Why you should avoid most IT recruitment agencies
Job seeking is always a chore. Always. It is also under-pinned by other tasks take up a lot of time and are often frustrating.
Writing, and re-writing, your CV and cover letter for each application. Searching the Internet for vacancies and contract opportunities. After you have applied, there is the waiting for responses. All of this before you even get your foot in the door.
This task is often made even worse by certain IT recruitment agencies. There are many good agencies in the UK, however the majority purely have their own interests, and profit margins, in mind when they contact you.
IT recruitment agency tricks of the trade
1. Posting vacancies that don’t exist in order to collect jobseeker details. The more jobseekers they have on their books, the higher the chances they have of placing them, thus earning commission. It’s obviously fine to collect CVs, but this is a rather underhand way of doing it.
2. Asking jobseekers for contact details of their current HR manager in order to contact them to provide their services. This is often done by telling the job seeker that they have a fantastic role, but need to check your references before they can put you forward for it.
3. They will ask the job seeker “Did you work for Dave Smith at Company X?” in the hope that the job seeker will reply “No, I worked for Paul Smith”. They can then ring Company X to offer their services.
These problems are encountered across all sectors, however the IT sector is particularly rife with this sort of activity.
IT contractors should also beware
IT contractors especially feel it, with the following issues being encountered by those whose CV is picked up by a recruitment consultant.
When asking about the minimum rate (this also applies to salaries for permanent job seekers), they will state that they will always aim for higher than that amount. They won’t, however. This is most likely the maximum that you will receive, even if the employer is willing to pay more. The difference will go to the recruitment agency.
Being told that if you introduce the agent to another contractor, and the agent then places that contractor, that they will receive an amount of cash. Usually £250 to £500. In reality, you will only ever get paid this money if you keep tabs on your recommendations. The agent will most probably never proactively contact you to pay you themselves.
If you find a good recruitment agency, then they can really assist in your hunt for a new job. Ideally though, you should apply directly to recruiting organisations. Either try to find out the name of the company that is recruiting, Google them and contact directly. Or use a direct job board, that only posts vacancies directly from employers. Ultimately, these are the reasons that EmptyLemon was set up in the first place!
Use our IT job search to find your next IT role, without the need for a recruitment agency or third party.
20 Comments
[...] on from our Why you should avoid most IT recruitment agencies post last week we were talking to one of our job seekers, an IT contractor, who supported what we [...]
Having read both articles (this one and the follow-up), the key issue is that not all agencies are like this, but even by saying “most IT recruitment agencies” (which you have done in the title), it still feels as though all agencies – good and bad – are being tarnished with the same brush.
There will be good and bad agencies in any industry, so saying that “the majority [of agencies] purely have their own interests, and profit margins, in mind” can be said about any agency, regardless of whether or not they operate within the realms of recruitment. Recruitment just seems to a worse stigma attached to it, compared to other areas.
If a candidate is unsure of whether or not to use an agency, then it should look out for recommendations, testimonials, reviews, etc. – not necessarily from clients, but from other candidates and other contractors who have used them. Some agencies may have a bad rep with their candidates, but if a lot of “not your usual agency,” “a pleasure to work with” and “they actually care” type speak keeps appearing then surely that’s a positive sign that they’re one of the good ones.
Hi Steve,
Thanks for reading and posting. Unfortunately, in our experience, the majority of the thousands of IT recruitment agencies out there offer poor experiences for candidates. To us, the key issue isn’t that not all agencies are like this, the key issue for us is that most are. We are trying to inform job seekers and recruiters of the potential pot holes so that they can avoid them.
We agree that there are good ones out there, but the ratio of good to bad agencies is not high. We are talking from the perspective of job seeker and recruiter as well. The line about profits isn’t necessarily saying that this is a bad thing, but that job seekers should be aware of this. For example, many job seekers become disheartened when they don’t get a call back from an agent following an unsuccessful interview – being aware that they are profit driven helps them to not take this personally.
As you have suggested, searching for testimonials is definitely a good way to find a good agency – there definitely are good ones out there.
The worst we received was the following, three of our staff received it, each had a different regional variation, a quick check on linked-in revealed that this “recruiter” is still in the business
——————————————————
A -based IT company are about to make 17 excellent IT people redundant.
They have had to make 10 Software Developers redundant including:
4 x Java, J2EE, Oracle, XML people and
6 x .Net C#, ASP.NET, VB.NET, SQL Server people
Unfortunately they also had to let their Project Manager/Business Analyst and Technical Support team go, who had strong experience in Windows /2000/03/XP/Active Directory and MS Exchange.
I would much appreciate it if you could let me know if you have any suitable opportunities for them, either now or in the future.
——————————————————
Oh my. That’s a net being cast as far and wide as possible. For anyone reading that hasn’t experienced this before, these emails get sent out in the hope that someone will come back with a “funny you should ask, yes we do have an opportunity”. At which point the agent will trawl the CV databases looking for the imaginary candidate they just pitched.
Thanks for posting Rupert!
I get this all the time. It’s nothing short of what I’ve been telling people for years.
Some good tips here – recruiters are getting worse in my opinion. I have had many of them on the phone and they are all after one thing, commission. It’s good to set the rules with them at the beginning and stick to them, I find the fact that they don’t tell you who the interview is with is particularly annoying!!
A lot of recruiters place job ads with the Job centre that blatantly don’t exist. Why do they do it… because there’s no cost to them, and an easy picking of CV’s.
It irritates the ***t of me when they refuse to tell you who the company is, then say they’re going to send you a spec and don’t, then hey presto, you can’t get hold of the agent or the call is never returned
If they ask if you’ve been for any recent interviews, don’t tell them!
One the biggest offenders id jobsite. I doubt many of the ads on that site for IT are real.
EG project manager required in London, kent, essex, bishops stortford, etc.
All of them!!… that’s one hell of a position they’re advertising there, and highly unlikely they’ve one each town with the same description.
Thanks for commenting John, and we’re sorry you’ve had such a hard time of it with the agencies. It’s for these reasons that we are a direct employer job board and, as we grow and get more roles posted, our aim is to remove the need for recruitment agencies for job seekers and companies alike. Take out the middle man and you save time, effort and cost for both parties.
Of course you would say that as you are presenting your site as an alternative to the recruitment consultancy industry. However, it is an industry that badly needs a more moral alternative so I really hope you succeed.
Your post does not even cover the half of their bad behaviour:
*How about asking candidates where they have also interviewed so they can approach those companies with their own candidates?
*Playing the numbers game, phone candidate after candidate completely unaware of their qualifications for a job (or mostly not) Frustrating both the candidate and the would-be employer?
*Trying to brow-beat candidates into accepting jobs that it is impractical or not worth their while to accept. I recently got frustrated with one on the phone recently and asked him would he collect my children from school while I was on the two hour commute home from two counties away. His response was ‘Don’t you have a car(!)’
Like the person above said not all agencies are like this.
Some use all these ‘tricks’, some use one or two and the exceptions use None. However the exceptions need to become the norm if the recruitment industry is one that has any respect as a profession going forward.
You’re right, the list of tactics goes on and on. We’re trying to raise awareness of the tricks used, so these posts will come across as ‘Agency Bashing’, but we do regularly state that not all agencies are like this. The numbers game and forced selling issues are derived from the management/director level of the agencies. Forcing performance indicators like call times and revenue targets leads to desperate tactics from those on the phones. It is difficult to instil good practice when the axe is constantly hovering over you. The whole situation drastically needs reviewing!
ElizaF’s post is bang on. I’ve experienced exactly the same behaviour and it isn’t one or two agencies doing this it’s virtually all of them.
I’ve also turned up to interviews to find the job is completely different from the one advertised and had multiple interviews with the same client only to not be told by the agency that I didn’t get the job. But of course there’s no money in politeness.
What are recruitment agencies actually for? An agency is supposed to find and filter suitable candidates for a role with a very specific skill set. So why do I have to continually explain to recruiters the difference between a Web Developer and a Web Designer, that Java and JavaScript are not the same thing and that putting {database name here} on your CV does not automatically qualify you as a DBA.
Unfortunately companies looking to hire staff do not have the time to filter CVs themselves so unless sites like EmptyLemon can innovate in this area recruitment agencies will be with us for the foreseeable future.
More power to your elbow.
Thanks for posting Phil. We are developing CV search functionality for companies to use as we speak which, as you point out, will save time for those that are hiring.
[...] our post about tricks used by IT recruitment agencies. During periods where opportunities are few and far between, unscrupulous agencies will post [...]
Good to see you are pointing out both the good and bad points to make a fair statement. Oh no, you didnt. Its just a rant. Typical.
JOhn – the reason for the multiple location on a job ad is to ensure we reach all potential candidates. If you search on a role with a location that isnt mentioned, it will not appear in your results. However, if the add has many locations (all near each other) it is more likely you will find it. ITS TO BENEFIT THE CANDIDATE!!!!!
Hi Caroline,
This post is not designed to be a rant, we are highlighting practices that we have experienced. If you would like to write a post pointing out the benefits that recruitment consultants offer to IT candidates, we would happy post it here on our blog. Simply drop us a line via our contact form and we’ll drop you a line.
Thanks
I don’t think the issue here is when the locations are near to each other, but when adverts state London, Manchester, Leeds, Glasgow, etc. Each of these offices should surely have a separate advert, indicating how many positions are available at each office. This would surely improve the accuracy of the applications as well.
[...] desk). These adverts are usually generic because they are not promoting actual vacancies. Some IT recruitment agencies use these adverts to collect CVs and expand their databases. In order to avoid wasting your time, [...]
I have to say I tend to agree with this article I have experienced similar practices over the years and it is not a good experience that’s for sure. Although it may not be fair to tarnish all agencies with the same brush, I do think there is a problem and this article is right to warn people.