Slashdot Mirror
When Do You Fire a Headhunter?
Captain Sarcastic writes "I have been a contract programmer for a few years (with some time off when a contract-for-hire paid off and made me a full-time employee). Currently, I'm between projects, but I'm a little worried about one of the contracting companies who's helping me. First off, a little history. "Zeke" (not his real name) was with ABC Contractors (not their real name) when I first met him, and he took my resume and started processing me through the jobs that ABC had available. A bit later, Zeke left, and his replacement Yvonne (standard disclaimer) submitted me to a company (call them "Acme") for a contract-for-hire. Everything looked like a good fit, and she E-mailed me a copy of the resume they submitted to Acme. Came the interview, I realized that Zeke had left out part of my history and had mis-dated other aspects, to keep me from appearing unemployed. Like an idiot, I tried to correct this at the interview, to find out that Acme had decided that I had fabricated all of my experience, and chewed out the rep for ABC for sending an unqualified applicant. Fine, learning experience for me — double-check what the contracting company says about you, and don't try to correct things in the middle of the interview." Read below for the rest of the story. What other difficulties have others gone through with headhunters and when is it time to leave one behind?
A couple months later, Zeke contacted me from his new position with Blue-Sky Consultants (standard disclaimer), and sent me on a couple of interviews. Once again, I found out he'd "corrected" my resume — the same way he did with ABC. I raised the issue with him, and he apologized and said he'd correct the resume, and he's submitted me for other positions, but none seem to have gotten to the interview stage. I suspect that he's not trying very hard, and I wonder if he's soft-pedaling submissions for me to keep his own bosses from recognizing he'd altered my resume. So, I have the following questions:
- Am I suspecting malice and/or clumsiness where a competitive market is the true suspect? (An answer of yes would be harder on my ego, but a relief.)
- Do headhunters modify resumes, and if so, should I just shut up and go with what the headhunter says? (I was always told that eventually, the truth comes out, so I'd be uncomfortable doing that, but life isn't always comfortable.)
- Should I tell Zeke to get lost and stay that way? (I was always told that making enemies unnecessarily was "considered harmful", but I get the impression that Zeke isn't a friend).
- Have fellow Slashdotters dealt with similar situations?
We see dishonesty from head hunters all the time. Personally I'd much rather if there was a mistake on your resume as we have it in front of us, that you point it out. For this reason, it's always good to go to an interview with 5 or so copies of your resume. If you try to cover for the contracting company's rep, now you're starting your relationship with me out by lying and covering something up. Unless you really are trying to cover something up, I guess =).
Especially if you bring correct copies with you, I would easily believe the contracting company misrepresented you. If you're still a fit for the job, I'll be happy to talk to you.
Also, as soon as a contracting company knowingly falsifies data about you or otherwise misrepresents you, make it clear to them that the first time was the last time. If they keep it up, drop them. Unless you're willing to move around the country a lot, there are only so many companies in a given area which are likely to have skill sets that line up with yours. You don't want your contracting company closing doors on you.
Slay a dragon... over lunch!
Should I tell Zeke to get lost and stay that way? (I was always told that making enemies unnecessarily was "considered harmful", but I get the impression that Zeke isn't a friend).
That's not 'unnecessary'... the guy screwed you. Never work with him again, and advise any friends to do the same.
Experience teaches only the teachable. -AH
Find a new agency and go talk to a lawyer. Depending upon the law in your state, you may have grounds to sue the headhunting firm--and not just for money, but for a written apology and retraction to the company that you interviewed with. Your reputation in the market is crucial, and they just screwed yours.
And they wonder why everybody, on both sides of the contract, hates them.
[1] they're paid on commission from the employers - so that's who they "work" for.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
I have owned a recruiting firm (sold it because I miss working in technology) and can tell you that most headhunters do not ever have your interest in mind. They are trying to fill a slot and make a commission from the company, no more. With the current economy you as a job seeker / contractor is a commodity that is fairly easy to find right now and will pass you over pretty quickly with little resistance unless you mean $$ to them.
There are all types of recruiting firms and you have to remember that they are trying to sell the contracting position twice.
1) You to the company
2) The company to you
The best advice I can give you is no matter what they tell you they are a sales people and to be cordial but always realize that they are there for one reason to place a body in position and reap the rewards. Also never put your eggs in one basket. Make contacts with many firms and find how/what fits for you.
I hope this helps!
If it isn't broke, tinker with it till it is!
I follow the three-head rule; if you can't give me three heads shrunken down and stitched up to my QA-Approved Design Specifications, then pack up your grass skirt and nose-bone buddy!
"When I am king, you will be first against the wall..."
Always take a copy of your CV or resume to an interview: I've yet to be interviewed somewhere where the agency hasn't "tweaked" my CV in some way or another (and I've been on the receiving end as well - we were looking for a PHP programmer and the agency sent someone with a good looking CV - apart from the fact they had changed all mentions of Java to PHP: totally misrepresenting the candidate). Plus it's useful to have your own CV to refer to "just in case".
Alternatively, don't forget to promote yourself on sites such as http://linkedin.com/ and http://careers.stackoverflow.com/ - build up your own client base and get to keep the 10-25% the agency "skims" for just download bunches of CVs from job sites, adding their logo and sending them on.
No matter what the headhunter or someone else does, your integrity is attached to you as an individual. If you are dishonest, nobody thinks 'ABC contractor is dishonest', they think 'Captain Sarcastic is dishonest', and that follows you when you leave ABC. In fact, if they are being dishonest or even just reckless with the truth, I would avoid association with ABC; that also might follow you wherever you go.
You also should demonstrate good judgment by avoiding embarrassing ABC, but if pressed, just say 'I'm sorry, there must have been some miscommunication, my real experience is ...' or 'there must be some mistake, let me get you a corrected resume'. Don't speculate on ABC's motives, which you probably don't know anyway. (and don't need to know; intentionally or not, ABC is unreliable). Even silently allowing important mistatements to pass is deceitful.
Integrity is a necessary trait for anyone I work with. Others certainly don't mind or even admire someone who can deceive effectively; if someone like that hires you, you know what to expect from them.
Specialized headhunters sometimes do the job properly. At least here they have the decency to ask for a pdf-based CV and copy it by hand into their database. They also usually don't have any concrete numbers for a salary, they just send you to the company and they get paid by the companies for this.
Courts have said that they can fire you without recourse and rescind any bonuses if they hired you based on a bogus resume. And that has happened repeatedly. If they find out, you may never work again; at least not in that field. Not worth the risk.
Let me get this right, for almost 39 weeks now, we've been seeing an additional 500,000 people unemployed every two weeks. I can't pick up a paper without reading about more layoffs...
Rather than answer the question, I'd like to pose another one: Why are headhunters even needed?
I am an employer. I can't imagine using a headhunter right now. Why? Because there are millions of people to choose from. I don't need help finding people at all. There are more jobs than people. Call me when there are more people than jobs. That's when I need (and will pay for) a headhunter. I am 100% certain I am not alone.
Methinks the headhunters are duping people into thinking there are more opportunities than there really are. I mean just stop for a second and think about the entire headhunting business: the employer pays a recruiter to go find him qualified candidates. Note, the employer pays for this service (usually 1 months salary, ymmv)
Who the hell is doing that right now? Answer: nobody.
It just an industry that is currently unnecessary. Surely, it will be needed again. But not for a while. Anyone using one to currently find a job is probably doing worse than they could do on their own. So the answer to TFA is: fire them now.
We have a few recruiters sending us resumes. The only time we ever get good people from them are when there are lots of people sending us resumes directly. This puts us in the situation where we have to decide between someone with an artificially inflated salary and significantly higher risk profile if they quit in that first year.
We also have the very real risk that the recruiter starts playing both sides of the game and going after our employees. Far too many of them are really unethical.
We now just try and spam-block them on email and phone systems it has gotten so bad.
Always do leg work yourself and never rely on just a recruiter. More leg work gives you much better exposure than a recruiter ever will. But I am in a different industry (consulting engineering), so YMMV.
If you are lying to a company in order to satisfy some requirement of theirs you think might be silly, then they probably aren't a good fit for you anyway.
Overselling yourself is just going to make life hard for yourself. We've hired a number of people who have oversold themselves and I think some do so because they are cocky (blah, how hard could it be?), or because they are simply ignorant of what the job entails. They flounder and eventually get let go.
Find companies that share your sensibilities and be honest with them about what you can do and where you want to go in the long term.
You can use what every euphemism you want... doctoring, massaging, fluffing, polishing, etc the resume (they're all as dirty as they sound). Potential employers all call it *lying*. There are several things you need to keep in mind here.
1. You probably just killed any chance of getting hired with that company, ever. If you walk into an interview and impress them, they'll usually keep you on a short list and even try to find appropriate matches for you. If you lie (doesn't matter if it was you or the headhunter), you go on the black list.
2. HR departments may not talk to each other but technical staff certainly do. I'm originally from the DFW area and it's basically six degrees of telecom employment. If you make a substantial impression, good or bad, other people are going to find out about it.
3. Ultimately... represent yourself. It's a lot more work, but you pick who you engage and how you engage them. You're going to pick engagements that benefit you. Headhunters don't care... the want their cut and then they move on. If you're serious about contracting you need to build personal relationships and trade on that reputation.
Finally, I'd report these clowns to the BBB. If you have a good relationship with a lawyer you might want to get their opinion on this. The headhunter is acting as an agent on your behalf and if they doctored your resume you may actually have some legal recourse (IANAL).
Not only have courts said it, it happens all the time. My wife (a human incarnation of Catbert) has fired maybe 20 people over the last decade because they lied on their application paperwork.
Normally it plays out that something questionable happens and the employee starts to get scrutinized. Then looky, looky, they lied on their application and are a problem. Time for security to walk them out of the building...
You correct it. You take your lumps with this employer. And you drop the guy who hacked your resume.
It's OK so shorten your resume. It's not OK to falsify anything on it.
You should have dropped 'em the first time. Now that you know this guy fakes resumes you should never touch him again.
You may be having trouble now because there's two versions of your resume getting to some HR departments and you're flagged as a fake. If you keep getting no-replies you may need to include a cover letter explaining that a(n unnamed) headhunter had previously "enhanced" your resume and circulated this false version, that this one is true and correct, and you no longer do business with him.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
There are more jobs than people. Call me when there are more people than jobs. That's when I need (and will pay for) a headhunter.
Riiing
dude.. if Zeke or whatever submitted your resume to us, and we decided we liked you enough to bring you on, we'd do a background check (we're obligated to, due to the nature of our work, and the Federal regs around the kind of people we can hire). we'd check those references independent of your headhunter. if there was an inconsistency (like the dates for your previous jobs) we'd fire you on the spot.. like escort you from the building, we'll send your stuff along in a week or so fired.
Zeke is not only costing you work, but he's costing his company money too.
dump him.
Most of the Headhunters I went to asked if they could tweak my resume. Most of them added things that were (at best) stretching the truth. Some of them did do some things (formatting, wording) that I liked which I integrated into my permanent resume. A few times after not looking into their changes enough I got called into interviews and had them ask about my experience with . Those moments were quite embaressing and needless to say I did not land those positions. I'd call the Headhunter and tell them not to have that on my resume and they would say "I thought you knew Java. OH! Javascript! I'm sorry. I thought they were the same" or something of the like. Ugh.
The last headhunter I dealt with got me a job in about two days. I was hurting for a job and was pretty darn happy at the speed in which he got me into his office, got me in to see the client, and got me employed. It was going to pay $37/hour. Nice. I went to my first week on the job, liked the environment, and generally got along fairly well with the people. My first check was a live check (until they got direct deposit set up) and I eagerly awaited it, as I was getting pretty low on money. I opened it and....wow. What did I claim on my taxes for it to be this low? Hmmmm, taxes don't seem that out of whack. Maybe I didn't get paid for the entire week yet. No, all my hours are on there. What is this? Hourly rate....$21.00.
I called the Headhunter and him and his secretary both "Clearly Remembered" that he said Twenty One and would not have said Thirty Seven. He told me I could ask the company I was working for if they wanted to pay me more, but he guessed that would upset them at this point. I cursed at myself for making a handshake agreement, sent out some more resumes, but went back to work. After a month of being there my boss sat me down to ask me what I thought of the place. I was doing a really nice job and they were really happy with me. I told him that I liked the company and figured I'd just throw out the information about the headhunter and my salary. He just about hit the roof. He grabbed the contract out of his file cabinet, called the headhunter, and asked him about my pay. Apparently he had a written contract indicating how much the Headhunter would be payed and how much the employee would pay. Those numbers were more in line with what I had expected. By the next week after some phone calls between my employer and the Head Hunter, I was out of my contract and hired on as a "permanent" employee at $37/hour but with no health benefits until I had a year with the company. I was really pleased at how the company went to bat for me despite being there for only a month. I'm in my fourth year with them now. ;)
d'oh...got it backwards. That's what I get for posting late on Fridays
Well, I was working with a headhunter, and everything was cool till I found out he called a place I was interviewing at to see if they needed any assistance filling that position that I was applying for. That was it for me.
Let me get this right, for almost 39 weeks now, we've been seeing an additional 500,000 people unemployed every two weeks. I can't pick up a paper without reading about more layoffs...
Rather than answer the question, I'd like to pose another one: Why are headhunters even needed?
I am an employer. I can't imagine using a headhunter right now. Why? Because there are millions of people to choose from. I don't need help finding people at all. There are more jobs than people. Call me when there are more people than jobs. That's when I need (and will pay for) a headhunter. I am 100% certain I am not alone.
I am a manager at a large Fortune 500 company, and I have hired a fair number of people for accounting positions in the company. I certainly won't rule out a person who is out of work, but I certainly have a bias towards people still in their job. Here is what goes through my head when I see a person applying for my position who is unemployed:
a) Where they fired for cause?
b) Were they laid off, and thus at the bottom of the performance rankings at their previous company?
c) If they quit (to find another job), isn't their judgement sound enough to stay with their current job until they find another?
If your spouse has taken a job in another city, and you are the "trailing spouse", the question of unemployment (in the new city) is easy to answer....and I don't mind hiring such an individual.
If your previous company has outsourced the entire department to another country or location, that is also a very easy answer.
But your answer needs to address the three questions I posed. If you cannot satisfactorily answer them, I will probably lean towards hiring the guy who currently has a job (assuming you have similar qualifications). That is because you pose a risk to me (I am afraid you might be a problem employee), while I can be more confident that the guy who is currently employed can keep a job and perform.
Best wishes.
If your HR department is unable to understand the hiring manager's needs, it's precisely in this economy that you can use the help separating the wheat from the chaff: Do you really want to go through 800 job applications? It's easy to spend a lot of time going through applicants. In a small company, spending much time in the preliminary steps of hiring might have higher opportunity costs than hiring someone else to do that for you. A good headhunter has interviewed each applicant he gets, and might be able to save you a lot of time.
The problem is figuring out who the quality headhunters are in the first place. Someone that sends you a fake resume from an applicant is a good headhunter, period.
You're never given a second chance at a first impression.
Your headhunter has placed you and your prospective employer in a difficult situation and you are the canon-fodder. If you can't trust your headhunter to honestly represent you then you need not work with them.
I, too, am a contract programmer currently between gigs. If some headhunter calls you and says you're Mr. Wonderful but refuses to pay travel expenses for your interviews then don't even entertain them. Find out before you are submitted to the client because if you are submitted first and then refuse to pay an $800.00 air fair for a Face-to-Face then you are screwed and will never get a F2F with the client. One, you are not guaranteed the position so you'd be out $800.00 based on conjecture. Very hollow, indeed. And, two; being doubly-submitted is very taboo. Depending on whether you signed a right-to-represent from the headhunter they could take you to court which makes you a risk to the prospective employer. Which leads me to my next topic.
NEVER sign a right-to-represent without fully reading the entire document. If you must sign, then ENSURE that the right-to-represent is ONLY with the single client position for which you are being submitted. Some headhunter houses are *very* shady. These hunters will, and have, sued people for not using them to get positions at locations in or around cities in which the headhunter-house operates. It has happened. Sure, it's a scam; but, desperate contractors do fall for the scam and lose out on large amounts of money. (Mostly, it's small claims court; so, usually $5000.00. No need to bring in those meddlesome attorneys.)
NDAs. Don't sign NDAs with companies simply for an interview. I did this. Epic fail on my part. Basically, I was creating similar systems on my own that a company in Missouri was creating. I, arrogantly, thought I was a shoe-in. I didn't get the job and for a period of two years I am contractually restricted from creating like-devices for that industry. Recently, the company began looking for more people. When I inquired to one of my trustworthy Head Hunters he told me who it was. He informed me that they're not looking for anyone they've already interviewed. Honest and OK enough. I asked him if they hired anyone the first time around and he said, "No, they didn't." Imagine my surprise.
Save your NDA signing for when you have already been given an offer of employment and it has been accepted.
Last and certainly not least: Never discuss your offered positions with other Head Hunters. If they find out what position you are being represented for by another head hunter they will attempt to undercut you and you will never get the job. Need an example: Here. I know a guy who was traveling to his next assignment. One of his head hunters called and began talking to him about his situation. He informed the HH that he was going to start work in 1 week at company X, 600 miles away for $X.00. They spoke for about 10 minutes. The next day the contractor that got him the job called and told him not to come as the client found somebody else cheaper.
Moral of all this: Don't slit your own throat. Lose lips sink ships.
I can tell you that having dealt with headhunters from both sides, as an employee, and as the person doing the hiring, I hate the bad ones no less regardless of my current role. I have quit good jobs because the contracting company I was working through were being jackasses. I hated to do it, but it had to be done. The problem from the interviewers side is, even if they like you, you've pointed out that the contracting company misrepresented you to them. That means that the contracting company is disreputable, and they likely won't want to do business with them anymore. If they hire you, they have to continue to do business with them, and deal with potential issues that will arise between them and the contracting company, and you and the contracting company. Unfortunately, they typically can't just circumvent the contracting company at this stage, so you might not get the job, simply because they don't like the contracting company. The two of you get hired or passed up as a team, so you need to work as a team. They need to understand that if they place you somewhere you're not happy, it won't last, so they're better off putting you somewhere you're going to be happy, and to do that, it involves working together and not lying about things to either side. As a side note, I tell every headhunter before they submit me to any job that they are not permitted to change my resume in any way. I've never had them say no to that request, however, they have gone ahead and changed it once, in which case I informed them I was no longer interested in the position. Contracting companies/headhunters work for you, which you seem to get, now the second part you need to get is that there's a million of them out there, and they're all fighting over you and the positions, they aren't in a position to pull that kind of crap, and you should be sure to let them know.
I can count to 1023 on my hands. Ask me about #132.
Some cautionary tales
http://world.std.com/~swmcd/steven/crypt/recruiters.html
You're assuming that the headhunter is even mildly competent in the field of interest that they're trying to fill the job for.
Most of them think:
So, where do these people come from? If you haven't figured it out by now, they're RealtWhores who ended up in a different job. Just like RealtWhores, they almost always add no value, you can't expect them to be honest because their interests conflict with yours, it's ultimately all about "getting the listing", and with the Internet, they're quickly becoming obsolete.
Why redact the headhunter and headhunting firm's name from your story? If the facts are true it seems they should stand on their own merits. I say spill their name and let it serve as a warning to all. Even better, submit your story with all of the relevant facts to The Consumerist.
It's true no man is an island, but if you take a bunch of dead guys and tie 'em together, they make a good raft.
...and your friendly headhunters got 20 more contracts thanks to "good work" they did on these people's resumes.
1. Modify guy's resume
2. Send him in.
3. Profit!
4. ???
5. Guy gets fired for fake resume
6. goto 1
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
It's a familiar attitude, and the reason I don't work in the computer industry here in Japan any more.
Waterfall? eXtreme Agile? UML?
You can't run a project period, if you don't have some kind of idea what your human resources really are.
I know what the theory is, you don't really know anyway. Geeks tend to be too negative about some of the things they've experienced. Teamwork attitude is more important than experience. Positive Mental Attitude Conquers All.
Money exceeds all reasons, especially sleep, and you really didn't want to see your family anyway, way deep down inside.
I just got tired of the games, and tired of the death marches.
Lying about experience is a really good way to help start death marches, not coincidentally.
Why did I leave? Why don't I go back?
I was back on the job market after one particularly gruesome death march experience, and an outsourcing company arranged for what looked like my dream job. I really wanted that job, but I had bad vibes about it. My wife also had bad dreams. When I told this outsourcing company about the bad dreams, they thought higher pay would make it up for me or something. That was where the illusion tore, and I took a good look at all the lies and the real reasons for all the death marches I've been on, and I realized that I've just been too willing to try to go along with the hype.
I'll still go along with the idea that there is a difference between being honest and being negative, but I'd rather try to support my family on a single man's wages, teaching English, than get back into the industry with a dressed up resume again.
Lately, I've been thinking about undressing my resume. Paring it down, admitting that all the peripheral experience was peripheral, and focusing on what I can really do. It should be a lot harder for the headhunters to dress up a focused resume, and I'll have fewer meaningless interviewers from people who are interested in the side stuff.
Since the teaching job puts food on the table (except for the summer), I can afford to look for work I can really do, instead of wildly grabbing at stuff I might be able to do, if given the chance.
Computer memory is just fancy paper, CPUs just fancy pens with fancy erasers; the 'net is just a fancy backyard fence.
Hey, if we want to go hardcore, let's sign our CVs with OpenPGP. Let them try to alter something then!
I replied to a job description which specified "minimum, six years Java experience".
Java had only been around for four years.
I asked them whether they were negotiable on the experience, or if they'd mind me calling them back in a couple of years.
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