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layout: post
title: Bad Recruiter, No
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tags: article
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Seems these days that the only way to get a job is through a recruiter or some other 3rd party human resources team, it's a gatekeeper between you and the next phase of your career.
There are over 300 Employment Agencies in the Greater Pittsburgh area alone, and these companies all do the same thing: skim off the top of your paycheck.
I don't know about you, but I could really use a hiring bonus of at least 400 times my hourly rate, it seems to work well for professional athletes.
And you can be certain their client can pass a credit check, middlemen know to protect their neck.
The job descriptions seem to be written by somebody who doesn't understand the field they're hiring in, because it's usually a game of telephone through the hiring manager through HR to the recruiters.
The interviewers may have cribbed all their questions from a "What not to ask during an Interview" blog post, yet somehow they expect excellent candidates to come work for them or their excellent clients.
Here's a few basic techniques I've seen for hiring the top tech talent:
1. Protecting clients from the evils of the unworthy
It's a big secret *who* might be hiring who, recruiters can't let anybody sidestep the middleman and go straight to the client!
You can't get a name or address for any of these positions until you promise fealty to the recruiter.
You might use another recruiter who's only in their client's top 3 vendors and not a 1st place vendor like them, besides they know the hiring managers the best!
They've made 50+ placements! That can't possibly be churn (and churn couldn't be a red flag), they make it out to be 100% growth!!
2. Test the waters before revealing too much
Meeting face-to-face is the only way to ensure the talent fits their clients' needs (no uggos!)
After all, people may feel indebted to you if you buy them a cupp-o-chino or a free lunch, and business lunches are tax deductable & usually reembursed.
They need to hear somebody's voice first before just outright telling them what the job might be, but according to whatever your resume might say you're a perfect fit for selling life insurance to senior citizens!
3. Nobody reads resumes
The resume-finding keyword-matching software is impeccable, the best, so no need to read resumes or look at a potential hire's career history.
Potential employees are names and numbers on a spreadsheet, the more they can get through the more placements they may make. It's Always Be Closing, not Always Be Reading, daaaaang.
4. Voicemail, Schmoicemail
Phone went to voicemail during business hours? Better not leave a message, it's too important, call back immediately!
This is an emergency, there is an urgent need for web developers in Albequerque, damnit, no time to leave a message!
This job deserves the same phone ettiquette as your average life-threatening emergency, no way the person would forget to silence their "ironic" Beiber ringtone during a big meeting.
5. Millenials, amirite?
Kids these days are lazy schmucks, just like every generation that came after every other generation, they don't even have any respect for their elders!
Double-check that they can figure out how to work a button-down shirt, but take it easy on their ironing skills, ensure they don't spill coffee on themselves during your f2f.
Medical Insurance is still only for the independantly wealthy, but only after 90 days, if the talent last that long.
6. Everybody has Everything
Everybody has a car, fax machine, printer, land-line phone, teleporter, and a home office at the very least.
Even if they tell you they don't have any of these items, it's safe to assume they have easy access to all of them at their beck and call.
The Unemployeed allegedly have limitless resources, and nobody can tell a recruiter any different.
7. Nobody in a recruiting firm talks to anybody but their immediate manager
Most recruiters work for conglomerates with "fancy" websites, however nobody in any other office has access to your resume or anything else.
The websites were usually cobbled together over the years by various contractracts, sub-contractors, and sub-sub-contractors, and mixed with various 3rd party extensions and tools.
Here's a short list of Recruiters I've found that border on spambots:
apex systems inc
cybercoders < They seem good, their site is nice, but I've never managed to get an interview through them.
tekskills inc
amtex enterprises < this is one of the worst, emailing about jobs not even
related to the content of the resume, if there's any word-match between the
resume and the job description you get an email, there's no way to unsubscribe
