SPUG:Open Source Recruiters?

[Creede Lambard]

I can second this, having just gone nine months trying to get a job through a
couple of recruiters (Volt and Robert Half). There are a LOT of applicants out
there, and employers can cherry pick the best ones.

In some ways I'm still amazed that I found a job, but in some ways I wasn't.
The job was with an outfit I'd worked with before, about 4-5 years ago. I
remembered some of the people I interviewed with, and while the technology
had changed somewhat, I was still familiar enough with it to sound like I
could just jump right into the job.

The outfit is Microsoft. The group is the Macintosh Business Unit. So while
I'm not exactly working with a paragon of open source development here, I am
working with Darwin and the Mac OS -- and Perl. There are some who would
probably chastise me for going to work for M$, and in the best of all
possible worlds, maybe I'd rather work in more of an open source environment.
However, after nine months of wondering if I was ever going to work again and
watching the 401K money deplete down to next to nothing, a job here looked
pretty good -- especially a job with a group I'd worked with before and
enjoyed (and where I didn't really have to do much with Windows except read
mail and submit time sheets).

Back on topic: Working with a recruiter is still a viable way to get a job.
Just don't expect them to be able to create miracles for you.

-- Creede

On Mon, 5 May 2003, Marc M. Adkins wrote:

> > I didn't get much of a response on this so I'll ask a related
> > question.  Can anyone recommend a good recruiter?
> 
> So far as I know the current ratio of jobs to 'applicants' for a recruiter
> is on the order of 1:100.  Which pretty much means that even a 'good'
> recruiter is the equivalent of a lottery ticket.
> 
> On an unrelated but equally telling note, something like 50% recruiting
> companies listed on the tax rolls two years ago have either gone out of
> business, changed names, or been bought or merged since then.  The shakeout
> in their business rivals or exceeds the shakeout in ours.
> 
> mma
>