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chhotiiNever in my life have I gotten a job through a recruiter. Nothing in my experience suggests that they have any use whatsoever.
Way back I was naive enough to think that if the recruiter had read my resume and thought that a job was a good fit, it was worth a shot. I believed that they were doing some kind of matching, non-random matching, of people with jobs in their heads. If it didn't look to me like I had the qualifications asked for in the req for the job they were sending me in for, I thought-- "the employer must be actually more flexible than the req suggests? I guess? I mean the recruiter has read my resume, so they know this, right?" This lead to a couple of embarrassingly short and pointless interviews. This go-round I have been wiser than that. If I see a gaping discrepancy between the req and my qualifications I point it out to the recruiter.
But even with this filter, they have been just a time-waste. If I compare, on average, the average job that the recruiters have called me up to talk about, and the average job that I have found through LinkedIn etc. and actually applied for, the recruiter leads are way, way worse in every way-- required skills and qualifications, my interests, location, everything.
In spite of this I've continued to give recruiters the time of day. I've considered any possible position they've called to talk to me about, even if it was less than ideal, thinking hmm, well, I'm not crazy about the match, but at least the recruiter thinks this is the best match for me out of all the bazillions of jobs they know about. I figure that they must know something about what the employers are looking for, what requirements they are flexible about etc., and that if the employers are giving the recruiter the time of day, then going through the recruiter gives one some advantage. Like, if a recruiter brings your resume to an employer, the the employer thinks you've been vetted or filtered by the recruiter. The employer expects the recruiter to find good applicants, like needles in the proverbial haystack. If your resume has been "found", you must be needle, not hay, unlike all those resumes that pour in as people click the "Easy Apply" button in LinkedIn. Right? And even if the jobs they send me in for are crummy-- I'll take a crummy job I can get over a non-crummy job that I can't get. At least it would be a better launching pad that sitting at home, a stepping stone towards something non-crummy.
But suppose that my previous unfortunate experiences with interviews I got through recruiters are telling. Telling us that no, in fact, the recruiters are not actually applying any intelligence to the matches whatsoever. The only thing they do is to randomly match any req with any resume as long as there's any non-empty intersection in the sets of keywords. An employer could replace recruiters with a very small shell script and filling a position would not be any more work. You could click on "Apply" for random jobs LinkedIn lists for you and not get any fewer interviews. As both a job-seeker and as an employer, I have not seen any evidence that contradicts this hypothesis. (I know, I know,drwex is going to say "you're just talking to the wrong recruiters.")
So why do employers pay recruiters? Wouldn't there be cheaper ways to filter incoming resumes? But why do people pay fortunetellers, or take megadoses of vitamins?
Today I resolved to not let recruiters waste any more of my time. I've stopped answering phone calls from non-local area codes. When Boston-area recruiters call me, I am not going to give every opportunity they try to bring to me the benefit of the doubt. I am going to be Ms. All Negative when recruiters call, unless by some wild crazy chance they happen to be calling about a job that sounds especially wonderful. Unless my reaction to the req is "OMG squee that sounds awesome!" I am going to shoot everything at the first negative I hear. I am going to be quick to say "I'm not interested in the insurance sector or the aerospace sector" or "that would be a longer commute than I want" or "they ask for C++ 11 expertise and I haven't done C++ in years so I would probably fail the interview" or "just because I have a background in healthcare informatics doesn't mean I have any interest in healthcare billing". This will at least avoid some wasting of my time; we can hope that this will also improve the quality of their suggestions.
Internal recruiters, though, might be a whole other thing. In the past couple of days I've spoken with 3 internal recruiters. Nothing is going to come of the first, I think; I concluded that it wasn't an awesome match, and although I left the door open by not telling her that, she probably figured out the same. The second might result in some possibilities. The third sounded very promising-- he said "I'm sure some hiring manager at my company is going to want to talk to you" and I think that perhaps I believe him.
Why do I think that the recommendation of an internal recruiter is more likely to result in an interview than the recommendation of an external recruiter? I would think that working at a company, someone would come to understand that company's needs from the inside much better. And they would know the hiring managers on a much more personal basis. I also can't imagine that an internal recruiter could get away with being totally useless at vetting resumes. Thus, if an internal recruiter says "I think we have a place for you," I can be... rather more optimistic?
Way back I was naive enough to think that if the recruiter had read my resume and thought that a job was a good fit, it was worth a shot. I believed that they were doing some kind of matching, non-random matching, of people with jobs in their heads. If it didn't look to me like I had the qualifications asked for in the req for the job they were sending me in for, I thought-- "the employer must be actually more flexible than the req suggests? I guess? I mean the recruiter has read my resume, so they know this, right?" This lead to a couple of embarrassingly short and pointless interviews. This go-round I have been wiser than that. If I see a gaping discrepancy between the req and my qualifications I point it out to the recruiter.
But even with this filter, they have been just a time-waste. If I compare, on average, the average job that the recruiters have called me up to talk about, and the average job that I have found through LinkedIn etc. and actually applied for, the recruiter leads are way, way worse in every way-- required skills and qualifications, my interests, location, everything.
In spite of this I've continued to give recruiters the time of day. I've considered any possible position they've called to talk to me about, even if it was less than ideal, thinking hmm, well, I'm not crazy about the match, but at least the recruiter thinks this is the best match for me out of all the bazillions of jobs they know about. I figure that they must know something about what the employers are looking for, what requirements they are flexible about etc., and that if the employers are giving the recruiter the time of day, then going through the recruiter gives one some advantage. Like, if a recruiter brings your resume to an employer, the the employer thinks you've been vetted or filtered by the recruiter. The employer expects the recruiter to find good applicants, like needles in the proverbial haystack. If your resume has been "found", you must be needle, not hay, unlike all those resumes that pour in as people click the "Easy Apply" button in LinkedIn. Right? And even if the jobs they send me in for are crummy-- I'll take a crummy job I can get over a non-crummy job that I can't get. At least it would be a better launching pad that sitting at home, a stepping stone towards something non-crummy.
But suppose that my previous unfortunate experiences with interviews I got through recruiters are telling. Telling us that no, in fact, the recruiters are not actually applying any intelligence to the matches whatsoever. The only thing they do is to randomly match any req with any resume as long as there's any non-empty intersection in the sets of keywords. An employer could replace recruiters with a very small shell script and filling a position would not be any more work. You could click on "Apply" for random jobs LinkedIn lists for you and not get any fewer interviews. As both a job-seeker and as an employer, I have not seen any evidence that contradicts this hypothesis. (I know, I know,
drwex is going to say "you're just talking to the wrong recruiters.")So why do employers pay recruiters? Wouldn't there be cheaper ways to filter incoming resumes? But why do people pay fortunetellers, or take megadoses of vitamins?
Today I resolved to not let recruiters waste any more of my time. I've stopped answering phone calls from non-local area codes. When Boston-area recruiters call me, I am not going to give every opportunity they try to bring to me the benefit of the doubt. I am going to be Ms. All Negative when recruiters call, unless by some wild crazy chance they happen to be calling about a job that sounds especially wonderful. Unless my reaction to the req is "OMG squee that sounds awesome!" I am going to shoot everything at the first negative I hear. I am going to be quick to say "I'm not interested in the insurance sector or the aerospace sector" or "that would be a longer commute than I want" or "they ask for C++ 11 expertise and I haven't done C++ in years so I would probably fail the interview" or "just because I have a background in healthcare informatics doesn't mean I have any interest in healthcare billing". This will at least avoid some wasting of my time; we can hope that this will also improve the quality of their suggestions.
Internal recruiters, though, might be a whole other thing. In the past couple of days I've spoken with 3 internal recruiters. Nothing is going to come of the first, I think; I concluded that it wasn't an awesome match, and although I left the door open by not telling her that, she probably figured out the same. The second might result in some possibilities. The third sounded very promising-- he said "I'm sure some hiring manager at my company is going to want to talk to you" and I think that perhaps I believe him.
Why do I think that the recommendation of an internal recruiter is more likely to result in an interview than the recommendation of an external recruiter? I would think that working at a company, someone would come to understand that company's needs from the inside much better. And they would know the hiring managers on a much more personal basis. I also can't imagine that an internal recruiter could get away with being totally useless at vetting resumes. Thus, if an internal recruiter says "I think we have a place for you," I can be... rather more optimistic?
no subject
Date: 2019-12-19 05:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-20 12:04 am (UTC)So that explains why a recruiter is useful to job-seekers. I still don't understand how they are useful to employers-- and it's the employers who actually pay them. Puzzling.
no subject
Date: 2019-12-19 05:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-19 06:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-19 11:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-12-21 09:31 pm (UTC)For the record
Date: 2020-02-06 02:58 am (UTC)