working with recruiters (solo show)

full transcript

auto-generated from the audio, so expect a few typos. the audio is the source of truth.

Hello, hello. Thanks for listening to guidance counselor 2.0. Listen, I want to give you a quick rundown of what this podcast is and what you're about to get into as you listen to these episodes. We had guidance counselors in middle school. We had guidance counselors in high school, but we didn't really have guidance counselors in college and now as professionals. We don't really have anybody to turn to to ask a quick question to learn something about the job search or to navigate your career. So that is what I want this podcast to be for you. I want it for it to be a tool for you to navigate the job search and your career.

So that being said, I hope you enjoy this episode and if you need to reach me, Taylor at vacovac.com is how to get in touch with me old-fashioned email social media at tdsintdessey. And then finally, please rate and review this in the app store because I want this to be discoverable for others so they can navigate their careers. Hope you enjoy the episode. So let's go ahead and get started. So first and foremost, I want to give a shout out to that conference. So that conference, I'm going to be there next week. That conference is there's actually two conferences. There's one in Texas and one in Wisconsin.

So Texas is this upcoming week. If you are around the Austin area and want to be a part of a really good net in person networking, I would attend this. So you can use my code or you can go to that conference website, use the code unspecified and basically it's 120 bucks for your ticket. That does not include food, but you can literally show up and meet. Listen, the speaker, the speakers there are high caliber. So go check it out. We would love to see you for sure. Lavanda, it's great to see you. All right, so recruiters 101. So let's talk about recruiters. First off, there's two types.

For those of you who did not know, there's two types of recruiters, there's corporate in there's agency. You know, that's kind of recruiter 101. The typical recruiters that give the recruiting industry a bad reputation is myself, agency recruiters. The reason why agency recruiters have a bad reputation in the market or can give the industry a bad reputation is because we, as agency recruiters are only compensated, we're only compensated if we play somebody. Right now, that sucks. Right? Like we're not compensated to be your friends. We're not. We're just not. Now, I want to be different and I want to be your friend, but at the end of the day, we are not compensated to be your friend.

So that's why a lot of times in the industry when you talk to an agency recruiter, they will talk to you for five minutes and then move on. You'll never hear from them again. That's because again, we are not compensated to be your friend. We're compensated to make placement. So I'm going to dive into how to work with us here in a second. The other side of the recruiting world is the corporate recruiting side. So corporate recruiters, they are the recruiters at the end client. They are the recruiters at the end client. They are the ones that are recruiting for the company. Those individuals, so a little peel behind the onion here.

So agency recruiters are high commission. Our salaries can sometimes be half of what corporate recruiters get paid. All right, let me say that again. Agency recruiters base salaries are can be up to half of what corporate recruiters make. That is because we are heavily commissioned. So that's why you're probably going to get a better experience dealing with a corporate recruiter because they are not compensated. They are more more compensated to be your friend, right? To give you the experience of the company internally. They are kind of the first eyes and ears of the internal company. So they usually are better at treating you better. Now listen, I'm not excusing agency recruiters.

I'm just telling you how it is. All right, so let's talk a few more people tuned in. Hey, it's great. See you. Emma. I'm glad you're here, man. Let's talk about how to do with agency recruiters, right? So agency recruiters. So I talk about some time when you start when you start your job search, right? I always talk about don't spray and pray your resume to job postings. What I would do is I would spray and pray with with agency recruiters, right? So here's the deal. What I would do if I were you, if I would start your job search, I would go on LinkedIn and I would search technical recruiter in your area.

And I would start DMing every technical recruiter in your area, right? So here's why agency recruiters in my opinion, in my opinion, agency recruiters have a better market awareness than corporate recruiters. Again, this is just my two cents. I'm sure if corporate recruiters watch this in the future, they're going to say, no, you're wrong. I listen. I understand. But in my experience, as a whole, agency recruiters have more of an idea of the market in your area than corporate recruiters. Why agency recruiters we work with 10, 15, 20, 25 clients at one time, what do corporate recruiters do? They work only for that one company.

That's it. Now, they talk to other people who are interviewing. I get it. They can get a decent idea. But at the end of the day, the corporate recruiters are the ones that are on the outside and they can see everything, right? So now here's the deal. Most corporate recruiters won't get back to you. They just won't, right? Why you may be to junior in your career? That's the biggest hangup, right? I talked. That's one of the reasons why I started big code dot com back slash Taylor. If you want to go check that out is to give free resources back to junior developers because at the end of the day, companies do not call agency recruiters and say, hey, we need three junior developers.

Why? They can put up a dang job posting and find 25,000 in three days. Right? Agency recruiters were kind of the snipers in the military, right? We don't we don't spray and pray. We are very specific and companies pay us to go find those type of people. So that'll be in said when I would do a fire you, I would reach out and I would spray and pray with agency recruiters first. And and and when you get one on the phone now, if you're junior or you're not a fit, lean in and this goes with corporate recruiters to lean into us, right? Hey, Taylor, what's one tip I can do better on my LinkedIn, right?

I will always give you one tip, right? Hey, what's one tip I can have on my LinkedIn, right? When you get off the phone, when you're about to go out the phone with an agency or corporate recruiter, always pick their brains, right? Hey, what's one tip of my LinkedIn I can do and what's what's one company that should look for, right? So that's that's what I would recommend, right? Kevin is great to see you. The needa. It's great to see you as well. I'm glad you're reaching out to agencies. Again, you got to explore all options, but I would go all in on recruiters first.

Right. For example, there's a junior developer I have in mind. This individual I could not place. I helped them with his resume. This individual got a job because of the advice I gave him with the resume. Right. Again, lean on recruiters a lot. Another thing as well is that check in with us, right? I talk about it all the time. Agency recruiters, we deal our responsibilities to me 10 to 15 new people a week, a week, 10 to 15 new people a week. That is that's a lot. I'm an introvert and that's a lot. Right. So if so that's that's over. That's what that's that's you know, on average 300 people a month.

No, I'm bad at math. Yeah, 10 times 30 is 300. Yeah, 300 people a month ish. 200, 200, 200, 200, 200, 200. Right. Check in with us. I get this question a lot. Taylor, how do I check in with an agency recruiter? Right. Text us or email us don't call. Why? Most agency recruiters are on a call talking to new people. So they're not going to answer your call if you call them. Right. Now you're probably table. Well, I've emailed and text them a few times. Keep texting them and email them. Keep texting them and emailing them until until they respond back. They respond back to you.

Now I always say this this this this is another this is another thing that I say to do all the time. Is if you can't get a feedback from an agency recruiter. I will tell you this most of the time we're just lazy and terrible follow up. But sometimes they're just scared to give you feedback. So one of the word tracks I would recommend dealing with agency recruiters is hey, Mr. Mrs. recruiter. I haven't heard from you in the last seven days. I understand I'm probably not a fit. Can you please let me know if this is the case so I can go ahead and move on with my job search.

Because what that does is that allows the agency recruiter to go, okay, this person understands I'm going to go and let them know. Right. So I have not told people feedback because I have been worried about the response. Right. So again, that that is why I would recommend to do that. And I'm going to say that you're so unorganized. I'll never work with you. Yada, Yada, Yada. After that moment after getting blessed out by this individual because I just didn't have my brain straight. I from now on don't take phone calls. If anybody on this chat tries to call me. I want to answer. I want to answer.

Leave me a voicemail or text me. Right. And don't even leave me a voicemail. Just text me. Right. Again texting email is the way to get in touch with recruiters. Any other questions doing with recruiters. TikTok. You know, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube. If you have any questions on recruiters, let me know. I'm trying to think of anything else kind of just some basic 101 stuff. One of the things I talked about all the time is the BCC trick. I came up with this. This is not like an official thing. Listen recruiters recruiters do recruiters do with so many people that we forget sometimes that you're on the market for job we may get.

So what I would do if I were you before you submit your resume to the company. And or let's say your BFS with recruiter a and some random recruiter calls you about this job. What I would do is I would say hey recruiter. I appreciate this. Let me get back to you. I would call your favorite recruiter. This this happened to me to true story true story. We were working on Ruby Ruby roles Ruby devs fuse back. They always come back every four years. It's weird. So I'll four years ago I was working on Ruby devs. What about buddies who went out very, very well who have placed multiple time on projects.

This individual hit me up and he goes hey are you working on these Ruby orders. I've been called by other recruiters by one of work with you and I go oh shit. Thanks for calling me. I am. I just forgot it just happens. We can't keep track of everybody. So if you have a favorite recruiter in your area and some other recruiter calls you about that job. Just tell the other recruiter like hey listen I appreciate call me. Let me fall back up with you. Go check in with your other recruiter friend and see if they're working on that role. Going back to the BCC trick.

One of the things that I came up in my head is if you find four or five recruiters in your area Nashville Dallas Austin Houston wherever. And there's three to five to 10 of y'all recruiters that you that you like to a certain extent. You think could do a decent job. What I would do is I put all them on a BCC email. Right. I learned this on one of my lives. That means blind carbon copy for the record. And basically what I would do is I would BCC all of them and say hey like hey exclamation mark like you know make it seem personal without it being personal.

Hey. I came across this job posting on the internet. Are you working with this company or know anybody there. Listen if I got that email. And I'm not working on that job. I would be glad to make intros if I know anybody at that company. Most recruiters should be willing to help you even make a quick email intro which I always try to do. I guess if you if you can sense a theme here y'all start with recruiters. There's anything you get out of this live show and I'm gonna wrap it up here in a second. So any questions please ask them now I'm gonna go and wrap it up.

If you get anything out of this live show. Literally start with recruiters. Spray and pray your relationship with agency recruiters. Ask recruiters about jobs before you submit to them. BCC them pick their brains lean on recruiters first I promise you the job search will be a little easier to navigate. I'll see here one question. How can how can we ask us a recruiters to add us on LinkedIn to make a personalized message in the notes. So if you didn't know this when you connect with somebody on LinkedIn. You set please send them a note please send us a note if you connect with us on LinkedIn and don't send a note you just go by by I don't know.

How else to say you kind of just disappear into our followers. Also connect not follow right so if you connect that's a two-way street. So if you connect with them they see you you see them when you follow them when you follow them. You only see their stuff right which kind of gets into the next thing I'll talk about on my next solo show just about the job search and the reason why you connect over follow with content creation we'll get into that right so that's that's how I would do it. So yeah all right well that's it that's it again lean on recruiters oh here we go we got one more question.

Neil Patel does this also work with junior developers recent grads. Neil can you be more specific what I've been saying a lot of words which which part does this also work. If you're talking about just connecting with people on LinkedIn. Then yes right junior devs send me a message hey I'm a junior dev would love to just connect let's stay in touch right I will always accept your invite right super important always. Send a note that's one of the most underrated hacks on LinkedIn that I really need to talk more about is sending a note in the invite also I believe somebody correct me if I'm wrong.

I believe if you sending note on LinkedIn and that person accepts you get like a credit back if you're have the free version does that make sense so if you send a note. Like so I've blindly tried to connect with people just to build my audience right surprise I do it it's fine. So just blind connect blind connect blind connect. LinkedIn shuts you down for the day it's like whoa whoa you're being spammy let's chill out. But if you send a note every time LinkedIn doesn't ding you so you can connect with more people and I believe you get credit back so fun little fact there yeah so yeah connect with recruiters specifically again use that always send us a note.

Because it it really goes a long way let's see here another question coming in Lavanda how should entry folks approach recruiters today given that most once you yeah. So Lavanda it's like I've been saying on this talk I would just tell them like hey Mr. Mrs recruiter. I know you're probably not looking for a junior like just call what it is listen I am junior you're probably not looking for junior. Can I hop on the phone with you for 10 minutes 11 minutes right we talk about using those different numbers 11 minutes 12 minutes. And can it can I just talk to you about the market Vaudevaud now Lavanda most recruiters probably will say no right like if you messes me I'll probably say no just too busy right now.

But if you messes 10 recruits and one gets back to you that says yes that's 15 minutes a very precious valuable time that you can pick that recruiters brain so again just call it what it is listen. I'm junior I know you probably can't help me but we love to just learn from you. And the reason why you got dinged is yeah yeah don't post you got to post a link in the comments. But this is a whole another conversation Emma starting to bring in the intricacies of LinkedIn if you want to get in the content creation please stop posting links. as the post on LinkedIn because LinkedIn throttles it because they don't want you going off to platform if you do have a link post the words and then post the blog link in the comments of that makes sense.

Chris comes in send send the note because it shows up in your messages yeah absolutely yeah the way LinkedIn has it you will have to go in and like click off of it so like I have to see the message. Michael thank you so much I really really appreciate that that means a lot Barrett you're really really funny also Barrett congrats on the MVP Microsoft MVP big deal for Barrett former guest of the show. Brandon had a question on TikTok do you think the term recruiters should be replaced by something more approachable yeah I mean to be honest with you the name recruiter has such a bad reputation.

that we need to burn recruiter to the ground and and come up with a new name professional friend maker is what I like to say so. Alright y'all with that is enough with me running my mouth on this wonderful Tuesday I hope y'all have a great rest of your days alright so tomorrow the rest of the week. We got Kelly Vaughn so render ATL speaker series continues next tomorrow so Kelly Vaughn is tomorrow my dear friend Thursday unicorn finders we have a company called up rise they were at the very top of product hunt for a bit. there in the personal financial planning space pretty cool and then I conclude the week with Amy Dutton who is local but she is with James quick on compressed FM so excited about that.

So again thank you all for tuning this morning go connect everybody go be fearless they go be a friend to somebody call that co worker you haven't talked to in five years call that friend you haven't talked to in six years just say hey. because again those type of quick conversations are the things that lead you to your dream job y'all have a great one take it easy please. Hey you did it you listen to an entire episode and I am very grateful because you know why there's a lot of podcasts out there there's a lot of episodes and I myself. rarely finish an entire episode so I appreciate you so so much for listening quick reminder please rate and review this podcast in the app store I want this to be discoverable to others and the only way that happens is if you take the time right now and rate and review it please like right now.

unless you're driving then don't do it so thank you again if you need to reach out to me tailor at vaco.com or at t-d and on all social media handles and I hope you have a fantastic day.