Candidates are quite a species. As we know, it’s feast or famine – and right now, as a creative recruiter we are definitely in famine mode – it’s summer, candidates are a rare breed, and job orders are not as plentiful as we’d like them to be.
So, you find a candidate that has a good book – not amazing, but marketable. You call the candidate, give a few tips on how to make their book better. You hit it off, you see where they’ve been before, then clear them for your clients not before you state the caveat that you can’t present if they’ve been there in the past, and further that once clear, we are repping them for those places.
So, imagine my surprise when I find out that someone I have been working with for a full month has gone behind my back and was presented through other recruiters (yes, that is PLURAL) to an agency we work with. AND that another client who expressed interest in this candidate told us that she had applied there on her own – AFTER saying that she has NEVER even HEARD of these places.
Maybe I was Punk’d – but I spoke with a couple of my freelance friends who pretty much said when they are looking for work, they will DO ANYTHING to secure an assignment. One friend said they know that the recruiter is only after their next dollar, so why shouldn’t she. Further, she mentioned that no one ever told them how to work with their recruiters. What she did was obviously unethical, but she doesn’t think so one bit. She is working, our clients (at the time) passed on her. Somehow she squeezed in. While this is very slimy, she is still young and very impressionnable. Hopefully this was just an “oops!” moment that she never makes again.
Filed under: Career, creative, educating your talent, recruiting, staffing Tagged: | creative recruiting, ethics, mentor, professional development, recent grads, staffing
