevitable. They will not pay attention to requests not to do this. They equate pay rate without benefits for short-term contract to salary rate full-time with lots of benefits. If you decide to give them pay rate expectation (not always a good idea), give them both your salary expectation and a much higher contract rate that assumes a 3-6 month contract- divide your annual salary expectation by 1000 and that is your per hour, in general. Why they are what they are: Average larger sized recruiting companies take almost anymore to get on the phones, and those companies burn them up and move to the next, so it isn't the actual person's fault in many cases. They are given visions of dollar signs when hired and see us like an untapped oil field, and they don't know what they are doing. They want to make the "sale", so they are going to fudge it, and when they later feel used and like the scum of the earth because they got stepped on by us, they quit and someone takes their place. The ones that can justify running through us like we are numbers to be manipulated stay, so it is natural evolution that is not in our best interest. Advice for those really serious about using a recruiter: Don't treat them like scum and spend the time with them, even though it might take 10x or more of your time. Let them take you to free lunches and breakfasts. Don't lie to them, but don't tell them everything. They will remember and appreciate the love and will at least maybe write good notes on you and keep you on the hot list so when something comes up, they might call you first. What I do: I am an introvert, so I push all conversation to email that I can and don't take calls, ever, until there is an opp I'm interested in that I know is in the right salary range, right location (not just city), and right job description. They still email positions that don't match all the time, but I don't like the idea of lunches, etc. with someone I don't know about positions I might never want.

Nursie 14y ago
I really don't get the divide-salary-by-1000 thing. Is this a US rule? In the UK I'm taking home enough from a contractor rate that I would need to nearly double the salary part of calculation to have the same income.

nagrom 14y ago

While it is down, the summary of the post is something like: Don't give recruiters access to your reference contacts before an interview. If they are looking for them, there's a high chance that they are simply looking to use them for leads; in fact the job advert that you looked at is most likely a fake. If asked for reference information, politely tell the recruiter that it would be best to follow up on references after the interview process; if you feel awkward about being pressured, explain that you don't want to exhaust your contacts until there's a high probability that you take the job.

smartial_arts 14y ago
Thanks for that, nagrom!
kropson 14y ago
Fits my experience. I got a callback from a recruiter and he wanted me to drive about 30 min to talk to him. Needing work, I agreed. During the "interview" it was obvious that he just wanted me there to mine me for my contracts at some of the larger companies I worked at. I left extremely annoyed since I traveled there at my own expense and they had nothing for me. To this day I won't return phone calls or emails from that place.
stephengillie 14y ago
Even if you're actually getting a real job, the recruiter will still use your references as potential leads, and will pressure them into being recruited.
Stwerner 14y ago
I made it about 3 days at my first job out of college as a recruiter, and I can confirm this at least at the small company I worked for. It was actually part of the training to pitch to applicant's references because they were much warmer leads.
brown9-2 14y ago
Why would someone need leads for a job that doesn't exist?

rcakirerk 14y ago

The guy never trusted an old version of nginx -> http://d.pr/i/U2UP http://d.pr/i/U2UP

smartial_arts 14y ago
I should've updated that long ago, but everything was working - I never had anything like that happening, so there was no pressing reason to upgrade, I guess. It should be better now, well, I hope.
- smartial_arts 14y ago
  Now it dies at ~80 users instead of ~50 before upgrade. Oh well.

pooriaazimi 14y ago

[OT] Page is down. It's incredible how many people (even on HN) don't know it! You can get Google's cached version of a page fairly easily. Just type cache:[url] in Google search bar and press enter. e.g., cache:http://blog.nimblegecko.com/never-trust-what-recruiters-say/ redirects to http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&tbo=d&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fblog.nimblegecko.com%2Fnever-trust-what-recruiters-say%2F&btnK= http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&tbo=d...

robdoherty2 14y ago

Another trick that recruiters use: Ask you where else you have interviewed, and even get names/contact info from you if they can. Then they call that place and tell them that they have a stack of resumes of way more qualified people than you. You may never hear back from that place for two reasons: 1) they think you sold them out to a recruiter, 2) they believe the recruiter and start interviewing new people. Bottom line is that recruiters will sell you out any chance that they can get. As much as they may seem like your friend, you are not their client, you are the product they are selling.

smartial_arts 14y ago
Or they think that you were a recruiter who applied for the job with a fake CV (yes, that happens as well) and ignore you from now on.

noarchy 14y ago

Once a recruiter decides that you're of no use to them, they'll stop answering your emails and phone calls. I've seen this happen to others with astonishing regularity, and had it happen to me some years ago. The initial contact is cordial, there is even some hopeful talk about a position that allegedly exists. And then suddenly, contact is cut off. Just as bad is the common practice of advertising a phoney job position just to get a pile of resumes and contacts. I suspect that this might even be some kind of fraud, legally-speaking, but I don't know if these people are ever pursued for it.

orangethirty 14y ago

I've had recruiters pull fast ones on me back when I started programming professionally. There is a special place in hell for these people. Such jerks! This just drove me to create my own mailing list for job offers. The aim is to keep it clear of recruiters. If you want to check it out and receive job offers directly to your inbox (where you can look at them without logging on and dealing with the BS of most site out there) click (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5150829 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5150829) to see the HN thread. Not spamming, just giving back to the community.

fecak 14y ago

Speaking in absolutes about recruiters is never useful (see what I did there?). Recruiter here with 15 years in the biz, and I've written lots on my jobtipsforgeeks.com blog about the perils of working with recruiters. I'm also working on a book with a similar theme that will expose some of what recruiters do, in order to help tech pros to at least be aware of things recruiting concepts such as 'candidate control' or why recruiters ask certain questions certain ways, or the differences between retained and pure contingency recruiters. Knowing a recruiter's motivations is key, and there is not enough transparency in the market today. I personally don't use references as a source of candidates and only call a reference when clients request them (most of my candidate pool comes through past candidates that I trust). Regarding compensation, what the comments here seem to be forgetting is that you as a candidate have every right to turn down a job, and in almost all cases the recruiter makes more money by getting you a higher salary. In contract situations this is usually reversed, where every dollar they can negotiate you down is another in the recruiter's pocket. Some posting of fake job ads certainly happens by lower end firms, just as hiring companies keep ads up all the time to grow their network of candidates. It's somewhat dishonest, but not sure how it hurts job seekers (not advocating it, but seems a somewhat victimless crime). Recruiters are trained to ask everyone for referrals, and early in my career I probably did. Now I realize that if you treat candidates well, with honesty and respect, and if you provide candidates with something for free, they will refer their friends (with the friend's permission) without me aging to ask. The free service I choose is information - my blog, a monthly newsletter of tech articles, discounts to conferences and events that I negotiate for my network, inside information on companies, etc. Many recruiters are simply not good at their job, but every industry has some of that. Find a good one that doesn't ask you for things, and that actually provides you with good information and service, and avoid the bad ones. It really is that simple. Use recruiters that your friends recommend and set parameters and boundaries (don't send my résumé anywhere without permission, only contact me in this way, don't call references until x, etc). If they don't respect your wishes, drop them and don't recommend them to your friends.

bearmf 14y ago
Correction: most recruiters are terrible at their job. It is much worse than any other industry except maybe real estate brokers in New York :) In finance, it seems fake jobs are posted by every recruiting firm. And no, this is not the same as a company advertising positions all the time at their website. In the latter case the probability of hiring someone for the position is at least greater than zero.

known 14y ago

Unlike in Capitalism, Globalization demands you to be an "Highly Skilled Wage Slave" to get a job.

lifeguard 14y ago

Two important points of context for my comment: I am talking about software jobs for a skill set below 'mastery'. Recruiters are a waste of time because: 1. They do not know anything relevant about the technologies you are skilled in or the technologies required by the employer. 2. Part of the 'value' they add for employers is to vet candidates before they are interviewed by the employer. This consists of doing a web page background search, calling your references, and giving you a pee test. Also see #1 for why this is a waste of time. 3. You will be legally bound to a three way relationship between the recruiter co. and your new employer. There are no benefits to you in this binding agreement. 4. You may actually be paid by the recruiting agency's payroll department (contracting). Faxing time sheets to a fax machine no one bothers to fill with paper at the agency office is a waste of time and energy. To put it another way, you won't be able to talk to the payroll department directly if you have any issues. 5. You add another layer of useless management and bureaucratic complexity via the recruiting agency. Rarely do recruiters stay up to date on a project/position's projected end date. Once this resulted in a key card being disabled because the original end date had been reached -- but the project was still active. I have seen that the recruiters for staff positions are a little better and you get paid direct. I have also known gifted programmers who just hate to deal with people and negotiate, so recruiters are useful there. But to advance in your career, you are going to need people skills so you might as well start developing them now. To sum up, there are a lot of bad recruiters who ruin it for everyone.

lsc 14y ago
>1. They do not know anything relevant about the technologies you are skilled in or the technologies required by the employer. This... this shocks me, every time. I mean, in my experience, it's usually true, but damn. What, then, is the value the recruiter brings the client? I mean, sometimes they function as body shops, where the company pays them and they pay you, and the company then doesn't have to worry about labor laws and stuff, that becomes the body shop's problems, but I fail to see how that would justify the huge markup (and, generally speaking, but not always, lower quality) - Labor laws really aren't that bad. Do the standard things you do when dealing with programmers that get paid $90K+ per year, and you are in compliance with most of it. I mean, besides that, they are keyword matchers; personally, I don't think keyword matchers are particularly useful, and in any case, they are not particularly difficult to implement. But then, in defense of the recruiters (or, at least a reason for a developer to use recruiters): >3. You will be legally bound to a three way relationship between the recruiter co. and your new employer. There are no benefits to you in this binding agreement. Generally speaking, recruiters bring in a bunch of sub-par recruits. Way worse than if you had asked the people around the office to bring in friends (and worse than having someone in the office go over the resume slush pile.) What does this mean? this means that if you are a sub-par programmer, and you failed that google interview your buddy got you, or if you are a good programmer who, for whatever reason, looks like a sub-par programmer (say, for instance, that you had a [mental] health issue impacting your performance for the previous year, or just had a run of bad luck and have been unemployed for a while and don't know anyone to get you interviews) then recruiters can be a godsend. Recruiters are a fairly sure sign that the standards for the job will be low. The competition will be weak. And sometimes? well, comeon, most of us have needed to hit the bunny slope at least once in our career.

teapartyJim 14y ago

I am a technical recruiter with almost two decades of experience. I have literally placed thousands of IT professionals. People with bad experiences with recruiters are usually the bottom 80% of candidates - those we cannot help (employers only pay us for the top 10%, MAYBE the top 20%). Of course, no one thinks they are in the bottom 80%... Like every industry, 80% of the recruiters are lousy, and give the rest of us a bad name, so there is great truth in what is written here. HOWEVER, ask yourself, why is this happening to me? Why are agencies in business if we offer no value? The basic laws of capitalism would have forced us out of business if we did not create value. So if recruiters won't work with you, why is that? Remember, as a candidate, YOU are getting our work FOR FREE. You invest nothing but your time, and perhaps, some of your knowledge. We are taking a risk on you, risking our ability to earn a living, risking our relationships with our clients in the desparate hope you are not a lousy candidate, all by exposing you to the network of professionals we have invested large quantities of time and money in developing, so yeah, we expect you to give something back in the form of leads or references. What is wrong with that? Perhaps you would prefer to pay for our service? Believe me, we are expensive. Finding a good recruiter is easy - trust your gut, and find one who has been doing it for at least a year. The lousy ones are generally weeded out by then. Only trust those you are referred to, or are willing to meet you in person, and only those recruiters that partner with you. Also, help the recruiter help you. If you are confrontational, unprofessional, or otherwise difficult to work with, no good recruiter will invest any effort in you. Why would we take the risk?

pandaman 14y ago
Do you really have any people genuinely looking for your services and not cold-called or lured with the false job ads? I agree that somebody who is seeking your services for free has to be grateful and accommodating your requests. But as somebody who is being offered a service I have not requested I don't care how much you invested.
- teapartyJim 14y ago
  Yes, we do. Every day.