Getting past the Agencies

poppy9_2

Just been speaking to a friend who has had more dealings with agencies (when he ran his own business).

Apparently tell them you want a little more money than the position has advertised.

They only put the higher paid candidates forward because they make more commission from them.

In response to the above poster, this is ridiculous. As if a few thousand makes much difference to our commission! We put the best candidates forward in order to protect our reputation with our client.

Louise22

Strider590 wrote: »

Just been speaking to a friend who has had more dealings with agencies (when he ran his own business).

Apparently tell them you want a little more money than the position has advertised.

They only put the higher paid candidates forward because they make more commission from them.

surprise surprise eh?

hayley11

poppy9 wrote: »

I am a recruitment consultant and lots of you posters don't seem to understand how we work. We are paid a fat fee because our clients trust us to interview candidates personally and asses both their competency for the role as well as their personality and whether they are likely to fit in with the team.
The clients trust us because we have built up a strong relationship with them by regular meetings which have given rise to a deep understanding of the culture of the company. This is precisely why clients use agencies rather then advertising themselves and having to sift through hundreds of CVs of candidates who may on paper look suitable, but personality-wise are unlikely to be.

We spend an hour with each candidate and are given ongoing training around our area of expertise. For example, I am an ex-accountant and recruit accountants now, so clearly I am qualified to interview job seekers and ask appropriate questions.

Don't tar all recruitment consultants with the same brush. When I read some of the posts here, they do smack of bitterness at not having found a job yet.

I'm personally not looking for a job, I'm referring to a lot of past experience. And I don't think people are saying these things out of bitterness, I think they are sharing their experiences and most just happen to be quite negative. But that isn't our fault, it's the agencies fault.

I know there will be some good consultants out there and I do think specialist ones are likely to be better than ones that hire for all jobs, mainly because they do have an understanding of the industry and what the job requires. I haven't ever dealt with one though so can't say for sure.

I don't really believe that companies use agencies because they trust them to choose somebody suitable, I think it's more to do with them doing all the leg work.

One company I used to work for started using an agency while I worked there, I was the team leader in our office so had quite a lot to do with them and my manager said herself she used them because she hated going through all the CV's and at least this way she'd have less to look through. She didn't trust their judgement better than her own and we had a nightmare with them to be honest. They sent one guy to temp for two weeks who was so over qualified he walked out after a few hours and then another woman who had no computer experience at all, what fun that was :rolleyes:

The only positive thing I can say about an agency is they sent my OH to temp for the above mentioned company and that's how we met

I'm not tarring all consultants with the same brush, I am merely talking about the ones I have met.

Louise22

Same here - I said before that i had not met any decent agents like the ones that seem to be posting in this thread - maybe there arent many out there. As Hayley said, just sharing our experiences and unfortunately, they are all negative. I am not bitter because i don't have a job - I do.

Fragments_Of_Sanity

Aren't judgements on personality subjective anyway? I thought that's why a lot of the time interview panels have more than one person on them. Also, your personality when having a conversation with someone about your work might not fully convey your persona WHILE working, it's a tricky one.

I've not had any dealings with agencies, I'm just interested in this because I was maybe going to approach some to get some temping work in the summer, and found this discussion about how personality and the Agent's judgement of this being so pivotal rather curious. Does seem ever so slightly to be a bit of an ego/power trip going on there.

Louise22

I would never use one again. Just my opinion though.

DCFC79

Louise22 wrote: »

I would never use one again. Just my opinion though.

im being a little sceptical about them as well, was once sent on a wild goose chase for a job that didnt exist

Louise22

DCFC79 wrote: »

im being a little sceptical about them as well, was once sent on a wild goose chase for a job that didnt exist

Thats terrible - no wonder you are having your doubts! That has happened to a lot of people I know. Complete waste of your time and gets your hopes up.

Strider590

Nothing could be more annoying than chasing fake jobs when I could be better off putting my effort into something else.

Why do they insist on telling us lies? why can't they just say "sorry the position has been filled", instead of the kinda rubbish excuses they make?

The phone call, why do they do this? what is the purpose? they don't ask anything usefull and they make a judgement on what your like based on this?
Why do they hate to hear from people who are ambitious? surely if that person does well and moves up within the company, that makes them (agency) look good?

mountainofdebt

If everything is the fault of people applying for jobs for which they are clearly unsuitable why is it that the recruitment agency in my town has had the same jobs advertised in the windows for the last 3 months?

If these jobs have been filled - why not remove them?

Why promise that the consultant will call back and then don't?