Why do recruiters on LinkedIn contact me without disclosing key details such as the company's name, salary expectations, or specific information about the position?
Because they are external from the hiring company, competing with every other 3rd party recruiter out there, as well as the direct hiring of the source company. If they gave you too much info, you could bypass them and just apply directly to the job.
That is the same reason that one open role results in dozens of similar postings for it - different recruiters all posting the same gig.
Many no-compensation-listed jobs do not exist. They're there to hoover up CVs.
Anothrr reason, in the contract world would to maximize profits. Usually the agency makes their 20%, but it could increase drastically if they think you can be put in for less. I've seen them skimming up to a third off the top.
Company names are usually confidential because the agencies are all in competition with each other. Though a few do lock down sole agency agreements.
Often there are generic "xyz developer" roles that require 5 years experience etc... That they use from a previous client.
Remember recruitment agencies are sales funnels, and you're the product.
They're usually set up with a few account managers and a team of associates that work underneath them.
The associates rarely know anything about the skills involved in the role. They won't know the difference between MySQL and postres - just that they're different keywords. They could be straight out of school/university
Account managers are usually a little more savvy. These are the people who are in direct contact with the company hiring.
Often they'll get a decent database of clients and candidates then run off to another agency, or set themselves up as an agency themselves.
Some directors have been known to sell their agencies after building up a nice database of clients and CVs and be established for a number of years. Only to spring up again with that database after the non-compete clause in the sales agreement expires.
It's quite a seedy world out there in recruitment.
Always assume they're sharks and never reveal hiring manager names, or ex bosses. Some of them are really nice, but don't ever forget they're always after more information.
If you're a resident of Washington State, withholding salary ranges is against the law [0][1] in many cases. Potential employees can file a civil suit, otherwise the State will take up the case.
I've also experienced this. My guess (I don't know for sure) is not so much "so you can't go behind their back and cut them out of a fee", but rather "get you to commit time to them so they have a chance of forming a personal connection".
I haven't had hardly any of them push back when I (extremely curtly) ask for more details. I usually say something like "company name / role description / location / comp? I don't have the time to take calls for every message at that level of detail when I'll probably end up not interested"
Usually they provide the details after that, though sometimes they try to drip it over multiple messages. That's why I think it's not about the fees.
Edit: I've never thought to ask them that directly! Maybe they'd be forthcoming about it.
Salary should not usually be withheld. In my opinion if the salary is being withheld it is because the salary is low and the recruiter knows, or the company is not willing to share the salary because it is lower than market value. The reason the recruiter withholds the end company is so that you don't go and apply to the position with out the recruiter and they loose out on a pay day by getting you through their firm.
Telling you the company can lead to you applying directly. Telling you all the other details just gives you reasons to say no. They want to give you enough guaranteed positives to get you to say "yes" (or at least not "no"). If they don't know what you're currently making, that information asymmetry will prevent them for giving you a number early in the process and give you the sales speak ("a highly competitive compensation").
They are sales people. They earn a commission from the hiring company to get you employed.
If you are involuntarily unemployed and in desperate need of a job these people feel like angels doing gods work. If you are just trying to angle for a higher salary somewhere else they are a tool working you just as you are a tool working the system.
When I was out of work last year I went through a lot of these people because I desperately needed work, but I was also being extremely cautious, and I had to juggle all my needs plus the superfluous demands from my household. Some of these recruiters were amazing and I was the asshole holding things up. Some felt really sleazy and were trying to juice my resume.
Now in all fairness hiring last year was, and might still be, weird. Employer online job portals were broken because there too many applicants. Hiring had effectively become professional sprinting in that you had to do stupid things like juicing your resume to survive resume AI filtering so it just became a game and that was even after going through a recruiter who already had access to a hiring manager. This made things challenging equally for both the candidates and the recruiters.
My learnings:
* The recruiters that had to bend the fewest ethical considerations were employees of the hiring companies.
* JavaScript work is for beginners. Every step in the process felt like meat on a slab, an incompetent replaceable commodity that copy/pastes boilerplate for large framework nonsense. You were treated this way because expectations were simultaneously as low as they were frivolous and vain. Many of these jobs were only looking for expert beginners with 8+ years doing this nonsense and never writing an original line of code. It took a lot of matchmaking failure before I realized I don’t need to do that anymore, and maybe suddenly becoming poor wasn’t so bad.
That is the same reason that one open role results in dozens of similar postings for it - different recruiters all posting the same gig.