JobFox: We are not a crook

On September 21, 2012

JobFox, the job-board spawn of CareerBuilder, is rapidly sinking under the weight of mismanagement, financial distress, a class action lawsuit, claims of fraud, and complaints from customers and vendors.

JobFox was started by Rob McGovern, who also founded CareerBuilder. Like TheLadders, JobFox tried to take refuge in the resume-writing business, but quickly realized that was a sink hole.

Now the bottom has fallen out. Things are so bad that McGovern has published a video explaining that JobFox is not a scam.

Where have we heard those last words before?

Back in 2009, I sent McGovern an e-mail asking an important question. He didn’t answer it then, and he didn’t answer it in the video.

I hear Marc Cenedella over at TheLadders has some pretty good executive job openings, and he writes a pretty mean resume for top executives.

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Modern Advances In Career Science: Eliminate the humans

On September 7, 2012

If you’re smart and know how to show an employer how you’ll contribute to the bottom line, you don’t need Big Data — and you’ve got little competition.

But Big Data is the Modern Advance In Career Science, and the objective is to eliminate the humans from job hunting, recruiting, and hiring.

Joel Cheesman had me laffing my A off with his latest: They’re heeeeeere. Again.

Writing in his new blog, JobScore, Cheesman runs down the recent zombies created by Career Science: itzbig, Trovix, Climber v1.0, JobFox and sundry “eHarmony for jobs players.”

Advances in database technology surface and die so quickly that they leave behind more career-industry corpses than one blog posting can impale on poles along the roadside. But Cheesman does a yeoman’s job of keeping up.

Where do these living dead business plans come from??

Cheesman answers with this morbid quote from Darren Bounds, CEO of Path.to, a career service whose website is as dim as its business concept:

“A big data approach to hiring can eliminate 80 percent of the work being done by humans.”

Another Modern Advance In Career Science: Eliminate the humans.

Cheesman racks up the headshots in the online recruiting space: Bright, Silp (“Your dream job will find you” — Not if I see you first, Sucka!), WorkFu (“We are currently in discussions regarding the possibilities of keeping WorkFu alive and will update as soon as we have more information.” BAM!) — every one of them relies on database technology to create as many mindless job-hunting zombies as employers can hire.

Except employers aren’t hiring them.

Employers — personnel-jockeys-turned-zombies themselves — are crying there’s a skills shortage because your keyword resume doesn’t exactly match the lifeless, bloodless job description they uploaded to the Big Database.

No sweat — JobScore says Monster.com took Trovix off the streets for $70 million and turned it into 6Sense. I see more dead people.

The good news: If you do your job search like a human and avoid the databases, the clawing zombies that think they’re competing with you for a juicy salary will never keep up.

My old buddy Jeff Pierce is still right: 80% of people are cows, but zombie cows. I’d buy a lunch of warm entrails for the venture capitalists behind all these corpses, just to watch their heads explode.

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All recruiting campaigns suck

On August 23, 2012

The best recruiting campaign is a manager that calls you on the phone, tells you he loves your work, and invites you to lunch to talk about working together to make more money making better products. In other words, the employer isn’t scavenging. He did his homework and knows what he wants: you.

That’s recruiting.

All other recruiting campaigns suck. But this one, by game maker Kixeye, sucks less.

Kixeye slams competitor Zynga hard, after poaching some of Zynga’s key people. There’s no word about what Zynga’s recruiting response is. Maybe it could poach from its key partner, Facebook, whose employees are bailing anyway since restrictions have been lifted on employees dumping FB stock. Which is now priced so low you could line your Farmville pigpens with it. How low can you go?

Or Zynga could just change its business model and try to make money. Or it could create a new game altogether: Facebook Deathwatch. Earn tokens by adopting Facebook code jockeys and creating keywords for their resumes. Hey: That’s a recruiting app!

What most companies do to fill jobs is not recruiting. It’s advertising. And advertising is a stupid HR trick that raises operating costs by soliciting resumes they don’t have time to process. Which leads to cries of “Skills Shortage!” because turning on the fat-gauge sewer spigot is no way to get a meal.

I wonder what it’s costing Kixeye to sort through all the drek they’ve getting in response to this ad. Who cares. That kid CEO is a hoot.

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Is Your Resume Spaghetti?

On June 11, 2012

In the June 12, 2012 Ask The Headhunter Newsletter, a headhunter asks a candidate to remove contact information from a resume before submitting it. Is that normal?

I was contacted by a headhunter about an opportunity. I was asked to provide a resume in Word format. I said I could not, and instead I provided a PDF version so that I could ensure the visual appearance is what I want it to be. Then the headhunter asked me to remove my contact information, but said a PDF version would be okay. I was assured that this was normal, but I wonder about this.

I spoke with the recruiter once after this happened, and we had contact just once more by e-mail. It has been three weeks since our last contact. The recruiter has not returned three voice mails or responded to three e-mails.

What do you think is going on? Do you think my qualifications threw the client or the agency off?

My Advice

This is a classic example of how most headhunters operate. What people don’t know is, these headhunters don’t create resumes for their candidates. They take what the candidate gives them and merely pass it along to their client. This doesn’t add any value to the recruiting process. There’s an insider technical term for this practice: “throwing spaghetti against the wall.”

Headhunters who work this way are wasting your time and their clients’ time. This isn’t recruiting. This is dialing for dollars, also known by yet another technical term: “dumpster diving.”

The worst of these headhunters will bundle any and all resumes they can get their hands on, and send them along to an employer who might pay them a fee. This means the personnel department must sort the incoming drek, just like they sort resumes they buy from job boards. The headhunter adds no value to the process, and any HR department that accepts such resumes should be closed down.

Adding value

A good headhunter doesn’t just find candidates for a client company. A good headhunter interprets how a particular candidate can help the client get a job done. The headhunter carefully interviews the candidate and maps the candidate’s abilities and skills against the requirements of the position. As I explain in How to Work With Headhunters… and how to make headhunters work for you, when I’m done interviewing a candidate for my client, I’ve got all I need to produce a simple, clear, and very compelling resume. It’s exactly what my client needs prior to interviewing the candidate. If the candidate doesn’t match the client’s requirements, why would I even refer the person to my client?

Do you see the problem? The headhunter you’re dealing with is merely pumping resumes into an employer’s sorting process. The headhunter is not carefully assessing and judging you, to ensure he’s sending only qualified candidates to his client. What I’m really saying is, if that headhunter had truly interviewed you, he wouldn’t need your resume. He could and should write a custom resume for you and then present it — with your permission — to his client.

Did the headhunter really interview you?

That’s not to say that the resume you wrote isn’t useful. The headhunter can use it to fill in the blanks surrounding key facts he’s learned by talking with you in depth. But if the headhunter just forwards your resume to the employer, he’s not contributing anything to the recruiting task. He’s not highlighting the specific skills and abilities that prove you’re a good candidate for the job. A smart client demands this from a headhunter — the client wants to know why you would be a good fit. And the fact is, there’s just too much stuff on a resume that a hiring manager doesn’t need to know about you. The headhunter’s job is to demonstrate the match, not to dish the spaghetti.

So this is how you can tell a really good headhunter from a dumpster diver: Did the headhunter conduct a thorough interview with you?

What (most) headhunters do with resumes

The headhunter you’ve described wants your resume in Word format so that he can delete your name and contact information. (A PDF version from which you’ve omitted that information is just as good to him — it’ll save him time.) He doesn’t want his client to know who you are until the client promises a fee before interviewing you. If the headhunter had a solid, healthy relationship with his client, the headhunter wouldn’t be worried about the employer going around his back. That’s why the headhunter wants to control your contact information.

Whether it’s a modified version of the resume you provide, or a new one the headhunter has written, you should always ask to see the document the headhunter will send to his client. You don’t want to defend resume errors in an interview. If you trust the headhunter, a Word version might be best to facilitate his editing it. But if you don’t trust the headhunter, or don’t know his practices, your PDF policy is a good one.

Splat!

This is how the game is played by many headhunters. Learn to judge headhunters by whether they actually interview you in depth. If they don’t, then they’re not going to present you properly to their client, are they? What I think is going on in this case is that the headhunter is throwing spaghetti against the wall — and yours didn’t stick.

Do you give your resume to people you don’t know — headhunters and/or employers? If you do, I think you’re nuts. You’d have better odds playing the lottery. Have you ever met a headhunter who thoroughly interviewed you even before requesting your resume? If you’re a manager, do headhunters splatter resumes on your wall — stuff that’s not even recognizable as a “right” candidate?

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Zuck’s Stupid Recruiting Start-up: Moo!

On June 5, 2012

Facebook is about to go face-down to $25 a share — but CEO Mark Zuckerberg may be saved by a new recruiting startup. (Recruiting industry watcher Joel Cheesman just keeps serving these flapjacks up, hot off the grill. I’m still LMAO about the last one.)

Identified.com

The Stanford University-spawned start-up Identified.com just got $21 million in sucker capital funding. (Disclosure: I went to Stanford and have yet to raise $21 million, but I do not hold that against Stanford.) And what does this “fastest growing career site for young professionals” actually do?

 

 

Yep — Identified.com sends traffic to Facebook.

Judging by the time-honored rule of putting your best assets right out front on your home page, Zuck’s got a winner by the short hairs. Somebody finally got the message — just send ’em over to FB right away!

Plus it’s not boring.

That’s the value proposition right off the bat. All you have to do is KMA and “Turn On Platform.”

Not Boring: Identified hangs out with Richard Branson

Courtesy of the Sacramento Bee, you can read all about it in the “unedited press release,” which explains nothing about how the “business” works. Well, it does say that Identified.com:

  • “transform[s] professional identity through gamification”
  • “aims to help young people achieve their professional goals”
  • “[is] taking the principles of game design and applying them to managing your career”
  • “[is] helping young people leverage data to make career choices in a fun, interactive way”

Then I realized where I’ve seen some of this stuff. It kinda reminds me of the classic resume objective statement: “I want to work with people to achieve my professional goals in a progressive company!”

But, the company’s business model, displayed on its front page, is that it’s driving more users to Zuck’s website… and that’s good for America.

And Identified hangs out with Richard Branson.

Dick Is Not On The Website

But the website doesn’t say dick about how it helps people and employers get together to fill jobs.

Because when I spent a few minutes to figure out what the proposition really is, all I learned is that:

The website says as much about the business as the press release. If you want to actually do anything on Identified.com, you need to talk to Zuck:

 

 

Why would V.C.’s dump $21 milion into a website that sends all its traffic to Facebook?

Wired magazine says:

“Facebook is on the cusp of becoming a medium unto itself — more akin to television as a whole than a single network, and more like the entire web than just one online destination.” (Cf., “We’re more popular than Jesus.“)

But then again, Wired also said:

“The sheer magnitude of Facebook’s success is one reason why, as the company charges toward what will likely be the most successful public offering in the history of capitalism…“

Disclosure: Wired is my favorite magazine. But like I said, Facebook is about to suck rocks at the bottom of $25 a share. (Facebook Deathwatch reports $25.87 at today’s close.)

If I were Tim Draper, Bill Draper, Innovation Endeavors, VantagePoint Capital Partners, and Capricorn Investment Group, I’d get Marc Cenedella on the phone, quick — Identified.com needs a better blog and a more capable hawker of recruiting services. (No disrespect to all these renowned V.C.s, but Dudes, I went to Stanford, too.)

How are we going to do that? Dunno, but it won’t be boring.

About Identified:

“What Facebook did for your social life, Identified is building for your professional life. How’re we going to do that? We’re going to make managing your career not boring.“

I was gonna say, who needs yet another online recruiting start-up? Who needs a business when you can just send all your traffic to Zuck?

But Cheesman already said it (I love this guy’s insights):

“The playbook for start-ups in the recruiting space usually goes something like this: Group of young, educated people — usually coming off their own job search, which apparently qualifies as experience in the employment space — come up with an idea to ‘make things better.’”

More Mooney?

When are the V.C.’s gonna learn that Facebook cow clicking is as good as it’s gonna get?

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Netflix: Another stupid employer

On May 16, 2012

Netflix bungled its business last year and ticked off lots of its customers, who quickly cancelled the service. It was a case study of a business and public relations disaster.

Now Netflix is at it again — this time by advertising for “recent college graduates” to fill jobs anyone could do. Age discrimination anyone? The ad on craigslist is titled, “Netflix – Recruiting Researcher  (los gatos)” and it says:

“We treat you like an adult and expect you to act like one.”

(For a PDF of the full ad on craigslist, click here. For the “live” ad on craigslist — which will not be there forever — click here. For the ad on Netflix.com, click here.)

***UPDATE 5/18/12: Netflix has removed the job posting from its own website. For a PDF of the original, click here.

Netflix has not responded to a request for comment.

Netflix would do well to act like an adult and recruit people who can do the job — and that includes college grads from quite a while ago. Consider the Netflix job ad below. What’s in this job description that an older worker couldn’t deliver?

We’ve found that recent college grads have been most successful in this position because we need some who is:
– Self-motivated and directed; hungry to get started with a great, well-known company.
– Proactive; taking initiative and follow-through is a must
– Accustomed to multi-tasking and meeting multiple, tight deadlines
– A leader and will offer innovative and constructive ideas to continue our team’s success

I know a lot of hungry 40+ year olds who are out of work — they’re self-motivated, proactive, can multitask, and lead others.

Netflix goes on to say that:

“We don’t have rules.”

That’s clear. They could add, “We don’t have any common sense.”

I’m a big fan of hiring kids out of college — as a cohort, they’re suffering mightily in the job market. They need help. Perhaps Netflix can hire a new grad who can show the company how to recruit properly. Or maybe it needs someone a lot more experienced than the clown in HR who’s producing these job descriptions and ads.

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Move Over H-1B: Make way for L-1 visas

On March 28, 2012

The H-1B visa is well-known in technology circles: U.S. employers use it to hire temporary foreign workers in “specialty occupations.”

Engineers and Information Technology (IT) workers have long complained that the H-1B program takes jobs away from Americans. While H-1B requires employees to be paid the prevailing wage, some argue that employers actually pay lower salaries to H-1B workers — and that this depresses salaries across the board.

Enter L-1: A dog of a visa?

While there is a cap on the number of H-1B visas issued in the U.S., there is no cap on the L-1 visa, which has no prevailing wage requirement.

The L-1 visa is used by foreign companies for intra-company transfers of foreign employees into the U.S. L-1 workers are supposed to have “specialized knowledge” — but my dog could claim that his nose enables him to fulfill that requirement.

Use of the L-1 visa is growing, in part because the definition of “specialized knowledge” makes it easier to abuse.

Leading work to other countries?

Computerworld reports in an article, Charting H-1B users, as attention shifts to L-1, that, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), L-1 could start resulting in significant job losses for Americans. EPI warns of “offshore outsourcing firms whose business model is to first hire L-1 workers to learn the work done by Americans, then to transfer that work overseas.”

Says an EPI analyst: “The L-1 program was not intended to function in this way. Nevertheless, this blatant misuse of the program is legally permissible. As a result, the program is operating at the expense of American workers.”

The issue: The U.S. government is considering changing the definition of “specialized knowledge,” and EPI is warning that the new definition could cause new, more extensive job losses. Are American jobs being led out of the country on L-1 leashes? I mean, L-1 visas?

Meanwhile, foreign companies that want to transfer more of their employees to work in their U.S. facilities complain about the restrictions.

Have you encountered L-1? Is it the new H-1B?

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Facebook: Pimping your cred to employers?

On March 22, 2012

Q:

At what point will Facebook start selling your “timeline” to employers who will be as happy to pay for it as they are to pay for access to your online resume?

A:

When is Facebook’s IPO?

There’s a news story that’s made the rounds in several media outlets. It’s about employers that demand a job applicant’s Facebook login and password, so they can check the person’s online bona fides. The Chicago Tribune reports there’s already legislation under way to stop the practice.

The articles ruminate on the whys, the wherefores, and on the proper response. But the proper response is easy: Up yours! This blog has already asked the question about Presumptuous Employers: Is this HR, or Proctology?

Everybody does it

But the problem isn’t just with employers. I found one version of this Facebook story on USA Today: Job seekers getting asked for Facebook passwords. It was the best of the articles I’d read on the subject, so I wrote a comment and tried to post it.

Imagine my ire when USA Today demanded my Facebook credentials in order to post the comment. Say what?? I clicked out of the comments box. Up yours, USA Today. F you and the Facebook you rode in on.

If I want to go to Facebook, I’ll go to Facebook. But when I want news, I expect my experience will be with USA Today, or whatever news outlet I choose to visit. There is no more reason for me to transfer my Facebook bona fides to another website than there is to disclose my salary history to some personnel jockey. “That’s the policy” isn’t a good enough reason. (If you wonder how to avoid turning over your salary history to an employer, see Keep Your Salary Under Wraps.)

So, Up the yin-yang of media outlets that are selling me out to Mark Zuckerberg’s database. They won’t get my comments — and I’m not so likely to bother with them next time I want news and discussion.

Did you give permission?

Of course, whether we’re talking about employers, USA Today, or any other partner to Facebook — the problem is suckers who play along. The problem is what you choose to share on Facebook. Because if you think it’s a problem when employers demand your social media credentials, you’re not thinking ahead. Did you already give permission for your credentials to be sold to them?

Monster.com and other big job boards rent, sell, and trade your resume information to parties you know nothing about.

LinkedIn is is now selling access to its database to employers who pay for access to people’s credentials.

Google just got sued again in federal court for misusing your personal information.

Pimping your cred

How much do you wanna bet that Facebook — especially once it does its IPO — doesn’t start pimping your “timeline” to employers who are willing to fork over the bucks? It’s gonna happen. Employers won’t need to embarrass you by asking for it in a job interview. They’ll already have it. It’s all part of “improving your social experience.” It’s all part of shareholder value. It’s all part of turning yet another database of personal information into a “career service.”

You won’t find Facebook managing the comments section of this blog. Not now, not ever. You won’t find me cueing up my Facebook bona fides when I want to post a comment on USA Today. As Mark Zuckerberg starts pimping out his members’ timelines, you’ll also probably find me canceling my Facebook account.

UPDATE March 23, 2012

Facebook has issued a statement: Facebook warns employers not to solicit passwords, calls it an ‘alarming’ practice. Gimme a break. That’s like bars and liquor distillers issuing statements that they are “alarmed” by drinking. My prediction stands: After the IPO, Facebook will sell employers access to your personal data. “A powerful new social feature to help you land that job!”

 

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Are Skype interviews good for you?

On February 6, 2012

In the February 7, 2012 Ask The Headhunter Newsletter, a reader says Skype interviews aren’t such a good idea:

Thanks so much for hosting an Open Mic session and offering your professional expertise. My career is in IT (information technology) and although I feel more like a commodity these days than the business professional that I am, there are interviewing techniques that throw up a big red flag.

Recently I was asked to do a Skype interview. There are many factors with a Skype interview that can be held against a candidate because it introduces things that are not common with the typical phone and face-to-face interview process. The interview is with a local company but regardless, I still find it as an unfair practice. What are your thoughts?

Here’s the short version of my advice: (For the entire column, you need to subscribe to the free newsletter. Don’t miss another edition!)

My Advice

I’m with you. I don’t like “phoners” in general. If you’re uncomfortable with this kind of interview, you can’t tell companies to stop doing it, but you can politely decline.

How to Say It:
“I’d be glad to invest time to come meet with you. I think I can demonstrate how I can contribute to your bottom line by doing X and Y for you. But I’m sorry — I get so many requests for e-mail, telephone, and virtual interviews that I respectfully decline them. I need to know that a company is really interested in talking shop. When I attend such a meeting, I’ve done my homework. If you’d like to meet with me, I’ll be ready to show you what I can do for your business.”

I think if a company balks at that suggestion, it’s wasting your time. Are they really interested in hiring someone, or not?

There’s a time and place for social media tools, to facilitate communication. I don’t think an initial contact is it. Whether it’s via telephone or Skype, there’s an enormous difference between casually chatting with someone about his work, and conducting a job interview. I think the technology emphasizes the power one party has over the other, and it makes forthright, balanced dialogue awkward. The candidate is always at a disadvantage. (And the employer may wind up wondering why she wanted to interview a talking head.)

I don’t think it’s appropriate to make a person perform on video if there’s not already a relationship in place. The person who invites another to talk business has an obligation to make the experience pleasant. That’s why we buy one another lunch. It’s an expression of our investment in, and respect for, the person we’re soliciting.

I get fed up with the “social media” tools that employers use as an excuse to avoid investing adequate time to assess a candidate. Check Recruitomatic & The Social Jerk (Or: Why you hate recruiters) for more about this. Perhaps there are ways to engage another person before suggesting that they appear on your computer screen for an interview, but it doesn’t seem the employer in your story has done that.

I hope the How to Say It example above gives you an idea about how to handle this. But please — use your own words, and modify the message so you’re comfortable with it. Sometimes, you have to push back firmly, but make sure you do it politely.

If you’re going to do a Skype — or any other kind of video — interview, don’t miss these 8 Tips for Successful Video Interviews by Rachel Ryan.

What’s your take on “phoners?” Have you ever done a Skype interview? Maybe I’m looking at this wrong, but I think Skype interviews put the candidate at a disadvantage, and they might leave the employer thinking he’s talking to Max Headroom. Please post your comments and suggestions.

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Sales Source: The best sales blog for job hunters

On December 2, 2011

Meet Geoffrey James. He writes a sales blog that will help you land your next job.

“When you go job hunting, always remember that you’re selling!”

That’s the refrain from job counselors, coaches, resume writers and HR people. I don’t buy it, because “sales” is misunderstood as a task by most people. They think of selling as delivering a brochure — or a resume — and then reiterating what’s on it to the prospect’s (employer’s) face, while they stretch a big smile across their own.

That’s not selling. Selling — and job hunting the way I teach it — is all about focus and knowledge. When you’re job hunting, true selling is about focusing on the employer and addressing what he or she needs. And then it’s about using the knowledge you’ve developed to demonstrate how you will deliver.

True selling is not about you or your product. It’s about the other guy entirely. A truly good sales pitch is all about the person who needs something.

Geoffrey James gets it, and he’s been writing about sales for a long time. He used to author the Sales Machine blog for the now renamed BNet. And now he’s moved into more exciting territory, writing the Sales Source blog for Inc. magazine online.

James teaches you almost everything you need to know about sales to address an employer’s needs so he or she will want to hire you. Start with this incredible gem:

7 Steps to Closing a Deal Via Email: He should be charging for this stuff. If you’re going to follow up with an employer about a job you want, this is how you want to structure your e-mail. James even gives you tips about what not to put in it.

Check out James’ suggestion for how to instantly draw yourself into the employer’s world before your interview starts: Forget Small Talk: How to Craft the Perfect Icebreaker. (Forget about last night’s game or this morning’s big news story.)

Then graduate to Why the “Power of Branding” Is a Myth. I’m not the only other big mouth out here who says “branding” is totally misunderstood and a waste of time and breath. Before you spend another minute “creating your brand,” consider what James suggests: Your brand is what the employer experiences after you’ve worked there for a while. Trying to “brand” yourself to get an interview or a job just reveals you don’t know where the value is.

The Sales Source blog won’t give you career advice — not in any direct way. But if you study it, you’ll realize that you can bend the ideas James offers in almost every column — to help you get in the door, to convince an employer you can do the work he or she needs done, and close the deal on a job. Sales Source is about true selling. And it’s a lot of hard work. Just like that great job you want.

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