OT: Opinion on making recuirters part of your LinkedIn network?

[Russell Reiter]

With recruiters it depends on which part of the cycle the economy is
in. Are they working to fill a natural demand, or are they working to
create a demand by headhunting; raiding companies for talent and so
forth. Several years ago I was headhunted by a recruiter to be a
recruiter for an agency. It turns out he just wanted me smuggle his
book out of the office before he jumped ship. He figured I could snarf
his data from the database and sneak it out past the firewall. The
book being his list of companies and prospects.

The way he got me interested in the job initially was to show me the
commission cheques from the agents in the office, which fluctuate in
percentages of wages depending on which side of the cycle the market
is currently placed.

I did not help him to purloin the company's data, it was theirs even
though he created it. Neither did I stay a recruiter.  I'm good on the
phone, I'm just not cut out for cubicle life. Recruiting can be
lucrative if you have the patience to get past the gatekeepers and
mine company data, or place your prospects, or snatch someone away
from a job for one of your jobs, but its not what it appears to be.
Although the vast majority of hiring by companies is outsourced, its
often a closed cycle of shuffling employment contracts around with
little regard for whether or not the candidate is suitable for the
position or vice versa.

I look at it like hiring an agent. You want someone who's going to get
on the phone and make all the calls you can't or don't know how to
make.

Good luck with the job hunt.
Russell


On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 1:40 PM, Alex Beamish <talexb-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> Hi folks,
>
> I'm currently looking for a job, and have been talking to a number of
> recruiters (some of whom may be on this list).
>
> I received a couple of invitations to connect from these recruiters,
> but I haven't added any of them to my LinkedIn network unless I've
> actually worked with them, because I prefer that my network consist of
> people that I know and/or people I've worked with. Thoughts?
>
> Alex Beamish
> Toronto, Ontario
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