What does it mean when a recruiter says he/she will check in every few months?

Question

I have had this experience before and I've also heard other people saying the same. People were contacted by some recruiter directly from the company and after a phone interview about general job related topics, the recruiter would say "I will check in every few months".

As far as I know no technical discussions were involved in the phone interview. So what does the recruiter mean by saying that? If they don't want people now why did they bother scheduling the interview? And if no technical topics were covered, how did they know the candidate doesn't fit the position they have in mind?

Answer 1

If they don't want people now why did they bother scheduling the interview?

Recruiters like to have people they can contact about positions. The more people they have positive contact with who are open to opportunities, the easier their job.

After talking they might think, "Xavier would be a potential candidate for a few positions but I don't have any available currently."

They then can keep you in the loop and touch base to make sure you are still available whenever a position does come up.

how did they know the candidate doesn't fit the position they have in mind?

They don't have any idea generally. But they most often don't care, either. The actual company is more responsible for determining whether the candidate has what they want. The recruiter cares more about, "does this person likely meet what the company is looking for?"

Answer 2

So what does the recruiter mean by saying that?

The recruiter means that they intend to maintain a relationship with you by giving you a phone call or e-mail in a few months to see where you are. Perhaps at that time you could want to explore opportunities or require their services to fill a position where you currently work that could be a win-win.

If they don't want people now why did they bother scheduling the interview?

They want to know how to categorize you amongst all the other people that they have on file. Are you an intermediate developer with technologies X, Y and Z? Are you wanting to be a manager or an architect next? These are questions that only get answered by asking them directly after reading the resume.

And if no technical topics were covered, how did they know the candidate doesn't fit the position they have in mind?

Be careful about what you assume happens in these interviews. If they are asking the questions to see if you are going into a manager, developer, tester buckets then what you see as general is actually technical for them. You don't know what were the key things they wanted to know. They have their database with a # of contacts or which Y are skilled with Z years of experience that can be useful for the firm to mention to possible clients. I'd likely wonder if you could see the bigger picture here or even the recruitment firm's perspective to some degree here.