montreal mike

Headhunters are a necessary evil. Alas, they are part and parcel of the process of finding a job. They work for the employer not the employee. They rarely have your best interests at heart since they make their living placing the most suitable (not necessarily the best or most deserving) candidate.

They know all the tricks of the trade. They will often speak to you about jobs which do not even exist. They do so to build up an inventory of potential candidates just in case at some future stage an opportunity arises. They will shamelessly ask you to give them names and contacts of people who might be looking for jobs and this in order to build up their own network. They may even ask you more on the company you work for right now (if you are intending to leave) or the one you just left, so as to try to get the company as a new client.

Many times they will work on spec. In other words several headhunters try to fill the same job.

When you are being seen, often not in total privacy, you realise they have not even read your CV and it is irritating to see they have not even done their homework. Often you will be expected to come with a printed copy of your CV in case they can’t find it.

They will operate in great secrecy not even telling you who the company is. So they will send away your CV to some outfit and you do not even know where it will end up. On the other hand you might not care. Other times they enjoy playing lawyer brazenly citing client confidentiality. That can be legit but I have always suspected they are scared one might approach the company directly.

It would be naïve to figure they always take into account your feelings, ambitions, objectives. They will simply determine, in their minds, whether or not you are a 'reasonable fit'. If they place you and it doesn’t end well in the first 6 months they are stuck with replacing you. Thus they try to be careful always taking into account their best interests, not yours.

I must have dealt with at least 50 in all my years and I have rarely been impressed. However I would not go so far as to call them all corporate whores. I have rarely met any with any great education. I also have met a few who couldn’t make it in the corporate world working in the HR (Human Resources) function. (HR can also stand for Human Remains).

In case some here feel I have been unfair and exhibit a negative bias, please don't be shy. I would like to hear from you.

If you are in agreeement, in whole or in part, please say so.

And if I have forgotten anything, whether nice or nasty, please let us know.

Howard1944

Mike, much of what you say is true because the nature of the business demands making commissions, so they have to be a little on the ruthless side to survive.

Networking is still the best way to get a job, I could ask my reps who they liked or pay a recruiter $12,000 for a list of names.

Most important in the process, the employee should ask hard questions, do your homework before you arrive,make sure it is the kind of company you want to be with.

Quitting after 6 months sends up warning signals.

Taught My Sons, after the interview, to ask if there is any reason that you can think of why you would not be considered, then send follow up communication thanking for interview and reiterating your desire to join the company.

montreal mike

Hi there howard

I suspect there are many here who just don't realise whose side the headhunter is on. But when reality sets in (I too was once young and naive) it makes the relationship a lot more manageable. Mind you I do not fault these people. It is mostly, if not all, commission-based and we live in a dawg-eat-dawg world. There is no room for sentimentality. Let's face it: to them it is just a way of making a living.

Judy in Calgary

I agree with most of what montreal mike said about head hunters.

However, I strongly recommend that you always treat head hunters politely. You don't ever want to get onto a head hunter's "black list." You don't know what harm it will do to your name behind the scenes.

Howard1944

Judy, I think it is called burning bridges behind you.

live to ski

Whilst still in UK, I tried to find a Vancouver based recruitment consultant to help us find jobs in Vancouver, but the only one I could charged $5,000 for the priviledge.

Took a bit of work but managed to find companies in our industries out here in the end on my own.

Irony is that I'm still getting emails from recruiters in the UK saying that they've "just come across my CV........." goodness only knows where.

So seems like the recruitment industry hasn't made it this far west yet, or at leat in engineering

R I C H

As a previously employed head hunter (IT start up companies), my thoughts and comments are below....

Hope that offers a persepctive from 'the other side'. BTW, it's been 10yrs since I was in that industry, so perhaps things have changed over time.....?

montreal mike

R I C H .. I appreciate your POV. Honestly I do.

I have given my experience, some 40 years, but then again what I write is not gospel. And of course I am not paranoid, just skeptical and realistic. I am weary of some people especially when I know full well they are putting their interests ahead of mine.

As to a CV ending up where it shouldn't, well I have a story to tell so please bear with me. Many years ago someone I knew saw a headhunter in hopes of switching jobs. This was done in confidence or so he assumed. A few days later, perhaps it was a week later, he saw a job advertised in the local paper. He was suspicious as it was an exact match and he then thought to himself 'that is my job'. Days later his boss called him in, showed him the same advert, and told him that since he wasn't happy where he was the company had decided to replace him. He was given two weeks pay and escorted off the premises. He could not figure it out as he had said nothing to anyone and was discreet by nature. Well he found another job and many years later ran into the department's typist at a shopping centre. She had also left the company to get married and have kids. They had coffee and talked about old times. She then confided that years earlier a headhunter had mailed a copy of his CV to his old firm. They got wind of it and he effectively walked the plank. Of course he never knew whether this was intentional or a ghastly mistake. So much for confidentiality.

My attitude is that if one is looking for a job and goes see a headhunter well just hope it will all remain secret but don't count on it.

R I C H

For sure, Mike. I understand the pitfalls, and no doubt that your experiences mirror what I occasionally saw in the industry too. There's no sure-fire way of protecting yourself, but I'd suggest that the contract you sign with the headhunter, the 'feeling' you get about their approach and professionalism, and most importantly their reputation are the key things to look out for when you engage with one. It's an industry that's poorly regulated and unfortunately some businesses are run by less than thorough individuals.

montreal mike

Myself I never was required to sign a contract with any of them since I didn't pay them.

As for reputation, from what I have seen there is a high turnover, these places come and go.

There are of course the more prestigious ones, those who operate out of tall office buildings, with fancy offices and big rents and overhead. Problem there is that unless one is going for a job in at least the $100K plus range they won't even look at you. These are the same outfits that are liable to have a resident industrial psychologist on staff, one who delights in putting you through all those nonsensical tests just to make sure you are well glued together. The biggest joke of all however are these so called outplacement centres, who purpose in life is to make sure those who have been laid off, through no fault of their own, are provided a decent chance to find a new job before their severance package runs out. Companies pay big bicks to these people and for what I do not know.

But having said all that I realise that headhunters are a fact of life and are yet just another way of finding work.

R I C H

The contracts we asked clients (job seekers) to sign were purely to make sure both parties understood what services were being offered, how the relationship was being maanged, the companies that we'd target on their behalf etc. It had nothing to do with money being charged to the job seeker.

You're correct about staff turnover, it's pretty high from what I saw. The nature of the clients I worked with was that they paid us a yearly retainer fee to engage our head-hunting services on an exclusive basis, whenever their staffing needs required it. We generally dealt with IT sales/marketing staff, rarely below national manager or director level, so base salaries were generally well in excess of $150k. Every company has it's niche, and that was ours. Never used psychological profiling/testing though - that was always left to the potential employer to arrange if they deemed it necessary.

Notiaink...honest

I loooooove head hunters. After all, thats how I came to this marvelous country.

A friend at my old work was looking to come to canada, but there was nothing for him work wise, however somehow my name came up, and here I am.

You have to treat what they say with some cynicism, but they have a job to do. And Judy is right, dont burn bridges.

Rob_999

Headhunters / recruiters go in the same bucket as Realtors. A necessary evil.... If you understand whats motivating them, and they understand whats motivating you, then it's easy to manage the situation.

Of course it all depends on the company/individual you're dealing with... Mike sounds like you've dealt with some bad ones!

As for uneducated, that really depends on what level, when hiring temporary accounting staff, the recruiters are clueless. But when hiring a senior permanent position, the recruiters need to know what they're talking about - most are CAs with good industry experience.

Daedra

Right just read through this thread and must say that my relatively recent experience with recruiters over the past 6 years compared to his decades of experience is very near the same.

I realise that perhaps due to my profession I was not in the 100K+ earners brackets to illicit such ethical headhunters as R I C H but sadly, many of us white collars are only on the 13-30K annually and there seems to be no lack of recruiters for our gendre (probably why we're considered 'middle class' or to some 'lower middle class')

Personally, I have have rarely had any recruiter tell me the name of the company they were sending my CV to (of course it was their own revamped version of my CV which I never got to see!!) and over 3 years I've had 5 different instinances of recruiters sending my CV to companies who had already recieved/interviewed me.... how that benefits the recruiters I dont know... seems to me it makes them & me look like d!cks! Just bloody tell your candidate what company your planning on sending it to and that way they can tell you 'no no, already been put forward/interviewed by them' but noooo instead they make themselves & the candidates look like idiots!

For the ones that DID tell me the company names, they also completely ignored the criteria I set forth and completely wasted my time & money (travel expenses not to mention the companies staff time in interviewing me!) by putting me forward for positions for far less minimum wage then I was asking or for companies way out of easy travel range that I requested.

I can not tell you the hundreds of phone calls I was enduring each month from recruiters, very often presenting potential jobs that did NOT fit my requested profile (ie, too low pay, too far away, not qualified for etc) when I was in full swing of looking... they all seem to get your name & contact details from public job websites like Monster & pass it on to one another or something!

My worst horror story being, speaking to a recruitment agent one day about a potential averageish potential permanent job and she says she'll send my CV to the company (of course not telling me who!) and my telling her I am moving house the following day and will be unavaidable the whole day.

Next day, 9:15am when we're just starting to pile boxes into the rented moving van, she calls and leaves a message... 9 :30am she calls again and leaves another (urgent) message... 10am she text's my mobile (urgent please call me)... I text her back reminding her I am not avaidable today as I am moving & that I will be in contact the following day. 10:15am another call & voice message that its really urgent she speak to me, she got my text but can I please call her back asap. 10:30am another text message saying to call her urgent asap. 11am I answer her call and ask her what part of being not avaidable today did she not understand... she apologises and asks if we can meet in the town centre in a couple of hours time?! :curse: I say no, as I have said since the day before, I am NOT avaidable today as I am moving house. She texts me again at 11:30am saying client has been in contact and wants to meet with me this afternoon.... anyone else getting ready to cock the shotgun & point & shoot by this point?!

That was 2 years ago and must say I have ALOT less patience with these agencies then I used to... they might feed you fancy lines that they are there to help the potential employees but thats a bloody load of bull unless your on a really nice advantage with wage etc... in general, I will never EVER believe they are there to benefit me in any other way then me using & discarding them just as they do their supposed 'favorite' candidates (heard that from almost every one of them even though only 2 or 3 of the dozen ever even put appropriate jobs forward for my consideration) it us complete tripe and yes, be polite but do NOT believe a bloody word of it & look out for numero uno (YOU!) if they dont like it, stuff em!

live to ski

Sounds like there a big difference between Head-Hunters and Recruiters, and it is usually something to do with whether your salary hits the 100k mark.

On a lighter note, I had another email from a UK based recruiter this morning who I've never had any dealings with before saying that she's found me a perfect junior engineering role in Croydon, but my mobile doesn't appear to be working.

Now what are the chances of me giving up my intermediate role, and better paid role in Vancouver with the most amazing view of North Shore and the chance to go sailing or skiing after work, for a view (if I am lucky) of the Wellesley Road, Whitgift Centre, Nestle or East Croydon Station, and to be at the mercy of either TfL or the M25 after work!