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Fausto Nunes for Runtime Revolution

Posted on • Originally published at revs.runtime-revolution.com on

IT recruiters are crybabies

Photo by Hasan Almasi on Unsplash

Yap. I said it. Let the flame war begin! šŸ”„

If youā€™re on LinkedIn and youā€™re, in some way or another, in the Tech industry, Iā€™m sure you have a few (or a lot!) of recruiters on your network.

Recruiters are a strange group of people that search for Developers and other professionals to fill up a vacancy (or more) in a specific company that needs a person with that set of skills. Some recruiters forget theyā€™re dealing with actual people. You know, fellow human beings with families, friends, desires, fears, expectations and demands. Sometimes itā€™s hard not to think of recruiters as cartoon villains, reducing everyone to a number in a body shop, especially if theyā€™re working for shady outsourcing companies with an evil mastermind as CEO.

Youā€™ve probably seen recruiters whining on Linked In about how a candidate did this and that or stopped replying at some stage of the recruitment process. There are rude people everywhere, but seriously, can you blame them? I dare to say, most of the time they had good reasons to be rude or they simply reflected the way they were treated in the first place.

Hereā€™s a list of things most recruiters do that make no sense and reinforce the stereotype:

  • Sending the same old template to everyone, no matter the seniority, project, tech stack, etc.;
  • Not knowing or not giving details about the project or company theyā€™re hiring for;
  • Assuming everyone in Tech must love Star Warsā€Šā€”ā€ŠDarth Vader/Stormtrooper image ā€œApply now!ā€, ā€œJoin the dark sideā€, Yoda image ā€œJoin the force!ā€. You know what Iā€™m talking aboutā€¦ _ughhh _šŸ˜’;
  • Having 5 recruiters from the same company hitting you up with the same message in the same week;
  • Ghosting after you had an interview with them;
  • Not providing feedback;
  • Saying they have THE perfect opportunity for you, when they donā€™t even know you;
  • Calling you during your working hours, knowing it might get you into trouble;
  • Saying someone referred you, when you know itā€™s bullshit;
  • Creating fake job ads just to put you on their database for future opportunities.

Just to be perfectly clear, I am a recruiter and Iā€™ve had some of these things happen to me when I was job hunting and it sucked!

I try to use what I learned from that process to be better at this job. Do you remember that old saying: ā€œtreat others the way you want to be treatedā€? The same applies here.

Some companies do put recruiters through a lot of pressure, unreasonable deadlines and objectives, outdated tools and give them no space to think about what theyā€™re doing and no room for improvement (Numbers, numbers, numbers!). Believe me, Iā€™ve been through it and whining about candidates on LinkedIn isnā€™t going to make things better.

If thatā€™s your case, I suggest you find a better company to work for, because if they donā€™t treat you right, itā€™s way harder to do the right thing. Besides, youā€™ll be on the other end of the recruitment process again. Itā€™s a great time to learn how candidates think and feel when you are the candidate.

Weā€™re not reinventing the wheel here:

It all comes down to respect and treating people fairly.

I follow a strict no bullshit approach to HR and Iā€™m glad Runtime-Revolution supports it. If you are interested in who we are and what we do, make sure to reach out! Iā€™ll make sure you get a clear picture of our way of doing things.


Top comments (1)

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silentsudo profile image
Ashish Agre

Exactly, recently 1 of the recruiter contacted me via linked, decided to see how it goes, and in email JD asked me a few questions see below and don't laugh...

List if questions...

q1...
q2...
Why would you like to join us?
q3...
and continued...