Blog

Knowledge. Experience. Resources designed to advance your success.

Ask The Expert

Recruiters Never Get Back to Me!

Thank you, Mark for sharing this at our Open Flame Happy Hour event yesterday!  Great discussion…

Recruiters Never Get Back to Me!

Written by: Mark Rowbottom, President of Recruiters of Wisconsin

 

In the course of daily operations of my desk I often ask both candidates and client companies what kind of issues they have had with recruiters.

There is a common and recurring response from candidates on this topic.  Many complain that they send a requested resume and never hear back from the recruiter.  Admittedly, all recruiters are guilty of this more than once in their career.

So why do recruiters not call you?  Some responses may be: Your resume does not match the recruiters current need(s), thus no compelling reason to call you. Your resume has not made an impression and the recruiter would rather not share this with you. Possibly, the recruiter never received it!

Here’s the point I want to stress.  Did you try calling the recruiter? Why not?  Pick up the receiver and take control of the lack of action.

There are other reasons recruiters do not get back as they may be consumed on other action items.  When you’re expecting a call for sending out your resume to anyone – make a call or email inquiry. What do you have to lose?

Recruiters are making calls and contacts all day/week/yearlong that are NOT returned.  What do we do in these situations?  Call again, email again – we are making things happen for our people!  Can we seem like pests because of this persistence?  Yes, but this is not our intent.  Our intent is to illicit a response while not presuming to know the answer.

Our client companies often have a similar complaint.  After sharing a job description with a recruiter and maybe some additional relevant information, they hear nothing back.  While the recruiter seemed quite eager to “help out” there is not further contact regarding the description and no candidate submitted.  The firm just moves on without further communication – WTH? Right?

Well, in a contingency relationship it is just that.  The recruiter will work on it contingent upon: If the salary is reasonable for the skills, if the interviewing process is timely and effective, if they have had past success with the company and Manager, if the position has not been open a year, if only a few search firms have the opportunity, if the fee is workable, and more.

So, if you do not hear back after giving out a job description to a firm I suggest you call them back or send an email.  Try to recoup some of your time invested and find out if there are any issues.  I believe this is reasonable, and you need to keep recruiters accountable.

Recruiters can get a bad rap for this “failure to communicate” problem.  The truth is recruiters will only fish with the right bait (candidate) and a hot fishing hole (client companies) in contingency searches.  Retained searches are a different model totally and that’s another topic I will get to.

In the future and moving towards a better result in communication may I suggest you reach out.  In doing so, remember that you are reaching out to a professional who is awaiting hundreds of replies.

You may be surprised at how well your inquiry is perceived.

In closing I feel the need to add that some recruiters are just bad and lazy, so be glad you are not getting a call back from them.

Other Articles