How do I find a recruiter that's actually worth working with?

Question

I keep my resume up to date on a few sites just to see what's out there. Normally, this leads to plenty of recruiter spam in the form of Dear Sir, I have an immediate opening in the middle of nowhere on a 3 month contract. Kindly reply ASAP. This really doesn't bother me, but it makes me think that the bulk of the recruiters out there are just yanking keywords and blindly spamming the job seeker. Because of this, I'm a little leery of working with a tech recruiter when I seriously start looking for a new position, but the fact is that many of the good tech jobs are unlisted.

So, my question is this:

How do I find a recruiter that's worth working with? Up until now I've just had my resume visible in the usual places and have waited for them to come to me. Is there a secret hideout I can visit or a bat signal that I can use?

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Edit: Just to put things into perspective (I probably should have posted this initially), I'm receiving roughly 10-15 contacts a day, and it's rare that there are any positions worth following up on in a day. A lot of it is contract work, when I've explicitly stated that I'm looking for FTE only. The locations are bad, even though I've specified major metro areas or telecommute only. Etc, etc.

I'm absolutely not adverse to networking with recruiters - in fact, that's exactly what I want to do, but it's an uphill battle sifting through all of the poor contacts that I receive on a daily bases.

Answer 1

Who Recruiters Work For

In most cases, recruiters don't for for you. They work for the client companies that pay them, either on retainer (if they're in-house head-hunters) or on spec if they're outside agencies. Either way, they primarily represent the interests of the hiring company.

With that in mind, you can't expect the vast majority of recruiters to do anything more than attempt to fill requisitions. It's the nature of the business; expecting something else is unrealistic on your part.

There Are Exceptions

Like everything else in life, there are exceptions to the above. You just need to understand the nuances.

For example, working with a search firm that you pay may make a difference, but I don't personally recommend that approach. For the average job-seeker, it's not money well spent.

In the contracting world, some agencies also make a point of investing in relationships with contractors because they need quality candidates on their hot-sheets. They won't go out searching for a job for you, but if you impress them then they may keep you in mind when pitching a potential client, and may call you first when a suitable requisition crosses their desk. This is a step above routine networking, but it does happen.

Invest in the Recruiters

Some agencies are body shops. Treat them as fire-and-forget. Others want to get to know you, and invite you to check in with them from time to time about your availability or your current work status. Seek out the latter.

"Do unto others" is a good approach, too. Recruiters need to place people to earn a living. Help them out when you can, even if it doesn't help you directly---even if the recruiter doesn't pay for referrals, they're more likely to have a helpful person on their hot-sheet than someone who networks poorly.

Also, there's nothing stopping you from calling recruiters and trying to network with them. Some recruiters find that an imposition, but some value the networking potential of maintaining candidate relationships. If you don't invest your valuable time in weeding through the recruiters for people you connect with on a professional level, you can't expect them to beat a path to your door.

Answer 2

A few things I've found that help in determining if a recruiter is a good recruiter...

1. If their initial email to you doesn't include your name, they're probably not worth your time. Seriously, in this day of form letters, if an email can't even be bothered to add your name in from a database, it's not worth it.
2. Respond to the recruiter's initial letter with an initial letter, asking questions like, "Why do you think I'm a good fit for this position, and what do you think my chances are?" I've found recruiters not worth their salt will never bother responding to these.
3. If I get on the phone with them, they have to speak clearly and coherently. They will be presenting you to the end client, and if they can't convince you who would be receiving money if successful, they sure aren't going to convince those paying money.
4. After you've started talking with them, do they specialize in your field? Do they try to meet you and build a relationship? Will they send you out

I've hit points of getting over 3 dozen recruiters going for my time at once. Just because you're searching for work on your off (or unemployed) time doesn't mean that it's not valuable time. For every recruiter you respond to, you could just as easily send your resume directly to a company (those usually do better anyway.) So that recruiter has to be worth your time.

Answer 3

What is a good recruiter?

This is not a rhetorical question. Is a good recruiter one that gets you the job you want? Is s/he one that befriends you and makes you feel like a buddy of theirs? Is s/he the one that keeps checking in with you regularly and takes you out to paid lunches? Do they have a kind and soothing voice on the phone? ...

I would argue that the only thing you should care about is getting the job you want at the rate that you want with a contract that you want.

If you make life-long friends while you're at it - great, but that's not the point of a job search. (For the record, I've made friends with recruiters and our relationship continued well after our professional one has ended). If you get to eat some free lunch, again, great, but wouldn't you rather have a higher rate or work with a more interesting technology?

How to find them

You don't really find them, they find you. To become more visible, you should use:

• Job hunting sites (monster, workopolis, etc...)
• Go directly to big & established recruiting agencies in your area
• Linked In
• Professional associations
• Blogs
• Stackoverflow, etc

Copy-pasted emails and 3-month contracts

One point regarding yanking keywords and pasting them to emails. If you had to design the optimal strategy to match a giant pool of candidates into a giant pool of jobs where the only thing you cared about was maximizing matches and minimizing time, does that not sound like a decent idea? I'm not saying that it's the best form of human interaction by a long shot, but it does solve that particular problem very efficiently. That also happens to be the way that most of the pay incentive systems are set up for these people.

Finally, regarding 3 months contracts in the middle of nowhere: this is the works of supply and demand. Obviously the great jobs are more rare and the crappy jobs that nobody wants to do are more abundant. You are merely being exposed to all segments of the market. Who knows, maybe for whatever reason you will find one of the offers attractive? The recruiters are spending very little time filtering or thinking about it as per the point in the previous paragraph. I don't find this to be a bad thing once you consider all the actors and ther incentives in the system.

Answer 4

Your best bet might be to find one via a colleague.

Why? Because most recruiters are a lot like used car salesmen. With experience, you will learn this. Your colleagues have likely interacted with recruiters, and it's possible that some of them have had a rare, good experience with someone. This is much more reliable than looking at ads in magazines, etc. There is no www.ethicalrecruiterswhoreallycareaboutyou.com

How? Simply ask your colleagues. "Hey Sally, can you recommend any good recruiters?"

Answer 5

I wouldn’t say that there is a ‘bat-cave’ of awesome recruiters that I’ve come across, but I tend to find the following sources quite good:

• Technical magazines / trade magazines
• Salary surveys are often commissioned by recruiters with a very active interest in the field (and can be quite good)
• Word of mouth – anyone I have been recommended has been very good (although care does have to be taken in who you tell!)
• Some jobs on linkedin are promoted by recruiters, and if you have a look at their profile you might be able to get a better sense of their fit for you

That said, most of the good recruiters I’ve used have come to me dependent on either applications, or from finding me online (stackoverflow careers / linkedin), and whenever I am approached I look for a few tell-tale signs that they might be better than average: anyone who wishes to speak to you or ideally meet face to face before sending an application out is more likely to be a better recruiter.

All good recruiters I have used also have an excellent knowledge of the more technical aspects of the industry and will know what realistic salary expectations for your sector are. As a personal preference I tend to believe a recruiter who believes you are worth more than your current salary is better as anyone who feels you are not qualifies for the jobs you are applying for will (I assume) not have as strong a conviction as if they felt you were a sure thing.

Answer 6

First, what makes a recruiter good for you? While this may seem like answering the question with a question, I'd wonder if you really know what you want in that recruiter other than placing you in your dream job. A few factors to ponder in terms of which recruiters would be good from your view:

1. Frequency of contact - Do you want daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly e-mails or phone calls giving you an update on such a position?
2. Technical competence - How well do you expect the recruiter to know your field and area of expertise?
3. Company profile and culture - How familiar are you expecting the recruiter to get into a company in terms of knowing culture, team size, methodologies, processes, etc.?
4. Interviewing preparation - Do you expect the recruiter to give you a sheet of tips for handling an interview? Do mock interviews and help you be better prepared for interviews?
5. Experience in the field - Are you OK with someone new to placing people or do you want someone that has done this for 10+ years?
6. Relationship situation - Does the recruiter want to have a long-term relationship or are you just a piece of meat for them to place somewhere?
7. Recruiter succession - If the recruiter changes companies, would you go with the recruiter or stay with the parent company? For example, say there is a Bob at Robert Half that you really like and enjoy having conversations. If Bob goes off to start his own firm, does your resume go with him or not? Do you still use Robert Half or not?

Second, with this set of criteria you can now go and interview various places and I'd be tempted to point out that while there may not be any opportunities right now that are a fit, you want to communicate what you want and to be kept in mind if something comes up. This could be interesting to see who would meet and discuss things as you may run into something like, "That's not how we do things here," which would be a way to weed out those places that aren't necessarily after the long-term beneficial relationship. There will likely be some issues to resolve as well as more than some time spent making sure you know what you want here.

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To actually find recruiters, here are a few ideas:

1. Google and other search engines can be a way to find the firms that handle recruiting within a specific specialty.

2. You could ask various people that work in the field where you want to work though I would avoid asking current co-workers as that could create an awkward situation.

I do think part of the nature of the question here is what defines a good recruiter which isn't necessarily that simple to answer if one really wants to ponder the question at micro and macro levels.

Answer 7

To find a good recruiter, you need to be able to identify what it is you're looking for. A good recruiter is one who's willing to invest a little effort into a potential hire! Of course, what counts as effort can be a few different things:

• Actually reading my resume beforehand, i.e.:
  • not offering me roles that are clear mismatches to my experience / education / expressed intent to have a certain job or live in a certain part of the country
  • not having to dismiss me out of hand on the first interview when they learn my resume is, in fact, up to date and I'm not secretly hiding some Professional iOS experience somewhere
  • Demonstrating some clue they've read my resume before the interview, like mentioning some detail from the resume (Oh, I see you've just graduated!)
• Giving me some degree of information on the actual role they're looking for, rather than treating their interactions with me like a fishing expedition -- at least on the first phone call, I should know what company I'm dealing with and a simple job description!
• Asking about my experience with certain skills needed for the job (but not demanding I need a certain skill with an obscure piece of software!), and helping in regards to how to gauge "years of experience"!
• Provides some level of tips for an interview -- not merely referring me to a checklist (half of which doesn't apply to a phone interview!), but actually giving me useful tips beforehand that I hadn't thought of previously!

And just for good measure, doesn't hit one of these pet peeves:

• Speaks my language clearly -- phone quality is enough of a crapshoot without having to translate a heavy accent, and it just makes both our jobs harder.
• Pronounces things like company names correctly when referring back to my resume.
• Spells my name right (really, now... this is just "gives-a-damn"-level respect I'm asking for here. I get my last name is tricky, but my first name should be EASY.)