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Reasons Why Your Technical Recruiting Emails Are Failing

Emma Bostian ✨ on December 31, 2018

The job of a recruiter is difficult. You get tasked with recruiting the best in tech for a role you may not be fully familiar with. It’s a lot of p...
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Chris James

It amazes me the sheer volume of emails I get with no salary information. Immediate no go for me.

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Mark Otway

Given the broad range of salaries that could be applicable to the same role, depending on the candidate's experience and seniority, it's unlikely any quoted salary would be close to what was finally negotiated. So putting salary figures into these sorts of emails would be pointless - they'll almost always be fqntasy or irrelevant.

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Ambrose Little

Companies always know what their budget is for a role. They should share the range. Saves everyone a lot of time.

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Mark Otway

Perhaps. But it would usually be misleading. I've never started a role where I've been paid what the original recruiter said it was paying.

Also, whilst the OP talks about recruiters wasting candidates' time, the reverse is also true. Better to start talking turkey once you've established that both the candidate and the role are mutually suitable. If you just stick a high figure on, you'll get all sorts of chances. If you put a number that's too low, people will dismiss it out of hand when there may be plenty of headroom for negotiation.

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Ambrose Little

Hi, Mark. If you end up outside of an originally stated range (for the same, originally posted job/experience level), the company was misleading you or wasn't being honest with themselves. But the reality is that in the vast majority of cases, budgets are formed for hires in advance of posting them, having gone through an approval process, and so companies know what they expect to pay. Many companies have well-defined ranges/bands for particular salary grades that inform how much they "can" pay for a budgeted hire.

So they can say that range. In the "worst" case, they know their max, and they can say "up to NNN, depending on experience." Depending on the maturity of the company, that upper bound may be negotiable for the "right" person, but on average, it's not. And if a company isn't able to do this, I question the stability of the business itself. This is pretty basic accounting/fiduciary responsibility.

The truth is that it is and has been a candidates' market for a long time, with no end in sight. This means companies need to be more willing to waste time than candidates. Not sharing these real numbers up front is part of what is broken with current practices.

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phantomread

yeah, most of companies wouldn't give out their number yet many of them ask candidate's expected salary.

I think candidates should never ever tell a company their expected salary. Let them tell first.

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Shauna Gordon

That is more a product of sloppy job postings than anything else. Several countries require salary ranges in their postings and use them to good effect, so it's certainly not impossible.

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Mark Otway

Case study 3 seems a bit unfair. I've seen plenty of roles which are a perfect fit, but if I'm happy in my current role that might not be relevant. So asking if you know anyone else who might be interested if you're not doesn't seem unreasonable.

Totally get you on the other points though. I still get recruitment emails offering me roles in Edinburgh despite moving to London 11 years ago. The last time I was actively looking for a job in Scotland was in 2003!

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Max Ong Zong Bao

😂 😂 😂 I feel you, I kind of get those unsolicited email or LinkedIn messages a bunch of times on a weekly basis as well.

I even ignore any messages from the various titles of the rainbow that represent technical recruiters.

There's even ppl who comes to you to ask you if you could help them. By building their tech stack as "CTO" or "Co-founder" of a startup as well which might be a clone of something successful in the marketplace.

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phantomread

I think the reason for your second case is that many recruiters search a particular skill set rather than a title.

So searching keyword Java would match those who put JavaScript in their profile, hence your profile turns up.

If they search for "back end developer", they would get better matches, but again many "back end" devs don't put "back end" in their profiles.

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Kyle Stephens

We have an "exciting opportunity" to join a "fast-paced environment"...

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Ambrose Little

Oh! My favorite is when they ask if I know anyone else. DELETE

 
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Mark Otway

😂

It's that kind of thinking which leads 90% of people to think they're "above average". 😉

 
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Mark Otway

As soon as a figure has been quoted, you've got a false base for the negotiation. Have you heard of the term "anchoring"? If not, have a look.

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Andrew (he/him)

Just because someone lists PHP or Java on their LinkedIn does not mean it’s relevant.

Then why do you have it listed on your LinkedIn?