What is your experience with recruitment agencies?

ozma83

What do you think of recruitment agencies? Are they useful? What is your experience with them (if you had any)?

I just went to register with one, the lady told me to send in my CV, then she called and said that she might have a position, but she's worried I might not be experienced enough for it (apparently it requires somebody highly experienced in photoshop).

She said she managed to get me registered anyway, but that in terms of salary I shouldn't expect a lot because "even people with 5 years experience have to be lucky to get 20 000 a year".

I am completely flexible, I really need a job and I am surely not going to be all difficult if someone offered less than that, not at all, but is it so wrong to have aspirations?

geoffky

pure scum and leech from poorly paid people...pathetic...

westv

My experience?

Bullsh*t, bullsh*t followed by even more bullsh*t! :mad:

InsideInsurance

They are a necessary evil irrespective if you are an employer or a potential employee but like almost everyone with "agent" in their title they are ultimately self serving and not really an agent for either party.

They do however get to hear about roles before they get into the public information, and in many cases are advertised exclusively through agencies. They do go with the quick wins so if you're wanting to change career, push your boundaries etc they generally wont put you forward unless they dont have anyone better. If you want to work in certain industries or with certain companies its worth trying to find out which agencies are on Preferred Supplier Lists as these will have access to the roles and straight forward processes. Others will be speculative in nature and so both later to the party and potential for you to "get the job" but then not because the agency and the company cannot agree terms for the remuneration for the agency.

You need to keep in contact with them fairly regularly as you will quickly drop out of mind and I've yet to find an agency that is very good at searching their internal lists of candidates.

magenta22

Surely she would register you with them regardless of the role she 'might' have and your experience. If you are not, they can't put you forward for anything.

My experience of agencies....... well, difficult one. Most of my temp roles have been via agencies but on the whole I don't find them that helpful and when you find on recruitment consultant who is, they usually leave!

I find that you contact them and if you are lucky you just get 'thanks for the update' I wouldn't say they go out of their way to be helpful and you have to keep pestering them which then they get fed up with and moan about.

When you see a role advertised, usually it's already been filled before they even put it on the website which irritates me.

It's the old thing though, they need us and we need them.

scheming_gypsy

I love em. As well as getting me all my work, they make thick people rant because they can't understand the concept of how things work.

GotToChange

There is a very wide gulf between -

Recruitment Consultant

and

Employment Agency


WRT to the latter - I would simply say
Non-.Existent.Jobs

(*Scheming gypsy - you are pathetic)

scheming_gypsy

GotToChange wrote: »

(*Scheming gypsy - you are pathetic)

and you're clearly a moron.

ozma83

Eh, there is always somebody who just barges into other people's posts to insult freely just because they are unhappy with their life and want to feel better. Scheming gypsy's post is of no use to anybody and therefore can safely and cheerily be ignored.

scheming_gypsy

ozma83 wrote: »

Eh, there is always somebody who just barges into other people's posts to insult freely just because they are unhappy with their life and want to feel better.

I agree, 'got to change' really does have to change instead of barging in to other peoples threads and being insulting.

Scheming gypsy's post is of no use to anybody and therefore can safely and cheerily be ignored.

the topic is 'what's your experience....' and that's my experience. They get me all my work and i enjoy laughing at the people who can't grasp the concept that they work for the agency, and therefor what the agency charges has nothing to do with their wage.

dandelionclock30

My experience of agencies is that they promise you the earth and then deliver nothing! Last year I facilitated a group of unemployed adults on Jobsearch methods and we all discussed agencies.The group was varied between skilled and unskilled people,nobody had a good word to say and one person said Bloodsuckers- and that basically sums it up.