Recruiters (rant)

SixPapaCharlie

SixPapaCharlie

May the force be with you
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First Officer 6PC
I don't rant often (I don't think I do)

So first time job hunting in ~5 years.

A significant chunk of the calls are a recruiter telling me about some job that fits me perfectly and then at some point in the conversation they say "Oh you know what? I just realized that position is no longer open. By the way do you happen to know any Java developers? I have 2 Java positions available. Maybe you could reach out to your programmer friends that might be looking. I also have 2 Oracle DBA positions open. Do you know any people that might be a good fit?"

:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

The first time or two I thought it was a legit mistake but now I realize they want me to be part of their recruiting effort. It keeps happening.

Additionally I get the calls telling me I am a perfect for this Perl developer position in New York

I finally asked "What makes you think it is perfect for me? I do not have listed on my resume, Perl anywhere. I am not even programming anymore and every job on my resume for the last 15 years has been in Dallas."

click

If you happen to be an IT recruiter, please take the time to read peoples' resumes and use a calculated process to do your job properly. I understand there are automated programs that search buzzwords and I get that but these are humans that are phoning it in.

grrr.

Rant over.


Edit: P.S. If you are a Perl developer in New York, I have a number for you ;)
 
The other thing that gets me is the "We need to see you first"
We have this position but before submitting you we need to have a Face to Face meeting with you. I joke with them "I swear I am pretty and I can talk my way into this job if I want it so you will get your cut"

That never works.

I had one that wanted to do the face to face thing.
I met them and they went over their recruiting fees.

out.
 
Yeah.

Over a year ago now, I suddenly found myself with a huge estate to deal with and a lot of business to take care of. Since I was tired of the full time programming position I was in anyway, I quit.

So, I put out feelers for part time positions to make a little extra spending money/keep me engaged. Keeping in mind I put in the cover letter and on the job site profiles that I wasn't willing to relocate and only interested in PT or contract work. So, naturally, all I got were calls from recruiters trying to get me for FT positions in Chicago and Minneapolis.

To live in a city and work FT at a cubicle, my current salary requirement is $1,000,000/year. Unless some unforeseen event causes us to become desperate for money that's where it stands.
 
My advice to you, coming from the other side of the coin, is avoid recruiters like the plague if you possibly can.

As an employer, I refuse to deal with those sharks anymore. I've dealt with them before yes. Just understand that your employer is paying anywhere from 30 to 100 percent of your first year salary in commissions. That's taking a lot off your bottom line. If you're a high powered exec that will bring in business to your firm then okay, companies will deal with you through a recruiter, otherwise, you better look VERY good on paper plus be willing to accept a lower salary than the next guy.
 
Is it Oxford? I have a guy from Oxford in Texas who calls. A lot. Several times a day.
 
Btw if anyone out there needs a developer on-call to remote in or do occasional work with progress 4gl or unix/linux scripting I still have the skills. I just don't have the ability or inclination to commit to full time hours on a permanent basis.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
I don't rant often (I don't think I do)

So first time job hunting in ~5 years.

A significant chunk of the calls are a recruiter telling me about some job that fits me perfectly and then at some point in the conversation they say "Oh you know what? I just realized that position is no longer open. By the way do you happen to know any Java developers? I have 2 Java positions available. Maybe you could reach out to your programmer friends that might be looking. I also have 2 Oracle DBA positions open. Do you know any people that might be a good fit?"

:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

The first time or two I thought it was a legit mistake but now I realize they want me to be part of their recruiting effort. It keeps happening.

Additionally I get the calls telling me I am a perfect for this Perl developer position in New York

I finally asked "What makes you think it is perfect for me? I do not have listed on my resume, Perl anywhere. I am not even programming anymore and every job on my resume for the last 15 years has been in Dallas."

click

If you happen to be an IT recruiter, please take the time to read peoples' resumes and use a calculated process to do your job properly. I understand there are automated programs that search buzzwords and I get that but these are humans that are phoning it in.

grrr.

Rant over.


Edit: P.S. If you are a Perl developer in New York, I have a number for you ;)
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's the entire recruiting industry. I tell them, "You find me a job, I'll give you my contact list."
 
You'd think it would be cheaper for an employer to just hire a kid fresh out of college and train him than pay ridiculous recruiter commissions.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
I had one that wanted to do the face to face thing.
I met them and they went over their recruiting fees.

out.
Click to expand...

:hairraise::hairraise: You know you are dealing with a crappy recruiter when they can't get a commission from the company and want you to pay them.
 
I had a recruiting firm cold call me from a job site profile and pitch a job that I was hiring for. Literally, they pitched me on a position on one of my teams, LOL. What was worse is that I have an account rep with that company that I was texting at the time of the call. She walked over to the desk with the recruiter on the phone with me. It made for a good laugh over happy hour that week. The poor recruiter was so embarrassed.
 
Become a Jesse Angell clone... dump the IT into secondary, and become one of the World's Greatest Flight Instructors.
 
cowman said:
You'd think it would be cheaper for an employer to just hire a kid fresh out of college and train him than pay ridiculous recruiter commissions.
Click to expand...

Agree but as most in IT know, they were that kid out of college, got trained and then found out what they could get paid with their skills elsewhere.

Employer's pay scale doesn't increase at the same speed as the industry

I doubled my salary in my first 3 years out of college by jumping.
3% cost of living raise if I stay or 20% if I go over to xyz company.

That was in 2000 and things were a little different. I was also 22 and $ was the only concern. I think that s typical though for the kids right out of the gate (in IT anyway)
 
Sac Arrow said:
As an employer, I refuse to deal with those sharks anymore. I've dealt with them before yes. Just understand that your employer is paying anywhere from 30 to 100 percent of your first year salary in commissions.
Click to expand...

X2

Recruiters generally suck. They can bring you some really low quality people with suspiciously good looking resumes and 'references'

Last two accountant hires. One did not show up for work on her start date. No phone call, nothing. The other one we hired was here two weeks before she started playing sick and quit. The job was too 'high stress'.
 
Last edited:
guardrail said:
I had a recruiting firm cold call me from a job site profile and pitch a job that I was hiring for. Literally, they pitched me on a position on one of my teams, LOL. What was worse is that I have an account rep with that company that I was texting at the time of the call. She walked over to the desk with the recruiter on the phone with me. It made for a good laugh over happy hour that week. The poor recruiter was so embarrassed.
Click to expand...


That's awesome
My boss did come to me one day and say
"Hey Bryan, you will never guess whose resume just came across my desk"

He hands me my resume.

Whoops.
 
cowman said:
You'd think it would be cheaper for an employer to just hire a kid fresh out of college and train him than pay ridiculous recruiter commissions.
Click to expand...

Not always. Hiring a paid recruiter is a form of delegating.

Sometimes the need requires a certain skill set or experience so the "get up to speed" period is short and the new team member is productive and "making money" very quickly.

A recruiter can actually save me money since I can do productive money making tasks while they are searching, narrowing lists, and qualifying candidates. Otherwise, I'm doing those tasks and other parts of my work and business will suffer. And I always ask for a performance guarantee from the firm. If they send me a knucklehead that isn't gonna work, they don't get paid the remaining amount (which is the larger part) that is due.
 
AggieMike88 said:
Become a Jesse Angell clone... dump the IT into secondary, and become one of the World's Greatest Flight Instructors.
Click to expand...


Ha!
I didn't know Jesse's last name.
I googled it then realized it was POA Jesse.

No CFI for me. I am not a patient teacher.
 
Sac Arrow said:
My advice to you, coming from the other side of the coin, is avoid recruiters like the plague if you possibly can.

As an employer, I refuse to deal with those sharks anymore. I've dealt with them before yes. Just understand that your employer is paying anywhere from 30 to 100 percent of your first year salary in commissions. That's taking a lot off your bottom line. If you're a high powered exec that will bring in business to your firm then okay, companies will deal with you through a recruiter, otherwise, you better look VERY good on paper plus be willing to accept a lower salary than the next guy.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the Yacht industry is probably the worst as it is a really 'high churn' industry for crew. There are a crapload of 'crew agents' these days, and I have yet to see one that wasn't worthless. Most of them are ex stewardesses that had a couple of season of doing beds and heads that don't have the knowledge base required to evaluate the candidates. But they wanted a baby, and maybe 1:5000 yacht jobs is conducive to having children. The do not have the requisite knowledge to screen candidates. I have yet to get a job through one, and have never hired anyone through one. To top it off, if you hire one of their people, basically it increases their cost for the season 50% in their fees.

Luckily there has always been a couple of free or very low cost web boards that everybody who has any time in the industry uses. These days all the agent jobs are working for owners and captains that nobody will work for because they are such *******s and cant recruit using normal methods and have to pay the premium to get crew. Since only complete newbies who don't know about the other websites sign up with these people anymore, they get sent to these boats for their first, and typically last, job in the industry.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
That's awesome
My boss did come to me one day and say
"Hey Bryan, you will never guess whose resume just came across my desk"

He hands me my resume.

Whoops.
Click to expand...

That happens a lot. I don't care unless their work efforts have really died off, then we need to have a chat about them checking out prematurely. I think a lot of people are afraid to talk to their boss's about looking for a new job. I've actually helped some of my team members find new roles/jobs when they let me know they weren't happy as-is.
 
AggieMike88 said:
Not always. Hiring a paid recruiter is a form of delegating.

Sometimes the need requires a certain skill set or experience so the "get up to speed" period is short and the new team member is productive and "making money" very quickly.

A recruiter can actually save me money since I can do productive money making tasks while they are searching, narrowing lists, and qualifying candidates. Otherwise, I'm doing those tasks and other parts of my work and business will suffer. And I always ask for a performance guarantee from the firm. If they send me a knucklehead that isn't gonna work, they don't get paid the remaining amount (which is the larger part) that is due.
Click to expand...

There are some good recruiters out there who actually do their jobs and don't just send over candidates who can pass a mirror test. I've talked to both of'em on the phone. The rest of the recruiter pool is just horrible....
 
AggieMike88 said:
Not always. Hiring a paid recruiter is a form of delegating.

Sometimes the need requires a certain skill set or experience so the "get up to speed" period is short and the new team member is productive and "making money" very quickly.

A goodrecruiter can actually save me money since I can do productive money making tasks while they are searching, narrowing lists, and qualifying candidates. Otherwise, I'm doing those tasks and other parts of my work and business will suffer. And I always ask for a performance guarantee from the firm. If they send me a knucklehead that isn't gonna work, they don't get paid the remaining amount (which is the larger part) that is due.
Click to expand...

FTFY;) In my business good recruiters don't exist. Luckily it typically takes me less than an hour to find new crew.
 
My guess is recruiting is a pretty competitive field. That said I would not cotton to BS just to get my contact list. As an employer I do see some value in what they do. On occasion we advertise for a PT legal secretary. Among other things the ad always says 2-3 years legal secretary experience required. The resume's I get include a Nanny and Waitress, Security guards, people in paralegal school, Office manager for a physician's office and others with zero legal secretary experience. It would be nice to have someone cut through all that crap and just give me some qualified candidates.
 
Clark1961 said:
There are some good recruiters out there who actually do their jobs and don't just send over candidates who can pass a mirror test. I've talked to both of'em on the phone. The rest of the recruiter pool is just horrible....
Click to expand...

Agreed.

Irony is that I have to spend time to find the Good One that might have been spent finding the candidate or working on a primary business activity.
 
Last time we had a budget fiasco, I made the mistake of posting my resume on dice.com.

I got constant e-mails from recruiters, nearly all of them offering the generic Silicon Valley DBA/PHP/web2.0 crap I don't have on my resume ('cause I'm really not interested -- I'm qualified for substantially more interesting work). And they wanted me to fill out their application in order to give any details about the job. I then added a note to "recruiters contact only with a specific position identified," and much to my surprise, the flood slowed to a trickle and became much more relevant. I eventually got offered two jobs in New Mexico -- one at LANL doing ASCI simulations, and the other overhauling the VLA outside New Mexico Tech. Both can through different recruiters. They were quite interesting, but (1) required a significant pay cut, and (2) made finding employment for the Other Half difficult due to remoteness. And then the budget cleared, so I stayed.
 
AdamZ said:
My guess is recruiting is a pretty competitive field. That said I would not cotton to BS just to get my contact list. As an employer I do see some value in what they do. On occasion we advertise for a PT legal secretary. Among other things the ad always says 2-3 years legal secretary experience required. The resume's I get include a Nanny and Waitress, Security guards, people in paralegal school, Office manager for a physician's office and others with zero legal secretary experience. It would be nice to have someone cut through all that crap and just give me some qualified candidates.
Click to expand...

All the 'vampire industries' are competitive, you get money for nothing except being a leech.
 
I get calls from recruiters a lot.

"Mr. Arrow, we are from a recruiting firm and we have this position (blase blase blase) and wonder if you are interested."

"Thanks but no."

"So do you know anyone that might be interested?"

"Well as a matter of fact..."

I keep a short list of real duds just for the occasion.
 
Sac, sounds like my way of dealing with the annoying telemarketers who call the office. I tell them the boss can be reached at one of the three following numbers (google them to see the humor)

512-463-1782 (ask for Rick P.)
512-463-2100 (ask for Greg A.)
202-456-1111 (ask for Joe B.)
 
AggieMike88 said:
Sac, sounds like my way of dealing with the annoying telemarketers who call the office. I tell them the boss can be reached at one of the three following numbers (google them to see the humor)

512-463-1782 (ask for Rick P.)
512-463-2100 (ask for Greg A.)
202-456-1111 (ask for Joe B.)
Click to expand...

Nice!
 
Just Happened again 12/9/2014 12:21 PM CST

20 min on the phone with captain Um uh uuuuh huh um...
asking me all about my background then says I siht you not

"well it looks like you are more on the IT side of things. This is more of a corporate trainer role and may not be a good fit. Do you know any of your peers that might be interested in a role like this?"

I was very polite but in my head getting more and more irritated after we decided it wasn't a fit and waiting for him to get through all of his "Uh Uh huh Um ua... I shouldn't be in a speaking role" nonsense trying to end the call.

insanity.

Next recruiter calls me, first words out of my mouth "I am seeking position xyz that pays x-y. Is this what you have available?"
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
Next recruiter calls me, first words out of my mouth "I am seeking position xyz that pays x-y. Is this what you have available?"
Click to expand...
Primary rule: Who ever is asking the questions is the one in control of the conversation.

Or maybe, "To recruit Bryan T, please provide a visa or mastercard. The rate is $20 for the first 5 minutes and $3 per minute after that..."

Or.... once the "do you know someone" happens, go "Oh, sure! I know someone" and hand the phone to Mini6PC.
 
HaHa
I always said "whomever is talking is losing the negotiation."

Different business models I guess.
 
I really, really hate it when these recruiting firms don't keep track of their contacts.

"Hi I'm Janelle from Network Staffing....."

"No."

"Hi I'm Jannelle...."

"No."

Repeat a couple more times over the course of a couple years. Finally get angry and tell her to go blow a donkey. One week later....

"Hi this is Melissa from Network Staffing...."

"You like ponies?"
 
AggieMike88 said:
Primary rule: Who ever is asking the questions is the one in control of the conversation.

Or maybe, "To recruit Bryan T, please provide a visa or mastercard. The rate is $20 for the first 5 minutes and $3 per minute after that..."

Or.... once the "do you know someone" happens, go "Oh, sure! I know someone" and hand the phone to Mini6PC.
Click to expand...

I did that once. I was working on some project or another while passively babysitting my goddaughter (then 8) when some joker called me about municipal government contracts he wanted to match me with. He asked to speak to the "person in charge of government accounts."

I had zero interest in taking on any more government accounts. In fact, I had just non-renewed a few because they were slow payers with cumbersome payment systems. But this guy was insistent. So I called Kimberly from the other room and told her that I'd give her a dollar for every minute she could keep the guy on the phone. I think she made three or four bucks before he finally hung up.

Rich
 
OH I've got you all beat here. I swear this is true.

Back in the day, while going to college I was working as a wafer fab tech in clean room doing mx on diffusion, epitaxy, sputtering, and vapor deposition equipment. I was a pretty good tech and working for Unisys. I get a call at home one night, someone had given my name and phone num to a recruiter, and we chatted a bit. He was harvesting clients and I told him to go find me a job with 20% raise and I'd have a lot of people at college eng program I would provide to him. I gave him my CV, including the current employer - Unisys and he said he would get right on it.

You know what's coming right? Sure enough, on the following Tue I get a call in the afternoon that HR wants to see me. I go down there and they have a letter from the recruiter on the desk, with his envelope, and my name and CV fat on the following page. HR wasn't upset, they said people move around all the time, but they wanted me to be aware. So I asked for a Xerox copy of both and I got them, and called the recruiter:

"Hey Marvin, guess what. I just got fired from Unisys. You sent them my resume with my name on it. Yeah, I got a copy of the intro, and my CV on your letter head, with the envelope addressed to my employer."

That got a nice settlement, paid off my semester school bill, and had a fair amount left over. Of course, I just kept working there until I graduated.
 
I just got a call from another weird one.
This company is interested in you but they want you to know they are a Christian company. They pray a lot.

I said "Do I have to pray too? I mean for the right amount of money I can play along."

This job hunt is weird this go round
 
a well known company that everyone here probably uses from time to time.
 
Oh god. This is now the worst part of being a web/mobile nerd. The calls and emails never end. Today (2pm here) I'm at 13 calls and 41 Emails.

I actually made an IVR on Asterisk just to route these jokers to a dialtone. ("Press 1 if your position is not in the Los Angeles Area...*click*").. but they figured out they can get an old version of my resume and "just try that number" (facepalm)

For the "Do you know anyone?" schtick, that ****es me off tremendously. I ask them if they split commission, just like a realtor would. You would not believe the furious outrage and indignation that triggers... then I get to stand on my soapbox and explain that if they're too lazy to find their own talent, and I have the talent in my social circle already, they're ethically bound to at least split the work, blah blah blah.

I've had one company offer to split with me, but wouldn't actually sign the agreement that I ginned up for the purpose.

Several have told me "We offer a $250 referral bonus! oooh ahhh" and I had to explain that for 1.5 hours' pay, I'm not going to annoy my friends on their behalf. They don't understand whyyyyy. Fools.

Lately it's just dumb Indian call-centers churning through. I've asked, they don't even have my resume (which says in red, 36 point font, on top, exactly what I will or won't do) -- but they call anyway on the strength of someone's shoddy keyword match. Sadly, that's one industry that can make it up in volume.
 
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