Understanding Recruiters
Do recruiters even try?
I hate recruiters.
Recruiters never reach out to me for the correct jobs.
These are all general sentiments you’ll hear on a regular basis about recruiters within the tech industry. What a lot of folks seem unaware of is the multiple types of recruiters that exist in this space and their incentives for operation.
Let’s take a look at the different types of recruiters.
Agency Recruiters
These recruiters work for an agency and although they are recruiting for a particular company (often multiple companies at a time), they are employees of the agency. Keep in mind with agency recruiters that if they work for an agency, they are making a cut of the profits, the agency also gets some of this money.
Contingent Recruiters
About: Contingent recruiters tend to focus on sourcing, but can operate as full desk recruiters for the company. They are tasked to find qualified candidates who are not already in the ATS (applicant tracking system) of that company. If they find a candidate that is already in the ATS, the company ‘owns’ that candidate.
Payment: They are paid a percentage (somewhere between 18-25%) of the candidates base pay. This payout occurs after the candidate has been employed at the company for 60-90 days. If the candidate does not stay that long, the recruiter does not get paid.
Quirks: Because they are paid for finding the candidate, they often won’t share what company they are working with upfront. Why? Because if you are interested and go apply for that job without them, they will not be paid.
Retained Recruiters
About: This recruitment model is typically for hard to fill and/or executive roles.
Payment: This type of recruiting is expensive because of the work required. Recruiters typically get 50% of the base salary and are paid ½ up front.
Quirks: Because this is typically for executive searches and the jobs are rarely posted anywhere, these are primarily searches through an agencies network. So, if you are an executive level (or Director+) I encourage you to network with executive search firms.
Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) Recruiters
About: RPO recruiting is when an external company takes over the whole recruitment process for a company or an entire piece of it (ex: all technical recruiting).
Payment: Since the firm is taking over the process, this is billed on a project basis and not by individual hires.
Quirks: This often happens at larger companies that have so much recruitment to do. Although this is modeled to have RPO recruiters feel like the hiring organization, it can often feel disjointed.
In-House Recruiters
Full Time Employee Recruiters
About: These recruiters work for the organizations they are hiring for. They will know the most about the culture of the organization and often have the best advice for navigating the interview process since they have probably seen many candidates go through it.
Payment: Internal recruiters are paid a salary and are not incentivized for individual hires.
Quirks: Most internal recruiters are overworked and underpaid. Since tech companies can’t hire fast enough, internal recruiters are tasked to hire more jobs than humanly possible. This can lead to some shortcut tactics or many roles not having movement on them for extended periods of time.
Contractor Recruiters
About: These recruiters work for the organizations they are hiring for on a contractor basis. Many FAANG companies hire contract recruiters as a ‘try before you buy’ model. This also allows companies to expand their recruitment organization without using official headcount.
Payment: Contract recruiters are paid a salary/or hourly and are not incentivized for individual hires.
Quirks: Most contract recruiters are overworked are being monitored very closely to see if they are ‘money well spent’. They are compensated well but not given benefits because they are contractors. This good pay is often used to incentivize work long hours and ‘prove’ themselves worthy of converting to a full time employee.
As you are job searching, it’s helpful to understand which type of recruiter you are working with. I’ll close with a few other recruiter facts that may help shed more light on recruiting.
There is no formal/or really informal education on how to be a recruiter!
Most large recruitment agencies (TEK systems, Robert Half, etc) hire folks out of college who aren’t totally sure what they want to do and just need a job.
Most large recruitment agencies are known to have terrible work environments where recruiters are often pitted against each other and burn out quickly.
Recruiters generally tend to be ‘graded’ on quantitative data - how many people they reach out to, how many calls they have, how many jobs they fill, etc - and sometimes never on qualitative - how happy are your candidates with the interview process, how engaged are they at work, how much are they referring their network based on the interview process - which incentivizes bad practices and leads to a negative reputation in the industry.