A Recruitment Consultant's perspective

smyla_2

Hi,
I've read this forum for a while now, but not posted before. I've seen a few posts that suggest lots of people are fed up with the behaviour of agency staff and recruitment companies. I'm not here to defend this industry, and I'd be the first to admit that not everyone working in this field acts with honesty and integrity, but hopefully a perspective "from the other side" might at least explain why we do what we do....
I've been in recruitment now for several years and I've seen the best and worst of it. It always disappoints me that so many people seem to get no response, not even an acknowledgement, when they apply, through an agency, for a job. Occasionally (less than 10% of the time) I don't reply to applications (more on the reasons, below), but what is much worse is when people hear nothing after an interview. It's only a small subset of applicants that ever get to interview stage, so there is no excuse for not staying in touch and letting people have feedback. Sometimes the hiring company don't get back to us with feedback, but it's our job to chase them if that happens, and to keep candidates in the loop. I can't imagine how frustrating it must be just to hear nothing. I can only suggest that agencies that behave like this are the lowest of the low, and perhaps the way to deal with them is to let the hiring company know how incompetent their agent is, as they are paying their fees!!
I mentioned above that occasionally I don't reply to all job applicants. The only time I do this is in the following situations;
If it turns out that a job ad generates hundreds and hundreds of applicants, it becomes impossible to read them all, let alone reply to them. What I will do if this happens is firstly amend the ad to make it clear that unfortunately, unsuccesful candidates will not be contacted due to the volume of applicants, and I will then use a keyword search mechanism to check all the CV's and highlight those that have specific keywords that are of interest (e.g. Excel, payroll, graduate....) - these will then be reviewed and short-listed - So if you are applying for a role that is likely to be over-subscribed, make sure your CV contains keywords that reflect the requirements of the role.
The other time I don't respond to individual applicants, is when the CV is clearly completely inappropriate (a receptionist applying for a Financial Director role). I figure that if someone can't be bothered to read the job requirements, I can't be bothered to reply.
There's so much more I could say, but I have to go and do some work!
Hope this helps.....
Smyla

DVardysShadow

smyla wrote: »

I will then use a keyword search mechanism to check all the CV's and highlight those that have specific keywords that are of interest (e.g. Excel, payroll, graduate....) - these will then be reviewed and short-listed - So if you are applying for a role that is likely to be over-subscribed, make sure your CV contains keywords that reflect the requirements of the role.

Keywords searches are among the dumbest of dumb ways to approach the problem. I have been called by agents on the basis of keyword searches of my CV and on discovering the actual roles and the keywords used, I have felt my time has been royally wasted.

The problem being that the required keywords were unrelated in my CV, but looked to be a good match to the role. In fact, the result was laughable and totally random. It is because keyword searches are completely unable to take into account the meaning of words. Too many false positives, too many false negatives.

Voyager2002

Interesting point about keywords. My CV does not include the words 'graduate' nor 'degree' because I say what my degrees are, so it sounds as I would be rejected for lacking an education, despite holding three degrees!

heart_free

I also don't think keyword searches are a great idea. using the excel example - I'm quite proficient using it but my CV states that I can use Microsoft Office which includes excel - so wouldn't be picked up. I also have a degree, but my CV doesn't say graduate. if you are looking for GCSE's you wouldn't find my CV - I have O Levels - and one of them isn't 'science' but i have 1 each in biology, chemistry and physics. No - keyword searches on CVs don't work!

I understand that going through lots of CVs is time-consuming but isn't that part of your job?

NotYetMrs

When i was applying to jobs online, either via agencies or directly, I was told, that unless you are in the first 50 to apply, then you will not get your CV looked at, some sites show how many have applied.

marybelle01

As an agency worker myself, I wouldn't register with a company like this. Some people may not have the choice, but I go for specialist agencies / agencies with specialist sections, and personal contact. I have been doing agency work on and off for 30 years when back in the UK, and have always used the same two agencies. Even though I may be abroad for 6 - 48 months, they know exactly who I am, keep in personal contact via e-mail when I am away to secure availability information, and are careful to match their candidates to the right employers and vice versa. If they are trawling through hundreds of candidates via searches, then frankly, they may make a lot of money, but they are too big/distant from their clients and their workers to make good matches. It's all too hit and miss.

Wellery82

I worked in recruitment agencies for a number of years and also feel there is unjust criticism, albeit only in the way we tend to criticise most jobs we don't understand.

A recruitment consultants job is to make money. There isn't any other angle to it. If they want to help people then that is a nice characteristic, but if it restricts the time they spend in generating new business then the company aren't likely to tolerate it unless the consultant is still generating lots of cash.

I witnessed countless consultants sacked, and the majority spent too much time on activities that did not make money. Giving feedback is useful if you want to build a relationship with a candidate for the future. If the applicant isn't ever going to be seen as a good "sell" however then it isn't a good use of time to waste time e-mailing or ringing them. That said i personally did used to send a generic response to everyone, but ignored all follow up e-mails asking for a chat, or more guidance.

My own take on it is that a consultant should be spending at least half their time canvassing for new sales opportunities, cold calling companies, setting up meetings with clients etc. The other half they are writing adverts, sifting responses, meeting potentially suitable candidates. Giving feedback to the poor responses unfortunately isn't a priority, however cold that may seem.

In an ideal world companies have the resource to give everyone feedback, or to have technology that makes this task easy and efficient. When you are working for a smaller outfit however who are battling to stay afloat for example, everything is on making money, and helping people is sadly not top of the list

SueC_2

I recently received an email from a recruitment agent, asking if I'd be interested in a position that was a complete and utter mismatch with any of my skills or experience. The (obviously standardised) text ended with:

"My apologies if this email is not relevant to your job search, our database selects candidates with relevant key words on their CV and unfortunately we are limited to how we can narrow down the search criteria".


I felt like ringing them and saying "Well, seeing as you seem to be a bit stumped, how's this for a suggestion... try reading the CVs".



I despair of a world where a recruitment agent is unable, for whatever reason, to actually look at CVs. There's automation and there's automation - and this example cannot possibly be progress!


I appreciate that as an agent you don't give two hoots about me, the lowly candidate who never actually pays for your services, but your current practice is providing nothing but mis-service to your valuable client base.

k12479

SueC wrote: »

I despair of a world where a recruitment agent is unable, for whatever reason, to actually look at CVs. There's automation and there's automation - and this example cannot possibly be progress!

I certainly don't want to defend recruitment agents, but with the sheer number of applicants for most jobs I think it's unrealistic to expect each CV to be individually read at the first stage. Even when read 'properly', CVs are only really briefly scanned so it needs to be tailored with the key words relevant to the role, sector, etc for the benefit of both the filtering software and the hiring manager.

SueC_2

k12479 wrote: »

I certainly don't want to defend recruitment agents, but with the sheer number of applicants for most jobs I think it's unrealistic to expect each CV to be individually read at the first stage. Even when read 'properly', CVs are only really briefly scanned so it needs to be tailored with the key words relevant to the role, sector, etc for the benefit of both the filtering software and the hiring manager.

While I completely agree that CVs need to contain details relevant to the role etc, I'm afraid I couldn't disagree more with the view that it's unrealistic to expect recruiters to read the CVs.

That is their job.

So they're a bit busy right now because there are a lot of people hunting work (although in fairness I would imagine that is completely balanced out by the reduced number of vacancies in the current climate), but that doesn't change the fact that finding the best candidate for the role is their job.

By all means use a computer as a tool to help you do your job, but expecting your computer to do it for you is where it gets unrealistic as far as I'm concerned.

westv

In a way, it's a pity that so many companies using saleman..I mean recruitment agencies. Those of us who have a need to change industries are excluded from the very beginning. Yes, a company could equally discount such an application on the same basis but that means one rejection - an agency might cover several companies so being discounted by them for one role will likely mean being discounted from any other roles they have too.