So, the deal is, I’m not looking for work at this exact moment (well, unless you count short term consulting, I’m always open to that). However, anyone who has been either in the gaming industry more than, oh, five minutes, knows that you should always hear recruiters out. The minute you think your current job is forever, the people who pay you will go out of business/go insane/lay you off.
Thus it is that whenever someone calls me, I respond with a nice note saying, “I’d love to chat, but I want to be clear about one minor detail – in my case, “cannot relocate” does not mean “give me more money.” I really cannot leave the DC/Baltimore area. If this is all right with you, let’s talk further.” That’s the basic outline, but I customize depending on the job involved.
I send this note even when my spidey senses tell me that the “opportunity” is to work for free, or to work for monkeys, or whatever. The most unlikely companies have turned into big things, and it’s always worth hearing people out.
But I really, really hate it when someone lays it on thick for me, and when I respond politely within five minutes of getting the message, responds BACK with a “Thank you for your interest; unfortunately, all the jobs have been filled” form letter. What? I feel like I’m fifteen again, and that hot guy from World History was flirting with me for the whole school year and begging me to go to McDonald’s and when I finally said, okay, let’s go get a burger, tells me that he’s busy. Forever. I desperately want to say “I wasn’t interested, actually, I was just being nice.” But I won’t say that, just in case the idiot sending the form letter winds up in charge of a studio someday.
There’s one thing more annoying than being cockteased. I mean, at least I got a response and I got it fast, however canned it may have been. Let’s say I’m really looking for work, and I send out a bunch of resumes. Six months goes by. One of the companies contacts me. I politely decline the interview on the grounds that I have long since found a job. Found it five months before, in fact. That’s not annoying. The annoying part is where the HR underling gets snotty with ME for having taken another job. Wow! Right! I’m to blame for not just sitting around eating bonbons while the economy implodes, just in case HE might call!
But the all time most annoying thing is… the black hole. “Please send a resume!” the company begs. Phone calls, emails, clever IMs. Finally I send the resume. Aaaaand nothing happens. Ever. In fact, all my future correspondence goes unanswered. Now, I’m pretty sure the resume isn’t the problem, nor is my past. There is nothing on my resume that isn’t already on my blog or LinkedIn. My sordid past is not at all hidden. Three seconds with Google reveals everything except for the photos of me at the fraternity costume party, and that lack is because I was the only one there with a camera. If someone is contacting me, it’s pretty safe to say they’ve already found out all the icky bits that might upset a venture capitalist. I’ve PASSED two venture capitalist screenings at this point, for heaven’s sake. Just tell me you’ve changed your mind!
Man, this economy sucks. When the employers have more power, there seems to be less… courtesy. I wish people would remember that no cycle is forever, but a grudge sure can be.
It’s like they have a filter in their brains that cannot process information suggesting you don’t want the job.
Man, there was a time, nearly 10 years ago, when recruiters would call me up and ask me what I wanted. I remember one, who after I had accepted a job offer a few weeks earlier, promised me 6 figures if only I’d show up for the interview. He was so confident that he sold the client on me prior to me showing up — if I’d just show up, I’d get the job. Well, I had a new job, I told him, so I wasn’t exactly looking for another…but he wouldn’t let up. For all I know, he’s still calling that phone line, which happens to be under thousands of tons of dust and rubble from the WTC collapse.
That client of his? Bear Stearns.
Nowadays, I think the tide has reversed. People are desperate for work, and since companies have slowed down their hiring, there are fewer commissions for recruiters. I’m frankly surprised that more recruiters haven’t resorted to corporate espionage as a method to make ends meet.
I think in the case of the current situation, my work situation is well outside the norm. I have a Government security clearance and work in IT. Pretty much guaranteed work, as long as I don’t screw up.
But I still get calls from recruiters asking for my “latest resume for their records”. I politely tell them that I am not currently looking for work, and therefore will not be giving them my resume. It’s amazing how a head-hunting company doesn’t understand the phrase “no, I don’t work with head hunters”. No head hunter has ever come through with anything of value for me, not even a properly qualified interview with a potential client.
And temp-to-hire is right out. Did that once, and it was a rousing failure. Didn’t find out until 2 days before the temp period that I wasn’t getting the full offer, and that it had nothing do with my work. But these people too are very insistent that I give them all my information because they want it. Even had one call me rude for refusing them. It’s funny how I’m the rude one, but they were told “no” three times before and won’t leave me alone.
So, I suggest that if this does happen, make public notice of the company that behaves this way. The only way this kind of culture will change is if it made clear that not only is it not acceptable, but others will be warned not to deal with them.
I went to school to work in the fashion industry in a technical capacity, but after ten years of stress I decided I wasn’t cut out for an industry that only pretended not to be a clone of Hollywood. The best thing I ever did was get a government job (at the Smithsonian, which happened to be a dream of mine). Which just goes to prove that job security doesn’t have to be hell.
Then I got sick and couldn’t work. Thank God I married active military or I’d be stuck waiting to get disability. But that’s beside the point, except for, just when you think your life is pretty damn good, things get turned upside down.
I don’t know, either you stick with the industry that you thnk you want to stay in and take the hard knocks, or you look into breaking into a different one. Me, I got tired of banging my head against the wall just for the “privilege” of working in a “cool” industry. And yes, stress WILL make you sick.
I think this is one of those things you can only fight one person/job/whatever at a time. The one that really gets to me is sending in a resume for a job posting and getting no response whatsoever. I was unemployed for 9 months, and in that time I applied to a lot of jobs. In that time exactly two employers had the decency to send me an e-mail letting me know the position was filled. Not one of them bothered to tell me why they weren’t hiring me, or what I could do to improve my chances in the future.
You know how I got back at them? When it was my turn to hire people I replied to every single resume I got. It sucked, it took extra time, and it netted me one nasty-gram (“How dare you tell me why you’re not hiring me, and give me advice on improving my resume.”), but at the end of the day I knew I wasn’t part of the problem. And that felt pretty fucking good.
From the entry: in my case, “cannot relocate” does not mean “give me more money.”
That seriously made me chuckle. It reminded me of the Friends episode where Chandler is on the phone trying to quit. “I’m quitting. No, I’m quitting. Stop saying numbers! I’ll see you on Monday!”
In every profession, be in HR or Community, there are good people and bad people. I know that sounds farfetched to you because you’re so damn good at everything you do (be it managing several gaming communities or writing). For the rest of us, it’s not so easy. Some days, it’s all I can do not to turn suicidal and take out 1/4 of a mile with me.
I reread that, and thought it might be interpreted wrong. I was NOT being El Sarcastico. I truly mean it. You absolutely rock, Sanya!
Sac of balls
I’m surprised Calarious that you had such poor luck with contracting/recruiting agencies. I’ve had nothing but phenomenal experiences with them. The reason why they’re so aggressive is because of how they’re paid. My contracting agency bills my eventual employer $45/hr more than they pay me. So they’ll make roughly $30K across a six month period just by introducing the two of us. Not every lead for them pans out so they make up for it with aggressiveness.
Sanya, it’s probably the same numbers game they’re going through with you. The recruiters that work directly for companies don’t have the kind of direct incentives that contractors do to close the deal. It’s quite possible that they’re just going through the motions of touching each job requisition at a given interval and they go through the same oversell mode because they don’t really expect you to respond.
Then again, I’m not in your industry so I could be a little off-base there.
My personal record was the phone call I got after dropping off a tape and resume at a mid-market radio station I wanted to work for.
EIGHT YEARS after I dropped it off.
My response (after I finally remembered actually dropping them off)?
“Sorry, that information isn’t accurate since the final operation.”
They never called back.
Radio is an entirely different beast than quite a few other career fields. I was once offered free pizza as a “signing bonus” to come to work at a station. Not “free pizza anytime you want it,”…A free pizza.
Of course, I’ve also been offered free rent, so the pendulum swings both ways. People are usually amazed when I tell them that the freelance writing jobs I deal with are usually much more “normal” than my actual career when it comes to management.