So I recently had create a post on My Experience With Recruiters. I think giving constructive criticism is valuable but providing solutions is probably more useful.
I wanted to give some general feedback this time, to give my opinion on what I feel would engage me if I were on the market for opportunities.
😀 Know your audience
My profile specifically states what technology I specialise in i.e. C#, JavaScript, etc. Why would you then send me a job spec for Java or C++ roles? Sending me applications for technologies I have no experience in, only makes me think that you didn’t even bother reading my profile.
(Although I respect that you’re trying to get leads, so reading each profile before sending out mass emails makes the process slower, no excuse if you’re calling me on the phone however).
Still, I’m less likely to work with you if I see that you’re not showing interest.
I respond the best when the email was tailored to me personally, or when on the phone, the recruiter demonstrates that they’ve read my profile. Even if I’m not on the market for opportunities, I think this kind of customer service is the best, more professional and shows confidence that you know what you’re doing.
I’m aware that recruiters are talking to many potential customers and so spending too much time doing this for each of them may not be as ideal. My point is that I’m more likely to be engaged if you did this.
✨ Be creative
I’ve received so many recruitment emails during my time as a developer. They’re generic enough for me to ignore them completely, meaning I don’t even open them anymore. The ones I do open, have interesting creative subject titles and the content is also interesting.
Bear in mind it is possible that many of recipients of these recruitment emails are likely already employed and are not actively looking for roles. If you’re planning to create leads from this audience, it would increase your chances if your email isn’t plain and generic.
😀 Communication
Most recruiters start off very polite and enthusiastic, but once you’ve submitted your CV with them to forward to their clients, communication quality goes way down.
If I’m in the process of working with you, some updates to the application would be appreciated.
When I was job hunting, I found that I was the one who had to chase up on the progress on the application, there was on recruiter who actually knew the progress of the applications, but just didn’t bother informing me of it, was a little rude about it as well. That guy I’ll never work with again and I know he recruits with roles that matches my profile.
In contrast to this, one of the recruiters who had successfully gotten me a role had such great communication and interpersonal skills that when I were made redundant at said role years later, I had called him first who then had gotten me another role.
🤝 Stay in touch
If you’ve managed to get somebody a role. Ask them to give you a recommendation on LinkedIn, every few months or so, send a message to ask how they’re doing, maintaining communications with the ones you’ve worked with in the past can also one day lead to another opportunity to work with said person.
I for one often appreciate someone getting in touch just for the sake of saying hi. If you’re trying to sell me something, I may have my guard up however.
🏢 Know the company you’re recruiting for
When selling me a role, I found that I was more impressed with a recruiter when they talk about the company, if they’ve successfully recruited for them before, met the people there, have an idea of the office environment, knowing what else the company has to offer i.e. Good coffee, bean bag chairs, free fruit etc.
If I have questions that may not be in the job spec, if the recruiter can answer them, it suggests that they have a great relationship with the company as well, which then suggests that working with this recruiter is worth my while.
💻 Understand the tech you’re recruiting for
I’m not saying you should learn TDD, but you should at least be aware of what it is or what it means. This includes some of the other items in your spec such as TDD, BDD, Redux, webpack etc
You don’t need to be an expert on any of these, but being able to explain what the job involves without just reading from the spec can be very engaging for the person you’re trying to recruit. It’s like selling a product to someone, if you don’t really know what you’re selling, it makes it difficult to believe anything you’re saying.
Summary 📝
This is only my opinion and should be taken with a grain of salt. I appreciate that I know nothing of the recruitment industry so my assumptions here can be completely wrong. I’m just providing feedback from a customer’s perspective.
I feel that recruiters have a bad reputation among the programming industry and perhaps this is due to the lack of feedback from customers such as myself. I’ve had many good and bad experiences, I feel it’s valuable to recognise and celebrate the good while providing constructive criticism for the bad.
I’m not expert but recruitment feels like a ‘people’ industry more than anything, and so to successfully to sell your ‘roles’ to us, communication is key, build a network and maintain it.
In any case, if you’re a recruiter reading this, I hope there are some insights you can take-away from this and I wish you the best of luck.