Playing it Straight With Recruiters

I tend to blog the most when a hot topic crosses my mind. Usually, it seems like when someone has annoyed me. Another case in point today I suppose.

FYI, the ROI blog is intended to be down and dirty and informative. Not just the usual PR pander. I'm not sure if everyone will appreciate my style, but the great thing about blogging, is you don't need everyone else's approval.

Some of this may be re-hash of other posts, but here goes:

People, if you are going to work with recruiters, make sure you understand how it works. And Recruiters! Make sure you tell people. Some people will still lie to you, but at least with a better informed population, the stupid mistakes will diminish!

Recruiters come in several flavors: company, 3rd party retained and 3rd party contigency. Company = company HR, 3rd party (like ROI) work for companies as vendors. Retained means the recruiter gets paid for working on the search. Contingency means only if they fill it.

We're going to focus on contingency today, since the majority of 3rd party work is contingency. ROI does both, but more contingency than retained.

Candidates, if you are going to work with a 3rd party recruiter to try and have them help you find a position, it does you absolutely no good not to tell them about any prior applications, interviews, or communications with a company. Getting the recruiter to submit you again is going to: make you look like a cheap commodity at best, or possibly dishonest or stupid. It's going to waste the recruiters time and make them look bad to the client. Most companies will not pay a recruiter for a referral of someone they have received a resume from in the last 12 months.

Candidates like to 'forget' they had any prior contact with a firm, even if they had an on-site interview 2 weeks ago! I can ask outright, and many will lie. Others simply forget to mention.

I'll let you in on a little secret: If you get me to refer you without telling me you already have been, and the client then tells me, several things happen: I have no motivation to get you hired because I won't get paid. If you lied to me, I'll tell the client you did. And even if you didn't, it's not in my interests to have you get hired, because I don't get paid, and the position is then closed and I don't have another opportunity to find someone else. Do you really want someone talking to the client about you that knows your background in detail and DOESN'T want you to get hired?



Addendum:

To be clear: I don't believe in trashing people, regardless of how much they've annoyed me. It just doesn't pay. However the thing to keep in mind in this business is that a mediocre comment or endorsement, or a complete lack of endorsement may be far worse than a trashing. If you trash someone, you come across like someone with an axe to grind. If you simply don't have anything positive to say about someone, that tends to speak volumes. Candidates, you only want your strongest advocates talking to people about you. And this includes recruiters, and references.

An example: Since candidates provide references, it makes sense that those people would provide glowing reports right? You'd be surprised. Some haven't even given their ok to be references, some trash the candidate, some give very lukewarm feedback. If these are your strongest advocates, and they only give you a B/C rating, what does that tell people? Keep in mind with grade inflation in everything these days, C=E in my book. Failing. When I'm talking to references, I focus pretty heavily on what they don't say and what they don't stress as superlatives: areas they don't mention as strengths, areas they mention as "OK", etc.

You better be sure both your recruiter and references are talking about you in glowing terms. Especially in the market right now. Being straight with your recruiter is a good start.

By the way, if you don't feel like being straight with your recruiter, why are you talking to them in the first place? Do your own job search, or find another recruiter.