Dodgy Agents
This article on Dodgy agents was posted to our Agency Affairs Forum by an honest recruiter who is ashamed of some of the tricks that his dodgier brethren get up to.
Golden Rules
Some golden rules to spot the dodgy agents:
1. You shouldn’t have to give any of your referee’s contact details until you have reached interview stage with a client.
Referees are usually line managers, i.e. hiring managers, i.e. someone a recruiter would call and try to sell to, instead of taking a reference from.
2. Do NOT give specifics to any recruiter about interviews you are going to. This is a golden lead to them and they will normally try to call the hiring manager and feed them more candidates, creating competition for you.
3. If you find a recruiter you can trust and work with, stick with them and build a relationship with them. It can work both ways.
4. If you have two offers to choose from, get the offer (in terms of length of contract, £, duties, hours – and whatever else is important to you) – in writing before you decide.
Barrow Boys and Dodgy Agents
Dodgy barrow boy will push you into making a decision with bull**** hard sell/guilt factor/ “you’ve wasted my time stuff”. You must stand up to the dodgy agents.
As soon as anyone starts making you feel bad, drop them.
And before anyone starts whingeing, I’d just like to point out I’m a recruiter – and detest what I’ve seen some of my colleagues get up to.
ITContractor Comment
It’s great to get some inside information from an honest recruiter. There are many honest recruiters around. It’s just that the dodgy agents get more publicity and get remembered more.
It must be difficult for the more honest agents to operate amongst the dodgier ones.
Remember that it is not only the IT contractors that the dodgy agents are cheating – it is the other, more honest, agents as well.
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