I have dealt with too many recruiters who have no concept of what it is that I do and have no idea how to sell me to their clients. I have so much intangible experience that you can't list on a resume, but all they see is text on a page and no clue how to interpret it. I should just put "GETS THE JOB DONE" at the top and leave it at that.

No offense recruiters, but most of you have no clue when it comes to the difference between Product Development and Project Management. You drop the keywords of the moment (did someone say "agile") and you don't know what separates Interaction Design from Usability. You might as well hire an Information Architect to build your next house.

99% of the jobs I've gotten over the past 13-years in New York City have been won by sheer hard work, determination and networking. The only job I got through a recruiter was for the Associated Press. That turned out to be a bunch of finger pointing whiners who would jump when someone said "boo!" No one would take responsibility for anything. Clueless. The "a" in "team" was for "ass" over there.

I know some of the recruiters who are lurking on this list I've actually spoken to. And most of you, once you've gotten my resume and forwarded it on, didn't even have the courtesy to call me back and let me know the client was turned on by someone else. It's called email. Use it.

Sure, let's go and build some application for recruiters to be more effective in sourcing candidates (I think we have Monster and Hot Jobs for that already, no?). Then watch when they abuse that system, because they're filling some job spec written by a manager who's worked for one company half their life, with no real world experience on actual agile projects, which call for rapid dev and deployment.

I hate to say this, but I'm actually pretty sick of most recruiters. I guess I'm lucky I'm employed. Through my own hard work, I might add!

Maybe I'm a little jaded, but I have the right to be. In my lifetime, I've probably talked to over 100 recruiters who have just WASTED MY TIME! All because they'll pitch anything that walks. I guess that's the name of the game, so who can be mad at them. They have to make a living too.

- - - -

Best regards,

Tony Zeoli, Founder
Netmix.com

o: [masked]
m: [masked]

email | web | blog | LinkedIn | Facebook | Twitter
aim / msn: djtonyz | yahoo: anthonyzeoli | skype: tonyzeoli

On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 3:58 PM, Avi Deitcher <[address removed]> wrote:

In theory, at least, this is outsourcing. If you advertise on monster
or careerbuilder or wherever, you get 1,000 resumes. If you spend just
1 minute on each, that is 1,000 minutes or two whole days of work
without break, your eyes go blurry, you have not paid any serious
attention to them, and this is not what you are getting paid to do.
Additionally, you, as a company, don't have good technology to
automatically skim the resumes and look for decent matches to reduce
that by an order of magnitude. Then you need to spend more time on
each of those, do phone screens, general checks, and when they get
your name, they bug you no end. Outsource it to a firm that focuses on
it, and the $20,000-30,000 is actually a very cost-effective way to do
it.

I say "in theory" because most (but not all; no offense to those on
the list) recruiters that work on a contingency basis are far more
clueless than the managers who hire them, as I am sure most people on
this list can attest, either as hiring managers or potential
candidates. The few I have met who really did know their stuff were
those who worked retainer only at the very top VP/CxO/Board levels.

On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 3:49 PM, Andrew <[address removed]> wrote:
> It's simple: far too many people don't know how to, or simply can't,
> interview techies. Good techies are often not good people people, and good
> managers are often not good techies. So, how do you (successfully,
> effectively, productively) interview someone if you either don't understand
> what they do, or don't understand how to interact with and read them?
>
> Thanks-
> - Andy Badera
> - [address removed]

> - (518)[masked]
> - Tech Valley Code Camp[masked]: http://www.techvalleycodecamp.com/
> - Google me: http://www.google.com/search?q=andrew+badera
>
>
>

> On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 3:27 PM, Graham <[address removed]> wrote:
>>
>> Suppose you are a hiring manager looking to fill a position which pays
>> $100,000.? You can employ a recruiter and pay him 20-30% of the jobs
>> compensation in commission ($20-30,000 in this case).? Or you can post the
>> job on Monster, HotJobs, CareerBuilder, etc for $200.? You'll get many more
>> resumes from the posting than you would through the recruiter.? So why is it
>> that, even in this economy, employers are frequently paying 100x what they
>> have to (at least at first glance) to fill an opening?
>>
>> To me this hints at the huge potential of technology in the
>> recruiting/employment business.? Any technolgoy or business process the job
>> boards can improve to bring ther efficacy towards that of a recruiter stands
>> to dramatically improve their margins.? Any technology or process recruiters
>> can use to automate their business can dramatically improve their volumes -
>> and thereby their proftiability.? To the extent we believe "people are the
>> most valuable resource" then solving these problems presents a tremendous
>> opportuinity for a startup to create value.
>>
>> We will be exploring this riddle and some fascinating new technolgies and
>> business models for employment related startups at the next Ultra Light
>> Startups meeting next Thursday.? You should attend if you have a startup in
>> the job/hiring/employment space, if you are a blogger or web publisher who
>> has or has considered adding a job board, or if you are a recruiter pushing
>> the envelope of technology in your industry.
>>
>>
>> http://ultralightstartups.com/newyork/employment-related-business-models.html
>>
>> Hope to see you there!
>>
>> Best regards,
>> Graham.
>>
>>
>>
>>
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>
>
>
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