It’s too bad that “sales driven” is code for “information hiding.” But it’s true.
Anecdotally, I’ve been able to solve the information assymetry problem by drinking recruiters under the table. This is pretty much a prerequisite for me working with you.
Recruiters aren't taking your references to figure out whether you're good at your job. I mean they are, but that isn't the main purpose behind taking them. They're taking your references to build a network to acquire business from your employer.
I got an email from a local recruiter a few weeks ago and stepped outside during my lunch break to give her a call. On the initial phone call she asked me where I worked currently. After the call I stepped back into my work where I sit back to back with my manager. No more than 5 minutes later his phone rings, its the recruiter calling to see if they have any need of her services. I emailed her while he was on the phone with the recruiter and told her I was not interested and to please remove me from her list for all future positions. That was a stressful 5 minutes.
They’re (mostly but not all) used-car liars until proven otherwise. Alphabet’s HR people seem nice, helpful, sharp & legit... they work really hard to place people in roles where people want to be and that want them. Triplebyte maybe a better model to help with the search. Also, it’s entirely plausible to sell yourself as well as or perhaps sometimes even better than a recruiter could if you consider their needs carefully, show you can hustle (follow-up, negotiate, stick to some requirements, etc.) and save the hiring manager/company time&money.
I don't think this would work. Anyone that is already using shady business practices wouldn't object to posting a few fake reviews of themselves and their competitors either.
Not to mention that many people burned by those business practices may not even realize they got burned. There's a lot of information asymmetry in the telephone game of candidate -> recruiter -> hr -> hiring manager.
Strongly disagree. I hope you are being hyperbolic. While there is certainly a wide range in competency and the level of value provided by recruiters, many of them are MUCH better than zero stars.
Yes but the unscrupulous ones will be happy to give and receive fake reviews. The more honest ones won't. So it will be hard to tell the difference between a bad recruiter (fake positive and real negative reviews) and a good recruiter (real positive and fake negative reviews).
It's actually really easy. My standard test for potential recruiters: Tell me something about myself. This takes a tiny amount of work -- anybody who has my email address can google me and find a huge amount of stuff. A recruiter who is not bothered to do that will not be bothered to find a job that's good for me.
When I find a good recruiter, I stick with them (as long as I'm shopping in the area that they deal with). I make sure they know that. If a recruiter is good enough that they can value a long term relationship as opposed to frantically trying to meet their sales targets every month, then they are a good recruiter.
The downside is that there are practically no good recruiters ;-). If I'm seriously looking for a job, I look as hard for recruiters as I do for a job. Often I find the job before the recruiter.
I've checked out https://app.recruitsy.co/ (no affiliation) if you're in one of the more common roles/locations where you receive a lot of inquiries. A directory like this needs to exist.
I ran small recruitment agency for one year long (never again! terrible sharks industry). During that time I saw many non-ethical tactics used by other agencies.
Some recruiters would do what you explain for one of the the following reasons:
a) to blackmail the company in the likes of “I won’t touch your employees if you recruit using my services from now on”.
b) already had a signed agreement with your employeer which didn’t allow the recruitment agency to “touch” any of its employees. You seemed like a match for their new client and the recruiter was checking if your employer agreement was still valid. Of course, this is also seen as blackmail by companies.
This sounds like something which should be transparently open, public knowledge, and public listings...
Can we please just have a matching service run by the unemployment office and also require salary / compensation range for the listed job? (Also that it IS an actual job and not head hunters collecting resumes.)
How is this shady? I worked with a recruiting agency that had a contract to find employees/contractors for a company. I was hired by my last employee through the recruiting agency. I then started working with the agency as a team lead to hire developers.
It would have been unethical for them then to try to place me somewhere else, especially with the inside knowledge they had about the company.
When I was looking for a job, while I was still there. The recruiters I had worked with for years before I started working for thier client, wouldn’t touch me with a ten foot pole. Fair enough. Now that I don’t work for one of thier clients they would be glad to work with me.
On the topic of the first one, am I the only one who finds it strange that a recruiter could 'poach' one of your references? I mean, maybe I'm unusual or it works differently over here, but from what I hear, most people's references in the UK seem to be managers or business owners for the companies they worked with, not the normal employees.
Do people usually give their 'normal' colleagues as references in the US?
If you've been working at a large company for several years, there may be very few people outside your company who know your work well enough to give a meaningful reference. Then, you can't give a manager's name, since they will almost certainly tell your own manager what is going on. That leaves only your co-workers.
Oh, you're talking about someone applying for a job and using a reference from their current company. I always thought people used references from companies they don't work at anymore.
In that case they should definitely avoid giving references until the last possible step. For those that do have other options though, I still think going with a manager/non colleague at a company you're not associated with anymore is the safer bet for these sorts of things, since recruiters won't have anyone to poach and your current boss won't know you're looking.
(Solution 2 would be to have as many different references as possible and to give different ones for different applications, so that no one gets too annoyed by all the calls/emails).
Or your references might be a manager from your previous position plus a co-worker from a previous position plus a manager from the position before that. The co-worker from the previous position might end up being recruited.
That said, if my reference applied for the same position as me and got it, whatever, more power to them, and I probably wasn't going to get it anyway. There are enough jobs out there for both of us, and I'd rather at least know that one went to someone I like.
As a source of information, references were hand selected by the person with an interest in getting selected, they will like be prepped on what to say, they have zero investment in your company's success, etc.
It's amazing what you get if you just stay on the phone with the reference. People want to talk. They want to say something meaningful. Once the cliches are dispensed with they're forced to say something real and at that point you get to find out the real type of person you're looking at.
Just being able to provide multiple people with meaningful positions (former manager at your company, etc.) who are willing to advocate for you is a signal. There are ways to fake that signal of course, but it's still something of a filter.
10% you can get confirmation that you correctly spotted the candidate’s development areas. (Everyone has them, so it’s not a gotcha. But if you think the candidate needs to work on their architecture skills, their last boss confirms it but says they’re a great hire, then you can a good conversation later. “I’d love you to do X, how do we make you a great architect along the way?)
10% if the time you catch the candidate in a lie or find yourself asking “Is the best they could find someone to talk about their work?”
When I reference checked nannies, the last bucket grew to 50%. And I had one nanny give another as a reference.
You don't have to break a law to be ruled against in civil court (in the US), but I agree with you; I don't see a case here (even checked with a lawyer who happens to be visiting.)
Anyone can certainly sue anyone at anytime (at least in the US), but I don't think there's any basis for a civil claim here. Not sure you'd find a lawyer to take your case.
This happened to me when it was time to move on from my first real job.
A recruiter, who I spoke to briefly and had no interest in moving forward with, contacted my current manager and said he'd help fill my role after I left. My manager had no idea I was looking to leave at that point.
After confirming with me that I was indeed planning to leave, the manager wished me well, then ensured neither the recruiter nor their company would ever work with one of the largest engineering companies in Europe.
That felt righteous and worked out for the best, but could really have left me in the lurch.
Being a contractor in the UK for the last 13 years i quickly learned when i first started that any recruiter that asks for references before they've even sent the CV to the client is a lying cheating scumbag and will get told outright where to go.
Indeed. I let the recruiter negotiate salary on my behalf as he guaranteed at least 50k which I considered my minimum to move to London. I went through the interview process because of that.
They didn’t budge from 45. What a waste of my time and theirs.
IT recruitment in Australia doesn't require a tertiary education, fluent(ish) English is a must and the job is relatively highly paid if you're good/sociopathic enough.
There are also a lot of vacancies as the working holiday visas rotate the backpackers in and out - hence all the cold-calling, cheeky, chirpy cockneys
Oh yes, with a special mention to the UK recruiters working on the German market. Had one trying to convince me for one full hour to accept a salary of 48-50k to relocate to Munich, where rent for me and my family would have been more than half my monthly salary.
I still remember his best two lines:
1. I placed a guy from your country at the same company and he had a salary of 35k and three kids and a dog and he did very well for himself!
2. look, the company is offering fruits every week as a benefit to employees. If you eat fruit, you can save up to 50 EUR per week!
I did end up in the job, after the HR from the company tried a second round of negotiations and were were much more flexible (more salary, bigger relocation bonus). Unfortunately, there were bigger problems there, so I had to quit after about 2 months, which meant, probably, no bonus for them. Also, we would got like 30EUR worth of fruit for 20 people every week
The recruiter doesn't even need references. Once you interview in person you should have direct contact with someone at the company you can give references to if need be. The good ones will make the introduction and get out of the way. Yes, I believe there are some good ones (not many).
Same with "what other companies have you been talking to?" while simultaneously asking me to not disclose the role I'm applying for with any other recruiters.
I hate the game-theory information asymmetry bullshiting game that is recruiting.
> I do know that my manager called me up pissed off about the phone call he’d received, and told me to not use him as a reference in the future.
It's also important for your references to know that they're your references ahead of time. You may think you have a good relationship with someone only to discover that they aren't a reliable positive reference. People also don't like being caught off guard.
I once hired someone as a Mid/Senior Dev at a large company in SV who had strong dev skills. Everything seemed great at first and we were very excited to have this person join the team.
I respected this dev and had no personal issues with them. Our interactions were positive. However this person quit suddenly after maybe two weeks because they didn't like having to justify their technical approach on their very first project to other team members. They just wanted to work alone and not interact with anyone else.
More power to this dev for seeking out their preferred work environment - I totally respect that! - but it wasn't exactly a positive experience for us. We spent weeks and weeks with Recruiting/HR and back and forth on offers to finally end up with someone who quit without any warning after mere days.
And of course I get a phone call a few weeks later where this dev (without contacting me in any way) has listed me as a reference for their new job. What do they think I am going to say? "Yes, during the multiple days this person worked with me before they quit, they seemed smart?"
Please don't sabotage yourself like that. Check with your references first!
Are you legally allowed to mention that? I thought references could only verify if you worked for the company, or otherwise risk being sued. Maybe that's a myth? Regardless, it's pretty odd he would put your company down as a reference after only staying two weeks.
Well, depending on what you mean by that, it isn't necessarily true.
If you mean "References can say whatever they want without any potential legal ramifications", that's not true. If you say anything that is demonstrably false about the former employee, you can be sued under defamation laws (and, yes, you can lose). Of course what it was that you actually said (and the potential harm done to the former employee) makes a huge difference as to their chances of winning such a lawsuit.
This is one of the reasons many employers have the policy of only confirming that a former employee has in fact worked for the company in the past. Usually it is because their legal team (or for smaller companies, just the lawyer they use) have advised them not to give out anything further.
You are always at risk of being sued. But if some had listed you directly as a reference you should feel you have more freedom than if you are just listed as a former employer.
You're thinking employment verification, or checking that the places you listed on your work history are correct. As an employer, you open yourself up to litigation if you say anything more than dates and titles. I mean there are stories of employers being called about a past, problematic employee, and saying things like "I could get sued if I told you how their performance was, wink wink." But... :-)
I don't believe in Colorado it is illegal to say anything more, it's just not worth it to risk possible litigation.
That is a CYOA policy that many companies have, not a law. In the US, you are legally in the clear as long as you aren't telling outright falsehoods unless you have some form of explicit NDA.
Eh. He probably just didn't like the team/felt that they didn't know what they were doing/they wasted more time on meetings and discussion in general rather than him just not wanting to justify his approach.
I just can't imagine being able to judge that in a two week period unless it's a total shit show. I have no reason to doubt the GP and I think its more likely this is just a case of "I know better".
And honestly unless the hiring manager straight up lied during interviewing that's the employees fault for not asking better questions about the position during the interview process.
So many people forget that interviews are a two way street. I don't want to hire someone that is going to be unhappy in the position because unhappy programmers have poor output and bring down team morale.
They need to ask specific questions about the things that are important to them in a job so I know they are really thinking about whether the position is right for them or not.
Candidates who ask me no questions after being prompted for them never make it past the phone screening interview despite sometimes being very technically capable.
Firstly, if you talk to your reference about the position you are applying for they will be in a better position to give meaningful feedback. I’ve been able to take somebody from a “maybe” to a hire because I knew how their interview went and their perceived weaknesses.
Secondly, you want to make sure that the person isn’t just going to be cold called—ideally they can set up a time over email so it’s at a good time. One time, while checking my reference the company called and somebody else picked up their phone as they weren’t in. They then proceeded to tell them that they’ve never heard of me and that I didn’t ever work there.
> They then proceeded to tell them that they’ve never heard of me and that I didn’t ever work there.
I did that to my boss once when I worked at a temp agency, someone called asking about employment history so I dutifully typed the name into the computer and was like "nope, looks like they've never worked here." Right after I hung up the phone I was like "wait a minute..." Office staff wasn't in the workers database so we couldn't cut ourselves checks and I totally spaced on the last name.
To clarify: you took issue with this person quitting mainly?
I'd be careful saying negative things about an employee for quitting - under at will laws, it can create legal liability to retaliate when someone exercises their at-will rights.
Stating the fact - that the GP knew him only for few days in a professional capacity - should be legal, rt? Any negative inference from that is left for the company doing the reference check.
Yes, stating "I only knew him/her a short time" wouldn't run afoul. It's when you venture into something like "I only knew him a short time - he quit shortly after being hired. I don't have a high opinion of him"
You're allowed to have opinions and share them. The problem comes if your opinion can be argued to be based on a legally protected action/characteristic.
This is why many HR departments don't like their employees giving out references, which really sucks since "Yes, this person was employed during [DATES] and was not fired" is not super helpful.
Besides, if an employees quits after two weeks because it was a bad match, that's actually good.
Sure, it's painful to find someone new. But it's a lot better than having to fire someone that who later. Or be stuck with someone who doesn't want to be there.
I wouldn't, so long as it sticks to facts. No need to be unreasonably negative.
"Honestly, he only worked here for two weeks, and then quit without notice. I didn't even know he'd use me as a reference."
"Honestly, I don't know how much help I'll be. He worked here for two weeks, and then turned in his resignation stating he wasn't comfortable discussing his work with others. I didn't realize I'd be a reference before you called".
These are facts, the first two easily verifiable in court - who would likely have no trouble believing the third.
Anecdote: I once listed three references. All three had favorable opinions of me. But I didn't tell any of them and they were unprepared to answer the questions that followed in a reference call.
One of them was able to wing it well. Second one answered questions flatly and without enthusiasm. A third was more nervous not to hurt me than he was confident he could help me with his answers.
I thought the surprise effect would be telling to my interviewers that the answers were not artificial.
Looking back, in a world where all interviews are artificial, why was I trying so hard to be different?
For most people, it takes conscious thought and effort to take an impression and articulate it. When you tell your references ahead of time, you're giving them a chance to take their impression/opinion/emotion of you and figure out how to put it into words ahead of time. There's nothing artificial about the outcome if you give them the time to do this. In fact it may seem more natural since they aren't nervous and on the spot!
> I thought the surprise effect would be telling to my interviewers that the answers were not artificial.
I tried this once for a job interview. I didn't prepare at all besides quickly scanning the company website.
It was a disaster. The position was for a PHP developer, and I accidentally mentioned that there is a lot of crappy PHP code in the world, in a way that made it sound like I didn't like PHP (I don't, but that's besides the point).
It didn't help that the interview was with an HR person. If it was with another developer, I would've been more than happy to elaborate on my opinion that there is a lot of poorly written PHP code, and that it is very easy to write poor quality PHP, but it is possible to write good (or acceptable) PHP.
That's the companies fault for interviewing you with a HR person. When I do the hiring for my teams I explicitly don't let non-technical people do more than the absolute most basic filtering (i.e this person can't spell for shit, this person doesn't have any experience etc).
In fact, I'd love to have some candidates come in and shit all over X language or Y library. It's a good sign as long as they stick to factual gripes and aren't just mindlessly ranting. People who don't care about doing the best possible job don't give a shit, they'll happily use whatever is popular on autopilot for years of their career.
All my interviewing has been for front-end so most of my interviewees are deeply entrenched in whatever the fad of the month cult is (Vue seems to be the June 2018 pick). I spend the second half of each interview begging them to give me some kind of discussion point, pros/cons of something, an opinion of their own, or literally anything other than the pseudo-marketing tripe on page 1 of their favourite library's documentation ("I love working with Typescript because it scales so well!" puke)
Sounds like your HR person didn't know what they were looking for ;)
> It's also important for your references to know that they're your references ahead of time.
It's always good practice to get someone's permission anyway before you pass on their contact details. If it's time critical and you need to put people in contact, you get the contact details of the person who's asking and you pass those details on to the person they want to talk to.
1) Your professional references may be better qualified for the role than you
This is pretty far fetched. Anyone who would be willing to go behind your back like that probably isn't someone you should list as a reference. Also nothing about being done with the last interview prevents the company from going behind your back like that anyway...
2) You’re giving the recruiter something of great value in exchange for very little
In my experience I have never seen house recruiters who add contact info for reference checks into the recruiting CRM. It seems like the kind of idea that sounds great/effective in theory but in practice is too much hassle. Maybe this only applies to 3rd party firms?
3) You may burn your references
I don't think you should ever hand out contact info for someone (email/phone #/etc) without clearing it with them first, full stop.
True. I guess the author's advice really should have been "don't give out reference info without checking with the people first", but that probably doesn't make it to the top of HN
> This is pretty far fetched. Anyone who would be willing to go behind your back like that probably isn't someone you should list as a reference. Also nothing about being done with the last interview prevents the company from going behind your back like that anyway...
Presumably some of these shady recruiters might pitch the position to your reference without even telling them they are calling on your behalf in the first place. Based on my meager experience with recruiters, I would not put anything past them.
> Maybe this only applies to 3rd party firms?
I read the article as primarily applying to 3rd-party recruiters.
Lots of lying and that lying leading me to not getting paid or putting me in unfortunate situations.
Meeting times for potential employers, length of engagement for contracts, date of pay, and so on.
Being a young, hopeful professional leads to being taken advantage of because at our core, we all believe that people act in good faith. The more I worked with them (and the older I got), I've learned that once money is in play all bets are off.
I used to be one in Germany, and trust me: there’s stuff going on you don’t want to know. Calls being recorded without your knowledge, zero respect for data privacy, recruiters sending out your CV without your knowledge (if they’re incompetent even to your own employer) - I’ve seen it all.
I like them. I'm a naturally lazy person, and filling out redundant information on Taleo forms for each job I apply to, only to be ghosted or called 6 weeks later is worse than dealing with recruiters who actively gain from getting me hired. Most of the ones I've worked with were friendly and followed up with me immediately about my standing. The only proviso is that their interests aren't aligned with mine regarding salary and start date. So you have to be assertive. I don't even see the problem with giving them a couple leads.
The recruiter can look up all your connections on LinkedIn or wherever else, so it's not like the name of your old manager or director is some super valuable secret like the author is treating it to be.
I mean, this is a no brainer. In some fields it is not easy to get a job. And in some cultures/some recruiters contact your references to "get a clear picture". What will your former boss[es] say, if the 10th person contacts them?
"I am more than happy to provide references that can back up my application but please understand that this is THE LAST STEP in the application process". Always worked for me.
Hint: The application process is often a good hint of things to come. Also, never go to an interview without a phone interview first to make sure you are on the same page.
That preliminary phone interview will also help you to establish your credibility and expertise before they get a look at you. In case you aren't a young white or Asian man.
I don't know about Asian males. But, call me crazy, salary is something that I would bring up. I does not make sense to interview for a position that pays far below your current salary. There is really no need to interview if you are not on the same page. This does not only save my time, it also saves yours.
By the way, the guy the was the most pushy ever about my references was a guy I insisted on doing a phone interview first. After the interview and the offer he have, I had to kindly decline to proceed on the matter.
Is there really any reason not to just walk around an external recruiter?
I had an external recruiter contact me for a position at big-tech-giant, but if was really going to apply for it, why wouldn't I just apply at their careers page? Or email a former co-worker who works at big-tech-giant and ask to be hooked up with a recruiter?
I'm curious, what are the upsides to working with an external recruiter?
Often people one hear about a job because it’s advertised by a recruiter and they don’t tell you the company’s name until you agree not to apply there yourself.
A recruiter can control the process better than an applicant can, and they prepare you for every interview, and (try to) influence the process by selling in your advantages after the interview.
They’re also often in contact with the hiring manager instead of the HR person.
Those might be reasons to work with them, but there’s also a good amount of reasons why it’s not a great idea
I used to work as a recruiter (not anymore, terrible industry), and one of my colleagues actually sent a candidates CV to their current employer without their knowledge or consent. Things like these happen, because many external recruiters don’t take enough time for you when you’ve only just started working with you and they don’t know whether you’re “loyal” to them or just want to know your market value.
And yes, references are used as leads. We were advised to call the companies and offer our services and to headhunt the people. There are SO many black sheep in this industry (such as my old company), and very few trustworthy ones.
Personally, I don't think this is that big a deal. If you're a good engineer, there really is no shortage of opportunities. If you're not a good engineer, then that is the root problem that should be fixed. For me, recruiters are just people who helps me do the logistics work so that I never had to apply for a job.
"To this day, I don’t know what the recruiter said to my former manager, but I do know that my manager called me up pissed off about the phone call he’d received, and told me to not use him as a reference in the future."
I think that's a bad manager. As a manager, especially in tech, you should definitely expect your co-workers to take the best opportunity available. As a professional, the manager him/herself should also take the best opportunity available. It's people's careers, be professional about it.
Well of course, but I mean that as if you're not confident enough to recommend other engineers because of competition, then the root cause is probably your own standard of expertise that you have set that you have not met and should meet.
How do people deal with present employers becoming aware that you may be looking for another position? Do people hide it (hold references back until a job offer, or give previous employment references) or allow their employer to know?
Don’t ever let your employer know. If they know you’re not loyal, but don’t find a better job or decide to stay for some other reason, you’re always going to be the one who gets the least trust, the worst projects (you might be gone soon anyway, right?) or even be the one who gets fired if someone has to go.
Another reason why you shouldn’t give references that early.
It's funny how it differs by industry, too. In software land, you keep quiet. In the service sector, people seem to be pretty open about it. In academia, it's definitely openly discussed. I'm kind of curious what it's like in law, civil service, etc.
I've never had anyone call my references. The most anyone has ever wanted is a W-2 form to prove I worked there.
I think it would be kind of unusual. What's the incentive to give an unbiased reference for free? If I didn't like someone, I'd say "oh yeah, they're great", because it's not my problem and I don't want to be held accountable for the person not getting a job. If they are great, I'd say the same thing, of course. The truly calculating individual would get a request for a reference and think "wow, I could poach this person from the recruiter by giving them a poor reference and hiring them for less than their market value."
I just don't see how references are A Thing. Maybe I'm just cynical.
The higher you rise in your career, and the better companies you work for, the more you'll find your references are checked. When I applied for a part-time Christmas season job at a Photos with Santa booth last year, no one checked my references. For my current salaried job, they checked every single one (I gave four).
I've been working as a full-time salaried (insert whatever term you like here for people who write code) for coming up on 13 years now.
This past month, going through the process with a potential new employer, was the first time anyone insisted on contact information for my previous jobs and made any effort to try to check on them. I have worked at both small (startup) and large (household-name) companies, at increasing levels of seniority. None of them ever did that.
What is the downside to just always giving a positive review, though? To rephrase the original question - this is recruiter/company A calling a person who works at company B to see if someone is suitable for company A. If you just always give a nice review, what is the downside for you? Unless you had genuine personal issues with the candidate, why wouldn't you just always give a good review? If the person doesn't work out, what recourse does the recruiter / company A have against you?
I don't think the recruiter seeking a positive or negative review, so much as simply verifying claims made by the candidate or their resume. Something like...
> Tell me a little about Jim's day-to-day
> Sure... Jim is an above average junior software dev...
> Sorry you say junior or senior dev? Does Jim have team management roles?
You can give a glowing review, but depending how how Jim portrayed himself, the review can be taken by the recruiter as a net neg/pos. To directly address your question - I don't think there's much down-side for a reference to always provide a positives reviews. Just keep in mind that an experience recruiter will probably realize this too (they've probably been burned before), and have some clever ways to ferret out the key info they're after.
Ignoring that you might altruistically want to help another company -- what's the downside to being honest? If you don't want to go into detail, you could just say "We would/wouldn't hire this individual again." You gain and lose nothing either way.
Recruiter and former CTO here. References are a box-ticking exercise that you pay someone like Experian to do, so that you can say it was done as part of a security review.
When working menial jobs, that required little skill, and no prior experience, references were almost always asked for, and sometimes checked.
As a software dev, moving across multiple large companies (large defense contractor, international broadcast network, international multi-industrial, well known video streaming site), from dev, dev II, senior dev, lead, manager, I've never had anyone even ask for references (I've seen one or two application systems that requested them when I was job hunting; I just didn't apply to those jobs).
Depends a ton on the role and the company. Every job I've gotten called my references. For at least one of them, the hiring manager told me my references were the tiebreaker between me and another candidate.
> What's the incentive to give an unbiased reference for free? ... it's not my problem and I don't want to be held accountable for the person not getting a job.
Maybe I'm on better, or at least different, terms with the people I've passed on as references. I let them know that I'm applying for jobs ahead, they follow up with me after the call and let me know what questions the hiring company or recruiter asked.
They don't have an "incentive" other than wanting to help make sure the job I'm applying for is a good fit. Maybe a recruiter's questions to a reference throws up red flags that don't come up in a screen or interview that might lead me to back out. Or maybe a recruiter seems focused on a specific skill or experience that I can double down on in prep. Or maybe they just want to know if I'm a good person to manage or work with.
> The truly calculating individual would get a request for a reference and think "wow, I could poach this person from the recruiter by giving them a poor reference and hiring them for less than their market value."
I limit my references to former managers and people who worked with me in different roles than the one I'm applying for. The interview and challenge processes are going to determine if I'm qualified for the job; the references are going to help the recruiter or hiring manager determine if I'm a good fit for the job.
I didn't consciously pick for your reasons because it never crossed my mind that the people I pass on as references — people with whom I stay in regular contact — would actively betray or undermine me in order to get the job that I also applied for. That might be naivety on my part, but I guess it's also harder to get poached in favor of a reference if I'm not using potential competing candidates as references.
To the OP's point, I agree that references shouldn't wind up on a tech recruiting firm's desk from the start (in part because I wouldn't curse being an unsolicited contact of a third-party tech recruiter on my worst enemy). But as a general practice, I've seen repeat value from having reliable references — aside from them also being friends with whom I like staying in touch even when I'm not job hunting.
> I just don't see how references are A Thing. Maybe I'm just cynical.
We probably just apply for different roles at different companies.
To add one more point, though this is not from personal experience, I'd guess that references get asked more detailed questions than "are they great?" which will reveal how sincere their recommendation is, and what strengths the person has.
Traditionally in the US recruiters know not to call or abuse references, it has been an unwritten rule. Things have gotten a bit sleazier in the last decade or so, you can't trust them as much to stay within what used to be the culturally accepted boundaries. It might be due in part to the considerable increase in recruiters working remotely, they're not being as well policed or screened by their employers.
If a reference is so weak that they will go after the same job from a reference check or decide not to give you references in the future, you should know better and find someone else.
Each reference should enthusiastically endorse you and want you to succeed. That often means providing several responses, because you are going to go get competitive offers right?
I'd like to also add another tip for fellow Vancouverites:
When a agency recruiters tells you he/she/zir doesn't consider salary as an important metric for gauging quality, hang up immediately, especially when they use a blocked number.
I hate commuting 1.5 hours for a 10 minute interview because the recruiter considers engineers as cannon fodder.
Or only give your references directly to the potential employer at the end of the interviews.
May as well tell the recruiter this is your intent before hand. There are a great many recruiters in the world and it's worth sorting the good from not so good.
Job offer is at hand and they are required to reference check based on the agreement they made with the company. That is part of the leg-work for the fee.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 285 ms ] threadIt’s a fair call, if you ask me.
Anecdotally, I’ve been able to solve the information assymetry problem by drinking recruiters under the table. This is pretty much a prerequisite for me working with you.
Your mileage may vary.
Recruiters are the used car salespeople of the hiring world. There’s no point in a review system where everyone averages out to 0 stars.
When I find a good recruiter, I stick with them (as long as I'm shopping in the area that they deal with). I make sure they know that. If a recruiter is good enough that they can value a long term relationship as opposed to frantically trying to meet their sales targets every month, then they are a good recruiter.
The downside is that there are practically no good recruiters ;-). If I'm seriously looking for a job, I look as hard for recruiters as I do for a job. Often I find the job before the recruiter.
Recruiters are like pimps, but without the morals And pimps usually dress better.
a) to blackmail the company in the likes of “I won’t touch your employees if you recruit using my services from now on”.
b) already had a signed agreement with your employeer which didn’t allow the recruitment agency to “touch” any of its employees. You seemed like a match for their new client and the recruiter was checking if your employer agreement was still valid. Of course, this is also seen as blackmail by companies.
Can we please just have a matching service run by the unemployment office and also require salary / compensation range for the listed job? (Also that it IS an actual job and not head hunters collecting resumes.)
It would have been unethical for them then to try to place me somewhere else, especially with the inside knowledge they had about the company.
When I was looking for a job, while I was still there. The recruiters I had worked with for years before I started working for thier client, wouldn’t touch me with a ten foot pole. Fair enough. Now that I don’t work for one of thier clients they would be glad to work with me.
Do people usually give their 'normal' colleagues as references in the US?
(Solution 2 would be to have as many different references as possible and to give different ones for different applications, so that no one gets too annoyed by all the calls/emails).
That said, if my reference applied for the same position as me and got it, whatever, more power to them, and I probably wasn't going to get it anyway. There are enough jobs out there for both of us, and I'd rather at least know that one went to someone I like.
As a source of information, references were hand selected by the person with an interest in getting selected, they will like be prepped on what to say, they have zero investment in your company's success, etc.
10% you can get confirmation that you correctly spotted the candidate’s development areas. (Everyone has them, so it’s not a gotcha. But if you think the candidate needs to work on their architecture skills, their last boss confirms it but says they’re a great hire, then you can a good conversation later. “I’d love you to do X, how do we make you a great architect along the way?)
10% if the time you catch the candidate in a lie or find yourself asking “Is the best they could find someone to talk about their work?”
When I reference checked nannies, the last bucket grew to 50%. And I had one nanny give another as a reference.
Yes, you do; civil courts enforce civil law, which is actually law.
All they are doing it looking for leads.
They didn’t budge from 45. What a waste of my time and theirs.
Pushed their hardest to place me and get the salary range I requested and pdf resume and LinkedIn was fine.
There are also a lot of vacancies as the working holiday visas rotate the backpackers in and out - hence all the cold-calling, cheeky, chirpy cockneys
I still remember his best two lines: 1. I placed a guy from your country at the same company and he had a salary of 35k and three kids and a dog and he did very well for himself!
2. look, the company is offering fruits every week as a benefit to employees. If you eat fruit, you can save up to 50 EUR per week!
I did end up in the job, after the HR from the company tried a second round of negotiations and were were much more flexible (more salary, bigger relocation bonus). Unfortunately, there were bigger problems there, so I had to quit after about 2 months, which meant, probably, no bonus for them. Also, we would got like 30EUR worth of fruit for 20 people every week
I hate the game-theory information asymmetry bullshiting game that is recruiting.
It's also important for your references to know that they're your references ahead of time. You may think you have a good relationship with someone only to discover that they aren't a reliable positive reference. People also don't like being caught off guard.
Story time:
I once hired someone as a Mid/Senior Dev at a large company in SV who had strong dev skills. Everything seemed great at first and we were very excited to have this person join the team.
I respected this dev and had no personal issues with them. Our interactions were positive. However this person quit suddenly after maybe two weeks because they didn't like having to justify their technical approach on their very first project to other team members. They just wanted to work alone and not interact with anyone else.
More power to this dev for seeking out their preferred work environment - I totally respect that! - but it wasn't exactly a positive experience for us. We spent weeks and weeks with Recruiting/HR and back and forth on offers to finally end up with someone who quit without any warning after mere days.
And of course I get a phone call a few weeks later where this dev (without contacting me in any way) has listed me as a reference for their new job. What do they think I am going to say? "Yes, during the multiple days this person worked with me before they quit, they seemed smart?"
Please don't sabotage yourself like that. Check with your references first!
If I’m in a position where I can’t give a good reference, I don’t give a reference at all.
If you mean "References can say whatever they want without any potential legal ramifications", that's not true. If you say anything that is demonstrably false about the former employee, you can be sued under defamation laws (and, yes, you can lose). Of course what it was that you actually said (and the potential harm done to the former employee) makes a huge difference as to their chances of winning such a lawsuit.
This is one of the reasons many employers have the policy of only confirming that a former employee has in fact worked for the company in the past. Usually it is because their legal team (or for smaller companies, just the lawyer they use) have advised them not to give out anything further.
I don't believe in Colorado it is illegal to say anything more, it's just not worth it to risk possible litigation.
So many people forget that interviews are a two way street. I don't want to hire someone that is going to be unhappy in the position because unhappy programmers have poor output and bring down team morale.
They need to ask specific questions about the things that are important to them in a job so I know they are really thinking about whether the position is right for them or not.
Candidates who ask me no questions after being prompted for them never make it past the phone screening interview despite sometimes being very technically capable.
(btw, the comment you replied to never mentioned the gender of the person)
Firstly, if you talk to your reference about the position you are applying for they will be in a better position to give meaningful feedback. I’ve been able to take somebody from a “maybe” to a hire because I knew how their interview went and their perceived weaknesses.
Secondly, you want to make sure that the person isn’t just going to be cold called—ideally they can set up a time over email so it’s at a good time. One time, while checking my reference the company called and somebody else picked up their phone as they weren’t in. They then proceeded to tell them that they’ve never heard of me and that I didn’t ever work there.
I did that to my boss once when I worked at a temp agency, someone called asking about employment history so I dutifully typed the name into the computer and was like "nope, looks like they've never worked here." Right after I hung up the phone I was like "wait a minute..." Office staff wasn't in the workers database so we couldn't cut ourselves checks and I totally spaced on the last name.
I'd be careful saying negative things about an employee for quitting - under at will laws, it can create legal liability to retaliate when someone exercises their at-will rights.
You're allowed to have opinions and share them. The problem comes if your opinion can be argued to be based on a legally protected action/characteristic.
This is why many HR departments don't like their employees giving out references, which really sucks since "Yes, this person was employed during [DATES] and was not fired" is not super helpful.
Sure, it's painful to find someone new. But it's a lot better than having to fire someone that who later. Or be stuck with someone who doesn't want to be there.
"Honestly, he only worked here for two weeks, and then quit without notice. I didn't even know he'd use me as a reference."
"Honestly, I don't know how much help I'll be. He worked here for two weeks, and then turned in his resignation stating he wasn't comfortable discussing his work with others. I didn't realize I'd be a reference before you called".
These are facts, the first two easily verifiable in court - who would likely have no trouble believing the third.
One of them was able to wing it well. Second one answered questions flatly and without enthusiasm. A third was more nervous not to hurt me than he was confident he could help me with his answers.
I thought the surprise effect would be telling to my interviewers that the answers were not artificial.
Looking back, in a world where all interviews are artificial, why was I trying so hard to be different?
I tried this once for a job interview. I didn't prepare at all besides quickly scanning the company website.
It was a disaster. The position was for a PHP developer, and I accidentally mentioned that there is a lot of crappy PHP code in the world, in a way that made it sound like I didn't like PHP (I don't, but that's besides the point).
It didn't help that the interview was with an HR person. If it was with another developer, I would've been more than happy to elaborate on my opinion that there is a lot of poorly written PHP code, and that it is very easy to write poor quality PHP, but it is possible to write good (or acceptable) PHP.
In fact, I'd love to have some candidates come in and shit all over X language or Y library. It's a good sign as long as they stick to factual gripes and aren't just mindlessly ranting. People who don't care about doing the best possible job don't give a shit, they'll happily use whatever is popular on autopilot for years of their career.
All my interviewing has been for front-end so most of my interviewees are deeply entrenched in whatever the fad of the month cult is (Vue seems to be the June 2018 pick). I spend the second half of each interview begging them to give me some kind of discussion point, pros/cons of something, an opinion of their own, or literally anything other than the pseudo-marketing tripe on page 1 of their favourite library's documentation ("I love working with Typescript because it scales so well!" puke)
Sounds like your HR person didn't know what they were looking for ;)
It's always good practice to get someone's permission anyway before you pass on their contact details. If it's time critical and you need to put people in contact, you get the contact details of the person who's asking and you pass those details on to the person they want to talk to.
This is pretty far fetched. Anyone who would be willing to go behind your back like that probably isn't someone you should list as a reference. Also nothing about being done with the last interview prevents the company from going behind your back like that anyway...
2) You’re giving the recruiter something of great value in exchange for very little
In my experience I have never seen house recruiters who add contact info for reference checks into the recruiting CRM. It seems like the kind of idea that sounds great/effective in theory but in practice is too much hassle. Maybe this only applies to 3rd party firms?
3) You may burn your references
I don't think you should ever hand out contact info for someone (email/phone #/etc) without clearing it with them first, full stop.
Presumably some of these shady recruiters might pitch the position to your reference without even telling them they are calling on your behalf in the first place. Based on my meager experience with recruiters, I would not put anything past them.
> Maybe this only applies to 3rd party firms?
I read the article as primarily applying to 3rd-party recruiters.
Well, the recruiter may cold call them without mentioning that they had talked to you previously. They're searching for leads.
Meeting times for potential employers, length of engagement for contracts, date of pay, and so on.
Being a young, hopeful professional leads to being taken advantage of because at our core, we all believe that people act in good faith. The more I worked with them (and the older I got), I've learned that once money is in play all bets are off.
Very much interested into what you might have seen.
And if it’s a headhunter...
- Be explicit that they need your permission to send their resume somewhere else.
- Don’t tell them where else you’re interviewing.
"I am more than happy to provide references that can back up my application but please understand that this is THE LAST STEP in the application process". Always worked for me.
Hint: The application process is often a good hint of things to come. Also, never go to an interview without a phone interview first to make sure you are on the same page.
By the way, the guy the was the most pushy ever about my references was a guy I insisted on doing a phone interview first. After the interview and the offer he have, I had to kindly decline to proceed on the matter.
I had an external recruiter contact me for a position at big-tech-giant, but if was really going to apply for it, why wouldn't I just apply at their careers page? Or email a former co-worker who works at big-tech-giant and ask to be hooked up with a recruiter?
I'm curious, what are the upsides to working with an external recruiter?
My experience has been that this is largely a black hole.
> Or email a former co-worker who works at big-tech-giant and ask to be hooked up with a recruiter?
Great plan, if you have former co-workers at companies you want to work for.
A recruiter can control the process better than an applicant can, and they prepare you for every interview, and (try to) influence the process by selling in your advantages after the interview.
They’re also often in contact with the hiring manager instead of the HR person.
Those might be reasons to work with them, but there’s also a good amount of reasons why it’s not a great idea
And yes, references are used as leads. We were advised to call the companies and offer our services and to headhunt the people. There are SO many black sheep in this industry (such as my old company), and very few trustworthy ones.
Recruiters will often edit your resume/CV &| cover-letter, so ask to see what was provided to them to compare.
"To this day, I don’t know what the recruiter said to my former manager, but I do know that my manager called me up pissed off about the phone call he’d received, and told me to not use him as a reference in the future."
I think that's a bad manager. As a manager, especially in tech, you should definitely expect your co-workers to take the best opportunity available. As a professional, the manager him/herself should also take the best opportunity available. It's people's careers, be professional about it.
Another reason why you shouldn’t give references that early.
I think it would be kind of unusual. What's the incentive to give an unbiased reference for free? If I didn't like someone, I'd say "oh yeah, they're great", because it's not my problem and I don't want to be held accountable for the person not getting a job. If they are great, I'd say the same thing, of course. The truly calculating individual would get a request for a reference and think "wow, I could poach this person from the recruiter by giving them a poor reference and hiring them for less than their market value."
I just don't see how references are A Thing. Maybe I'm just cynical.
I've been working as a full-time salaried (insert whatever term you like here for people who write code) for coming up on 13 years now.
This past month, going through the process with a potential new employer, was the first time anyone insisted on contact information for my previous jobs and made any effort to try to check on them. I have worked at both small (startup) and large (household-name) companies, at increasing levels of seniority. None of them ever did that.
> Tell me a little about Jim's day-to-day
> Sure... Jim is an above average junior software dev...
> Sorry you say junior or senior dev? Does Jim have team management roles?
You can give a glowing review, but depending how how Jim portrayed himself, the review can be taken by the recruiter as a net neg/pos. To directly address your question - I don't think there's much down-side for a reference to always provide a positives reviews. Just keep in mind that an experience recruiter will probably realize this too (they've probably been burned before), and have some clever ways to ferret out the key info they're after.
I think the "references" under discussion here are actually phoning up former colleagues/managers for more detailed questions.
When working menial jobs, that required little skill, and no prior experience, references were almost always asked for, and sometimes checked.
As a software dev, moving across multiple large companies (large defense contractor, international broadcast network, international multi-industrial, well known video streaming site), from dev, dev II, senior dev, lead, manager, I've never had anyone even ask for references (I've seen one or two application systems that requested them when I was job hunting; I just didn't apply to those jobs).
> What's the incentive to give an unbiased reference for free? ... it's not my problem and I don't want to be held accountable for the person not getting a job.
Maybe I'm on better, or at least different, terms with the people I've passed on as references. I let them know that I'm applying for jobs ahead, they follow up with me after the call and let me know what questions the hiring company or recruiter asked.
They don't have an "incentive" other than wanting to help make sure the job I'm applying for is a good fit. Maybe a recruiter's questions to a reference throws up red flags that don't come up in a screen or interview that might lead me to back out. Or maybe a recruiter seems focused on a specific skill or experience that I can double down on in prep. Or maybe they just want to know if I'm a good person to manage or work with.
> The truly calculating individual would get a request for a reference and think "wow, I could poach this person from the recruiter by giving them a poor reference and hiring them for less than their market value."
I limit my references to former managers and people who worked with me in different roles than the one I'm applying for. The interview and challenge processes are going to determine if I'm qualified for the job; the references are going to help the recruiter or hiring manager determine if I'm a good fit for the job.
I didn't consciously pick for your reasons because it never crossed my mind that the people I pass on as references — people with whom I stay in regular contact — would actively betray or undermine me in order to get the job that I also applied for. That might be naivety on my part, but I guess it's also harder to get poached in favor of a reference if I'm not using potential competing candidates as references.
To the OP's point, I agree that references shouldn't wind up on a tech recruiting firm's desk from the start (in part because I wouldn't curse being an unsolicited contact of a third-party tech recruiter on my worst enemy). But as a general practice, I've seen repeat value from having reliable references — aside from them also being friends with whom I like staying in touch even when I'm not job hunting.
> I just don't see how references are A Thing. Maybe I'm just cynical.
We probably just apply for different roles at different companies.
My references only ever go directly to the hiring company.
Each reference should enthusiastically endorse you and want you to succeed. That often means providing several responses, because you are going to go get competitive offers right?
When a agency recruiters tells you he/she/zir doesn't consider salary as an important metric for gauging quality, hang up immediately, especially when they use a blocked number.
I hate commuting 1.5 hours for a 10 minute interview because the recruiter considers engineers as cannon fodder.
May as well tell the recruiter this is your intent before hand. There are a great many recruiters in the world and it's worth sorting the good from not so good.