
My experiences as a Recruiter on Hacker News  - Peroni
http://voltsteve.blogspot.com/2011/07/my-experiences-as-recruiter-on-hacker.html?spref=tw
======
swombat
_I don't want an apology on behalf of the very angry minority, not even
close._

You may not want one, but you deserve one.

It's sad to see that even without the visibility of the mob amplifying itself
in public, you still get a private lynching of sorts... Perhaps the same
people who sent those emails can come out of the woodwork now and apologise.
That'd be big of them.

~~~
Peroni
_You may not want one, but you deserve one._

Feel free to buy me a pint on behalf of the community at the next HN London
meet-up. ;)

~~~
mahmud
hopefully not a Peroni. Italian import piss ;-)

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peroni_Brewery

~~~
Peroni
That's the one! Love the stuff. Trust me, I'm Irish.

~~~
clistctrl
If you're ever in Boston, i'll buy you a pint at the Cambridge Brewing
Company. Way better than Peroni ;)

~~~
Peroni
Deal. I always wanted to go to Boston.

~~~
mirkules
I actually tried Peroni beer today just because of this thread. I gotta say
it's not bad at all. But if you're ever in LA, I'll match the beer offer :)

------
edw519
How I deal with recruiters:

If they need understanding of the technology, I will gladly help them with
that.

If they need understanding the domain knowledge, I will gladly help them with
that.

If they need understanding of interpersonal, organizational, or "soft" issues,
I will gladly help them with that.

If they want referrals, I will usually do what I can.

If they don't call back or follow up, I will eliminate them.

If they are ever dishonest in any way, shape, or form, I will eliminate them
and tell everyone I know.

For a recruiter, brutal honesty can overcome any perceived weakness and enable
others (even us hackers) to be on their side.

Steve, thanks for your brutal honesty here at hn. That's the best we could
hope for and should be a model for any other recruiters lurking here. Respect.

~~~
dolinsky
I think that honesty is a two-way street, especially in this scenario, and too
many developers wind up holding a recruiter over a fire for what the developer
perceives as a dishonest/snake oil salesman approach when they themselves are
often inflating the truth either on their resume or when talking about
previous accomplishments (I was guilty of this early in my career as well).

Now I do my part to be honest, and I look for the same in any recruiter I come
across. I'll echo Ed's sentiment in saying thanks and it's nice to read about
recruiters who have a passion for the industry and the people in it and not
just a passion for making the sale.

------
thaumaturgy
1\. Unfortunately, one of the consequences of anonymity is that it allows
people to not be responsible for their actions. That's endemic to any
anonymous forum; the only thing that varies is the level and amount of abuse.
Anonymity has its advantages, but this is an inescapable disadvantage.

2\. People's reading comprehension aren't perfect, or even all that great.
People -- myself included -- often seem to miss points being made in
discussions and subsequently leap to conclusions that are usually a result of
some combination of their own mood, biases, and prejudices.

3\. I personally don't see anything wrong with you doing recruiting work here
-- _so long as you advertise it clearly as such and make it entirely opt-in_.
i.e., there are monthly posts on HN for people looking for work (freelance and
otherwise), and as long as you were clear and asked them ahead of time if they
were interested, it shouldn't be a problem. That's just my take on it though,
others here may have some strong aversion to recruiters or something.

You do have a lot of value to offer here, you just have to be careful about
that line between offering value and taking advantage -- just as everyone else
does here.

------
bambax
Although I'm currently self-employed (and therefore neither trying to recruit
or be recruited) I have dealt with recruiters before, both as a client and as
a candidate.

I don't think recruiters are hated by their clients; they offer a service: an
expensive service that they usually don't do very well, but they're willing to
work hard, they can be called at any time, filter as many hundreds or
thousands of CVs as needed, so it's not all bad.

The hate, I think, comes from the candidates. The reason is because recruiters
treat candidates as meat, and it shows. It's not just a problem of domain
expertise, it's a problem of human compassion.

I read a study a while ago that showed that people don't sue incompetent
doctors more than others, even when faced with complications; they sue doctors
who they think don't care about them.

Recruiters don't need PhDs, they need to be perceived as caring (and the most
straight way to acheive that is to actually care).

~~~
Peroni
_Recruiters don't need PhDs, they need to be perceived as caring (and the most
straight way to acheive that is to actually care)._

I agree although I do believe a lot of clients are jaded by their own
experiences with poor recruiters. If I pick up the phone to speak to a
candidate almost all will take my call and answer my questions however when I
call a prospective client for the first time they are usually skeptical as
some receive dozens of calls a day from recruiters all claiming to be the best
in their respective field.

The key is differentiating yourself from the herd. Hopefully this blog will
play a small part in doing that eventually.

~~~
invalidOrTaken
In that vein, if you're aching for ways to distinguish yourself, I think there
are few opportunities better than what you've got: right now, you're the most-
loved recruiter on HN, and you're a (relative) expert on something most
hackers are interested in, but not enough to become experts in. You could
leverage that quite a bit with a series of blog posts on hiring negotiation,
how to find a job using weird technology stack X (If I could find anyone to
pay me to work remotely with clojure...wow), etc.

As a comparison, I'm sure Gabe Levine got the option for a lot of new business
after the "Fuck You. Pay Me" presentation. He suddenly became the lawyer that
freelancers... _liked._ <http://mylawyergabe.com/> Among HN users, sunchild is
a "lawyer I know knows about software"...and there are worse positions in
which to be.

All I'm saying is that I suspect it's worth quite a bit to be trusted by
hackers as a recruiter who knows his stuff and won't screw them over.

~~~
Peroni
_you're the most-loved recruiter on HN_

Aw shucks.

But seriously, there have been some excellent suggestions for future blog
posts that will be relevant to the people here on HN and I fully intend on
writing some decent content over the next week or two so stay tuned.

------
michael_dorfman
I know this wasn't a pity post, and that you're not looking for an apology,
but I just have to say, I'm a bit disappointed that some portion of the
community interpreted took time out of their busy day to give you flack for an
act of kindness, when you specifically set things up in a way to show that
your intentions were altruistic.

Your original post was classy, as was this follow-up. Well done, sir.

------
mgkimsal
@peroni - this is a little offtopic, but hopefully not too much, and I'd like
your opinion.

Many other creative disciplines offer agents/managers/handlers for the
'creative' - think sports players, writers, actors, bands, etc. I've been
wondering if a model like this would work in the tech industry for developers.
I'm not sure _developers_ would go for it, since many tend to have a 'DIY'
attitude about everything.

What I see in the agent model is that someone follows you and your career for
the long haul, and finds you work that helps advance your careers (gets you
better parts in projects, better gigs for the band, etc). I've never met a
recruiter that has kept in touch with me for more than a month or so after a
successful placement. They're only working for the employer, because that's
who pays them.

Would developers be willing to fork over 10% of their pay to an agent who
negotiated better pay and benefits for them, helped get better gigs, etc? As
attractive as this model sounds on paper, I'm wondering if this has a
snowball's chance of working.

Thoughts?

Oh, and thanks for your offer to the group, even if it was abused by a few
people. I do this occasionally for members of our local php user group, and
it's fun to help people understand how to promote themselves more positively.
:) Never done it on the scale you did, and can't imagine the time/effort
involved!

~~~
Peroni
It's a tricky one. Technically speaking it already works like this for
contractors.

Example: Say I place you in a 6 month contract where you get paid £500 per day
(I'm an optimist!) in such a deal my fee to the client, your employer, would
be anywhere from £50 to £100 per day meaning I could place 4 good people and
make £2k a week before costs. I work for an agency currently but if I was
self-employed (and a lot of successful recruiters are) that would be £2k a
week in my pocket.

Your next question will probably be 'Why aren't more recruiters doing exactly
that?' and the answer is simple, it's the same as launching a start-up. You
become self-emplyed and your income isn't secure. More importantly it is
almost impossible to get traction as a self-employed recruiter unless you've
been in the game for at least 5 or 6 years and have a littany of highly
successful relationships with hiring managers that regularly recruit.

~~~
mgkimsal
What's missing from that equation are two things:

Incentives for the recruiter to place someplace that's most beneficial to the
developer. The person paying for the service is the employer. _YOU_ might not
make an bad placement, but many other recruiters I've worked with don't know
how to tell a good one from a bad one, and if the employer is initially happy,
that's all that matters. If the placement doesn't work out, I've found
employers tend to blame the employee more than the recruiting firm (maybe
that's not always the case though?).

Long term relationship with the placed candidate. There's no incentive for a
recruiter to keep moving someone from company to company every year because
they'll get a bad rep with the hiring companies. If the person paying the
recruiter is the employee/contractor, the focus would be more on making them
happy vs making the employer happy. In an ideal world, all parties are happy,
but if it comes down to making a decision, people will come down on the side
of the money.

~~~
Peroni
The interesting element to this is taking the cost away from the employer and
moving it to the candidate.

Pro's: Employers will be a lot more keen on dealing with an agent if they no
they won't ever have to pay extra for their fees.

Cons: When the market changes (and it's already starting to), jobs will become
plentiful and the need to use a professional to find you a new opportunity
becomes less of a priority.

~~~
mgkimsal
_Employers will be a lot more keen on dealing with an agent if they no they
won't ever have to pay extra for their fees._

Maybe, but they may end up back in having to weed through hundreds of agents
instead of hundreds of applicants. I suspect that won't be the case entirely,
as an agent would have more incentive to be selective about placement opps -
they don't want to waste their time either.

------
alain94040
The hate mail is weird. I made a similar offer two years ago
([http://blog.fairsoftware.net/2009/05/13/being-a-new-cs-
grad-...](http://blog.fairsoftware.net/2009/05/13/being-a-new-cs-grad-in-this-
economy-sucks/)), received a lot of resumes, and I can't remember receiving
even one complaint.

~~~
Peroni
I think the key difference is that I am a Tech Recruiter. Your own background
is a lot more credible and there is no reason why anyone would assume that you
would take advantage of the info you received.

------
patio11
I am sorry that members of the community treated you shabbily.

~~~
Peroni
It was an incredibly small minority and the positive feedback far outweighed
the negative. I did feel the need to highlight the hate as I think it's pretty
indicative of the automatic assumption that we are all selfish, money grabbing
salesmen.

~~~
d0m
Life is like that; minority ruins it all. Better to focus on the great
feedback. Still, I'm surprised that HN users acted like that.. maybe there's
something we don't know. But anyhow, I feel sorry for you as it was a great
initiative. Good luck in your next startup :)

------
trotsky
_even if we aren't one of the 'cool crowd'_

Funny what a difference a couple of decades makes. Saying something like that
in 1991 about programmers would have been obvious, biting sarcasm.

~~~
Peroni
Fair point! It was sincere though. I have a massive amount of respect for the
level of talent and creativity among the users of HN and I think it's about
time you got the level of respect you deserve.

------
MattBearman
I think we can safely say it's a tiny minority of HN users that would respond
in that manner.

I'm glad to see you've come back to HN, and although you say you don't want an
apology, I hope those responsible (especially the one who phoned your boss) do
apologise to you.

I'd like to say its a shame recruiters have such a bad rep, but 99% of the
ones I've dealt with have been a lot more interested in getting their
commission than getting me the right job.

That said, I've met some genuinely awesome recruiters, and you seem like one
of those, so keep fighting the good fight :)

~~~
Peroni
_but 99% of the ones I've dealt with have been a lot more interested in
getting their commission than getting me the right job._

There's the rub. The vast majority are only focused on how much money they can
make from you and how quickly.

------
mike-cardwell
Every community has idiots. The ones who emailed you can be easily dismissed
as fools, but the guy who phoned your company went too far and owes you an
apology and explanation. Stuff like that can seriously affect peoples lives
and is totally unnecessary.

------
maxklein
The problem with hate mail is that it's a lot more affecting than positive
mail. The best way to deal with it is simply to smile and delete. Everyone is
entitled to their opinion - but they are not entitled to change _your_ life.

------
xxjaba
Being the son of a recruiter and a software developer myself I've had the
pleasure of meeting many good recruiters and many bad ones. I've noticed that
the key differentiator between the two is that good recruiters understand how
to build solid relationships with people that are based on trust, honesty, and
integrity with mutual financial gain being necessary but not the foundation of
the relationship.

Bad recruiters build relationships based on mutual financial gain and little
else.

In the short term the bad recruiters often come out on top since treating
people as numbers leads to higher short-term throughput, but long term the
solid relationships are what will make a recruiter a success. They are what
lead to referrals both from managers and candidates, allow bad news to be
communicated without hesitation or undue stress (as honesty is a basis of the
relationship), and best of all move with the recruiter as they change firms
and grow as a professional.

I very much look forward to seeing your post about how being a software
developer gives you an edge over your peers in the recruiting industry.

------
44Aman
It always amazes me how people will actually take time out of their day to
personally abuse someone. Great response post and best of luck with your
recruiting!

~~~
Peroni
I agree and I was equally amazed by those who were offering to donate money to
my paypal in exchange for what was a pretty run-of-the-mill offer of
assistance.

------
Alan01252
I was one of the few guys who missed out. :( If you do ever get round to it,
it would be greatly appreciated still.

I also appreciate this follow up post, I looked a couple of times at the
previous user name and realised you'd stopped commenting. It did make me think
at the time maybe it was a (rather elaborate)scam to harvest C.V's after all.
I'm glad to know I was well and truly wrong.

~~~
Peroni
My email is in my profile. Send the CV on and I'll look at it immediately.

------
allantyoung
It's unfortunate a few knuckleheads decided to "teach you a lesson." You can't
please everyone.

Thank you for wanting to contribute to the community and giving a gift to
people who were not confident of their CVs and resumes. I'm sure you were able
to help at least one person drastically change their CV for the better.

Can you elaborate on your "edge" when you worked as a recruiter with a tech
background?

~~~
Peroni
Keep an eye out for future posts on what I think is drastically wrong with the
recruitment industry.

In a nutshell, I worked as a developer for a number of years and two key
factors seem to have made a drastic difference:

1\. Practical industry experience. I understand the full software development
lifecycle. I know what it's like to work on boring, unchallenging projects and
I like to think know what get's people excited about going to work in the
morning.

2\. I'm self-aware. I know our industry is universally hated by clients and
candidates alike. I understand exactly why our industry has a terrible
reputation and I actively conduct my business in the opposite manner to what
you may have come to expect from recruiters. I don't 'key word match', money
is not my primary focus, I don't try and shoe-horn candidates into roles that
won't interest them and when it comes to clients I find out everything I need
to know at the beginning and I try to be as unintrusive as physically possible
throughout the process.

~~~
rluhar
Having worked with recruiters a few times, I would say you are most definitely
an exception rather than the rule. Mostly it comes down to buzzword bingo. I
had problems when trying to explain to a recruiter that we were looking for a
junior Java developer, but they kept sending us CVs with people with 8-10
years experience. After all they had "Java" on their CV didn't they. Very
frustrating.

A recruiter who understands, and has true experience in the domain is
invaluable. I wish you all the best!

~~~
Peroni
Thanks!

------
Mz
I spent a lot of years being all helpful in public and had the living shit
kicked out of me over it. So I spent a lot of time working on how to make
peace with my internal wiring (where I am sincerely just a helpful
person...and often wish I could gnaw my left arm off and escape this trap) and
the kind of reactions that gets when acted on publicly. So this is my personal
opinion about why this kind of thing, which you would think would be well
received, typically goes over so very badly:

When speaking in public, especially on the internet, you are speaking to a
very diverse crowd. It is inevitable that some of the people "listening" will
have serious personal issues: They had abusive childhoods, they were badly
burned in some way by someone "like" you in some way, they got taken advantage
of in some gruesome fashion by someone claiming to offer help, they are still
suffering for it, they are currently in an abusive situation of some
sort...etc.

Any time someone as an individual offers publicly to personally do something
for a bunch of total strangers, well, you can't equally "love" everyone. And
some people have a very hard time accepting "love"/help...whatever you want to
call it. I've worked hard at trying to put info on websites, instead of making
public personal offers, in part to make it less personal. People can read it
and see if it makes sense to them or not and it punches fewer of those buttons
because it is more "information" and less "a person/personal favor". And
someone will always be left out. You had to close the offer and only got to
80% of what was sent to you. The folks who didn't get something for free will
feel (somewhat irrationally) kind of screwed over. You can't do that kind of
thing for everyone. So it's best to handle things more discreetly.

I try to not make "blanket" public offers I can't back up. There isn't enough
time in the day to give away everything for free to every single individual in
need. I try to find ways to make the world a better place without it being so
personal, without it being so much about me helping lots of other people
individually. Because one of the things I have found is that making a personal
offer like that gets read by the crowd as "ego". People think I am attention-
mongering or something and if someone else hasn't had enough ego strokes for
the day or I am threatening to steal their thunder or something, watch out!
There will be hell to pay.

The people in the world who are in a lot of pain, so much pain they would piss
on you to that degree, they need a lot more love and assistance than reading
their resume is going to provide. And they basically feel like it's just not
fair that others are getting what they need and they are not. I know that in
part because I was an abused child and I spent a lot of years feeling angry
and jealous and invisibly left out and so on. And it often struck me as cruel
when other people would try to talk to me about things in a well meaning way
but still could not/would not meet my needs. So if I can't genuinely help
someone who is living with some kind of enormous suffering, I try hard to not
step in it, to not say anything that will sound like rubbing their face in
their suffering and all that they don't have. It's part of why I have left
some of the health lists I have left: I got myself well and I share my story
in hopes of helping others get well but it mostly gets rage and abuse heaped
on me. I actually understand their emotional reaction: They are doomed to a
cruel fate and my presence just makes them all the more painfully aware of how
unfair it is. I still don't know how to resolve the situation. I don't feel
right about withdrawing entirely and leaving them to their dire fate when I
know it's possible to get healthier. But what I have been doing hasn't been
terribly effective and seems to just rub salt in a very, very, very bad wound.

Anyway, this is not about "me". I just tell my story as an example, because I
am still compulsively helpful and public lynchings have yet to cure me of
that.

Peace.

~~~
sliverstorm
The trick to being helpful and not getting torn apart is being an
'opportunistic' or 'predatory' helper. That is to say, don't broadcast an
offer help- selectively give it when you see it's needed.

The second trick is to help people who are vulnerable. People know when they
are vulnerable, and when you help them they are usually very grateful.

The best one I've found: helping people on the side of the road with flat
tires. If they don't know what to do, guide them or even do it yourself.

~~~
Mz
Thanks for the feedback. :-)

However, what I have found with regards to the health stuff is that the people
who are most open to hearing are people who seek me out -- who found my
website by googling for that type of information rather than running into me
on an email list. I sometimes do okay with talking to people in person that I
am on friendly terms with -- and sometimes bomb badly.

The issue I have with helping vulnerable people who know they are vulnerable
is that this tends to lead to dependency. I was able to figure out how to get
physically well after being appropriately diagnosed at age 35 in part because
I had already mostly psychologically recovered from an abusive childhood. I
have had to ditch quite a few "helpful" people who didn't know how to be real
friends or accept an equitable relationship and desperately needed to be
needed. I had to ditch them because they didn't really want me to stand on my
own two feet. They wanted me get better but not really well and to continue to
need a crutch so they could be needed and have my gratitude. I have no desire
to turn around and do that to other people -- and I don't think it really
works anyway (for one thing, I prefer having real friends to being surrounded
by sycophants and I am prone to attracting sycophants, much to my irritation).
This is part of why I have worked at finding a less personal way to share
information: So no one has to be personally ingratiated/indebted/socially
obligated. (Next step: Figure out how to monetize it.)

The other thing I have concluded is that society has two venues for the
"wisdom" business: religion and arts/entertainment/comedy. So I am working
towards doing something in the entertainment/humor space, where it is okay to
say things you can't say in many other settings and get people thinking.

~~~
sliverstorm
Oh, I know what you mean with the dependency bit et al. When I really feel the
need to be helpful, I typically extend it to people I have never met before
and will likely never see again.

------
martswite
A nice article. It's a shame that people misunderstood your intentions
regardless of how clear you were. I'd say you deserve an apology.

Just from reading this article my perceptions of recruiters has changed
slightly, though I fear recruiters such as yourself are few and far between?
Hope your start-up becomes what you want it to be. Good luck Peroni

~~~
Peroni
Thanks for the kind words.

I agree that decent recruiters are few and far between however I think there
is a lot that can be done to help change the industry. I will be following up
with another post in a week or so outlining exactly what I believe are the
issues with my industry and what steps need to be taken to change things.

~~~
yxhuvud
Let me guess - it will involve a lot of recruiters not understanding (and in
some cases, not wanting to understand) the businesses and needs of the
companies they recruit for?

Or in other words - they spend a lot of time recruiting people they don't have
any clue of what they are good at, to jobs where they don't understand what
the jobs involve.

~~~
Peroni
Pretty much spot on. There is a lot more to it than that but what you've just
said is the fundamental issue.

------
skimbrel
Wow. I'm no huge fan of recruiters, but I'd also never send anonymous hate
mail to one. Sorry you had to deal with that, and I'm glad you're making the
effort to stick around on HN.

If I can ask one question, though: Why do some recruiters seem keen on
ignoring the phrase "I'm not interested in new opportunities at this time"? I
have set my LinkedIn profile to say this, and it's the first thing out of my
mouth when I get cold-called, but there are some who are not stopped by it.
It'd go a long way in my view if recruiters would simply take it at face value
when I tell them I'm not interested at the moment.

~~~
Peroni
No one pays any attention to your preferences on Linkedin. Every recruiter
believes that the job they have for you is better than the one you've got. Few
believe that you are 100% happy with your current career choice.

That doesn't make it right or true, it's simply the way they work.

~~~
skimbrel
That's sad. I'd like to be treated as a person, not a "resource", and the
zeroth step in that is respecting my wishes. When I want to make a career
change, I will make said desire known.

Is there anything I can start saying to recruiters that could plant the seed
of this idea in their minds? I know it's hard and that I have to compete with
a $25,000 fee, but everyone has to start somewhere.

~~~
Peroni
The only thing I can think of is trying to make it a bit more obvious on your
likedin profile that you are not interested in hearing about new roles.

That is one of the many issues with the recruitment industry, you could launch
a national advertising campaign highlighting the fact that you DO NOT want a
new job & I will bet good money you will _still_ get recruiters calling you.

------
josefresco
Honestly the one takeaway I got from this is that there are roughly 45 active
HNers that I absolutely do not want to interact with.

While I know Peroni will never share those email addresses (he's much to
polite) I somehow wish we could see which users are that rude/psycho to send
this guy hate mail and stalk him (albeit online with the exception of the one
nutcase who called his boss)

~~~
Peroni
I'm pretty confident that a lot of them were lurkers. The grammar and general
literacy levels seemed to be well below your typical HN standard. ;)

------
run4yourlives
A couple of things struck me about this post.

First, the hate mail. I'm happy that you're taking it in stride, but
personally, I think all of the hate mail senders should be outed and their
accounts removed from HackerNews. (Yes, I know they can just make a new one.)
This community shouldn't tolerate this type of bullying - which is exactly
what this is - and resetting karma to zero and forcing people to own up to
their actions in public is the type of response I'd think appropriate.

Second, given the response, there is clearly a huge demand here. Perhaps a
business opportunity is worth exploring in this context? People are clearly
not getting the feedback they need from existing services. I wonder if there
is some sort of "pay per submission" service that could be linked to
reputation to facilitate CV/resume reviews... like linked in without the
recruiters. Obviously needs more thought but there's definitely something
there given the interest you received.

~~~
GrooveStomp
I completely agree. Hacker News is supposed to be an open, intelligent
community and we really shouldn't tolerate that kind of bullying.

It's amazing how some people react to acts of public good.

------
agilebyte
Great post Steve! I guess much like some developers contribute to open source
software projects, 1 recruiter wants to do the same in his field.

Looking forward to meeting you on the next HN London meetup.

~~~
Peroni
Thanks buddy. I owe you a pint I think. You were the one who encouraged me to
inform the community about my experience in the first place.

~~~
agilebyte
I have just suggested you as a guest on Techzing.

------
Valien
Good post. I spent 3 years in the Tech Recruiting industry. Did sales,
recruiting for both direct-hire and contract. There are a lot of bad apples
out there because it's a low-barrier career. But solid recruiters are a gem
and take care of their candidates. Most good recruiters make more money than
most developers out there and know their industry well. There are those that
are idiots and don't know jack about IT (I'm an IT guy so I did well and
understood candidates and clients).

Reason I got out of it was that my passion is in IT so I got back into that
world. Now I get to listen to shoddy recruiters calling me and I usually laugh
at them... :D

So ignore the bad candidates and focus on the good ones. They are the ones
that will put food on your table.

~~~
lsc
A low barrier career? really?

It's different from developing, certainly, and different even from hiring
people to work for you. But, as far as I can tell, it's quite difficult to
actually get set up as a paid recruiter. I've gotten quite a few people jobs.
Hell, I've gotten people who worked for me jobs elsewhere, and never once have
I gotten a dime out of the deal.

------
scdc
You were smart to tell your boss ahead of time.

~~~
shrikant
Welp, I might've accidentally down-voted you when meaning to upvote. As I have
no way of telling, apologies if that happened!

------
donaq
People like you make HN worth visiting. Good luck with your startup!

------
ajennings
Thanks for coming back!

If there were any "common themes" in the resumes you reviewed or if you have
any general advice for the HN crowd regarding resumes, I would love to hear
them.

~~~
Peroni
Good idea. Rather than post my advice here and have it lost in the noise I
will write a new post over the next day or two pointing out exactly what you
suggested, common themes, common mistakes, general advice, etc.

Great shout.

------
shailesh
I'm sorry to learn that you're were treated in a rather indecent manner by
some; hopefully the immature response of those folks doesn't deter your noble
initiative.

------
tomjen3
I understand why those persons send you that email (not that I agree with it).
Wild guess only one or two of the CVs had the personal details removed?

It would seem to be an excellent scam and since there are 80k visitors to HN,
it isn't strange that a few tenths of a percent of the userbase should have
encountered really unethical recruiters and be mad enough to do something
about it.

Just the way things are, I guess.

~~~
Jgrubb
Help me out, because I've never been in a position to be "recruited" for
anything technical.

What does an unethical recruiter do that ends up screwing over the recruited?

~~~
Peroni
There are a couple of options.

I could phone your previous employers without your permission on the guise of
taking a reference for you and use that opportunity to build credibility with
the potential client.

I could contact you and find out where you are currently interviewing and
approach those companies with stronger candidates.

~~~
psykotic
Those are fortunately pretty rare behaviors. They call for a degree of
sociopathy rather than merely buffoonish incompetence.

An unfortunately common story I hear from acquaintances who have used
recruiters in my industry is that many recruiters will use a shotgun approach
and feed lines of bullshit to prospective employee and employer alike. The
recruiter might take your resume, massage it to hit all the right notes for a
wide range of listed positions, and then submit it. That will probably garner
a few phone interviews and on-site visits at the very least. Once the
candidate gets on the phone or on site, he and the people he's interviewing
with will soon realize he's being tested for an entirely inappropriate
position for his skill set. Not only is this a waste of time for everyone
involved, but it permanently damages the candidate's reputation with that
company and the people involved in the interviewing.

------
roel_v
I think you're entirely within your right to post the abuser's email addresses
/ HN handles on your blog or elsewhere.

~~~
Peroni
No chance. That's one thing I love about HN. Even when you do encounter the
odd troll, people here rise above it and don't play into their hands.

The guy was an idiot, my boss at the time thought it was hilarious and he was
only one person. He didn't mention his HN handle (most of the people who
emailed me didn't) but hopefully he spots this post.

~~~
roel_v
Sure, and I guess it would be a net negative for you since most people would
find it petty, but at some point someone needs to take a stand against idiots
who think they can hide behind their keyboards and who feel they have the
moral high ground and that that gives them the right to bully others into
molding their behavior according to the bully's world view.

(not saying you have some moral responsibility to be a crusader against
internet bullies here, just that 'trolling' isn't funny anymore when people
start calling other people's jobs and families and that we shouldn't just
shrug it off and accept it as a normal thing on the internet)

~~~
dennisgorelik
"Take a stand against idiots"? Really?

It's better to ignore idiots.

~~~
roel_v
OK maybe not 'take a stand against idiots', but 'take a stand against
bullies'. Harassing people is not somebody just being an idiot; it's not like
we should ignore people who put a dog turd in somebody's mailbox every day.

People standing in the middle of the street holding signs about how Jezus
saves, or posting online about being abducted by aliens: idiots, ignore;
people picketing funerals with 'god hates fags' signs: bullies, punish. (not
in the lynch mob sense, but in the 'recourse society takes against deviant
subjects').

------
praptak
Hats off to you, OP for not having gotten discouraged by the hate. Rock on.

------
Uchikoma
341 * 20 * 0.8 = 5456 minutes of reading CVs.

Looks like a lot of work.

------
jsavimbi
No good deed goes unpunished.

Also, stop calling me; I'm not interested in working with Flash/Flex, servlets
and C# on a Tcl app for a Fortune 500 company within 200 miles of my local
area.

~~~
jsavimbi
why the downvotes? Do people not understand sarcasm?

~~~
epochwolf
My reason for down voting is it came across as mocking Peroni. I certainly
understood it was sarcasm but I did not think it was funny.

Edit: well, Peroni found it funny (didn't see his post when I replied.)

~~~
jsavimbi
> No good deed goes unpunished.

I never understood that to be a form of mockery, more of sympathy. So I looked
it up and yes, I was apparently, and unintentionally, mocking Peroni. My
apologies.

------
Uchikoma
341 * 20 * 0.8 = 5456 minutes.

Looks like a lot of work.

