If I’m In Charge Of Deciding, Then Why Aren’t I Employed?

From LinkedIn a few minutes ago:

Why am I getting so sick of the ‘salary’ stumbling block?

World’s Most Interesting Engineer at Your Company

I have been around enough now to pretty much see it all. I remember when it was the headhunter/recruiter/agent/employer/hiring manager that actually made a decision whether you were on the short, long, or any list. They knew what they were looking for.

Then came the budget cuts that ruined almost everything-including the entire hiring paradigm (I’m using that word here to impress you, as I have no idea how it applies). It seems like it happened overnight…

Job seekers now filter based on keywords, and I am bombarded by mail merge emails asking me to go to some web site and ‘register’-which means spending 30 minutes filling in database fields for them to do those keyword searches later.

“Take a look at this req, and if you are a match-or you know someone who is-go fill in this registration form…” How has this improved things for a job seeker? Now, I am expected to spend my entire day filling out forms so that someone who has no idea what I do for a living can send me job alerts for roles that are anything but what I do-simply because there was a keyword match.

Worst of all, the low-level filters ask canned questions that are designed to weed out people-NOT find good candidates. For example, I give you the single most pointless aspect of a job, the ‘salary’. Putting the whole commission/bonus/etc. discussion aside, recruiters no lead with this, and throw you out if you don’t guess the proper number. If you guess wrong-regardless of anything else-you are round-filed for this one. How is this helping [anyone]?

Sure it saves ‘them’ money, but at what cost? Here below are 2 questions for a standard, boilerplate form I’m filling out for a recruiter… Would you agree with my answers, or is my BS filter needing cleaning/replacement?


Thanks for sending us your resume for the Principal Presales Solution Engineer Virtual from you home office.

The hiring manager would like for you to answer the questions below.

1. Are you a US citizen?

 

Yes. Born here.

2. Why are you leaving or why did you leave your most recent position?
 

Bad 1st Quarter at Kratos, I was one of 24+ laid off from a small company they acquired (Newpoint Technologies).

3. Why did you leave the position before that?
Laid off. Switched to pure reseller strategy.

4. What is your current salary and the salary from the position before
that?
5. What is your expected Salary?
I’d rather not use salary as a selection tool. All SEs make the same range of salary/MBO/Comp, with regard to salary, bonuses, commissions.Salary may get someone in, but it won’t keep them there.

Salary has thankfully become the least significant aspect of a complete, total compensation package. More important aspects to explore are not just title, but growth opportunities, insurance, benefits, sales/sales support structure, methodologies (if any), hiring & burn rate, plans for expansion, [venture] funding, sell-off strategy of owner & investors, average length of tenure, knowledgeable & communicative management, and of course culture.

6. When the client does a background check prior to employment, will there be any red flags?
I have no idea what constitutes a ‘red flag’. Speeding tickets? Divorce? Republican? Think of all the things a background check can cover, and you’ll see why there is no ‘pass/fail’. Please give me more detail on what you personally feel a ‘red flag’ is, and I will cheerfully answer.
7. Have you applied to a position in the past 6 months similar to this position?
At your company? I don’t think so. But I am swamped with them, so if it matters, please check to make sure.
8) Do you have Bachelor’s or Master’s degree preferred, or equivalent work experience required? 

Yes-as long as we all agree on what ‘equivalent’ is.

9) Do you have 5-10+ years of experience in enterprise software Presales?
 

Yes. See resume.

10) Are you highly organized, with attention to detail?
11) Do you have effective decision making abilities?
12) Do you have excellent interpersonal and communication skills?
13) Are you Effective time management, multitasking and prioritization skills a must?
If you ask the security guard how good the security is, what do you expect their answer to be?
14) Do you have any problems with 70% travel required? 

No. I have never sold anything from behind a desk.
16) When can we talk for 5 minutes about the specifics of the requirement?

The ball is in your court.

 


 

original req/post:

Thanks for sending us your resume for the Principal Presales Solution Engineer Virtual from you home office.

The hiring manager would like for you to answer the questions below.

1. Are you a US citizen?
2. Why are you leaving or why did you leave your most recent position?
3. Why did you leave the position before that?
4. What is your current salary and the salary from the position before
that?
5. What is your expected Salary?
6. When the client does a background check prior to employment, will
there be any red flags?
7. Have you applied to a position in the past 6 months similar to this
position?
8) Do you have Bachelor’s or Master’s degree preferred, or equivalent work experience required?
9) Do you have 5-10+ years of experience in enterprise software Presales?
10) Are you highly organized, with attention to detail?
11) Do you have effective decision making abilities?
12) Do you have excellent interpersonal and communication skills?
13) Are you Effective time management, multitasking and prioritization skills a must?
14) Do you have any problems with 70% travel required?
15) Do you have experience in any of the following:
Please state below which area you have expertise in:
Specialized Skills and Experience:

Strong domain expertise in either:
o Master Data Management
o Location Intelligence
o Marketing
o Predictive Analytics, relative to Marketing
o Customer Communication Management

Master Data Management
o Providing processes for collecting, aggregating, matching, consolidating, quality assuring, persisting and distributing data throughout an organization to ensure consistency and control in the ongoing maintenance and application use of this information.
Location Intelligence
o Tools and data employed to geographically “map” information. Transform large amounts of geographic- and location- related data into color-coded visual representations that make it easy to see trends and generate meaningful intelligence to make better decisions and optimize business processes and applications. Location Intelligence tools leverage a variety of data sources including aerial maps, geographic information systems (GIS), consumer demographics as well as a user’s own customer records.

Marketing
o Multi-channel campaign management and real-time decisioning for customer recommendations
•
Predictive Analytics, relative to Marketing
o Campaign segmentation through modeling. Predict customer churn, cross sell, up-sell, loyalty, CLV

Customer Communication Management
o Capabilities and process that allow organizations to effectively communicate with their customers in a personal and targeted manner, multi-channel formats. Communications can be customized, stored and rendered on demand furthering an organizations ability to service their customer base through focused messaging.

16) When can we talk for 5 minutes about the specifics of the requirement?

thank you!
XXX, Recruiter

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