The Party’s as always were extremely well done. The Opening Ceremony outside the Staples Center was well done, red carpet was ready and several celeb’s were in our midst. Joan Rivers, Oprah Winfrey and Brad and Angelina just to name a few. AIG had quite a nice evening dessert event at the Belasco Theater which is an incredible old Theater. Zurich, AON, XL and Priority Care all did a great job and we appreciate the invites and ability to mingle with some our clients and candidates on a much more casual setting.

We look forward to seeing everyone again next year in Denver, look for a new Questpro and Q TEMPS Booth and we are working on something new to entice you the attendee’s to come say hello!

Tampa, Florida Location

2202 N. West Shore Blvd, Suite 200   Tampa, FL 33607   Phone: (941) 735-0102   Toll Free: (866) 545-2076

Apologies for my delayed response – getting acclimated to the new job has taken my focus, and I just realized I had never sent you the comment I promised. I have yet to get on LinkedIn, so in the meanwhile, here you go:

“I had never worked with a recruiter before, so I didn’t know what to expect. The experience was fantastic – Trent was knowledgable, frank, and full of helpful advice. He followed up regularly. He did a great job of setting realistic expectations for timing and next steps, and his advice helped me interview well, and obtain the position I have today.

Thanks, Trent!”

Regards;

Alexis

The purpose of this first contact with a recruiter is to:

• Let the recruiter know that you exist, you’re sort of looking around, but you’re in no big hurry
• Give the recruiter some idea of your technical talents
• Share with the recruiter your career plans and goals

Some recruiters don’t want you to call them until you’re desperate for a new job. Avoid these recruiters. Continue searching until you find a real professional.

1. Find a recruiter that specializes in your talents. Most recruiters specialize. A recruiter usually specializes by geography, technology, or industry, or some combination of the above. When looking for a recruiter, try to find a recruiter who specializes in your technical field and geographical preference. We get lots of non-I.S./telecom resumes sent to our office, and they always wind up in either the paper shredder or get processed with a ‘delete’ key.
2. Find a recruiter that you like to work with and that you trust. No matter how perfect the technical and/or geographic match you are with a recruiter’s specialty area, you MUST like working with this particular recruiter. If a recruiter “bugs you” for any reason, find another recruiter. It is far better that you find a recruiter that you like and can trust but is slightly out of your talent area, then continue to work with the “perfect recruiter” under a lot of friction and stress.
3. Don’t be too quick to send your resume to an unknown but “smooth talking” recruiter… especially if you’re still employed. When you finally find a good recruiter, your goal is for that recruiter to keep you in mind for career-building positions as they arise. Most recruiters are true professionals with very high ethics. They will gladly keep you in mind for new positions that are “right up your alley” as they are uncovered. However, there are a few unethical recruiters in the marketplace that will do whatever it takes to get you to change jobs. For example: How would you like your resume to wind up on your current boss’s desk next week? How would you like your resume “shotgun blasted” to hiring managers at every one of your current employer’s competitors in the U.S. and Canada? How would you like to have your carefully crafted resume “doctored” to say things you haven’t done, mention technologies you haven’t used, or credit you with academic credentials you don’t have?

All of the above has happened to others. Some intentional, some maybe not. Be careful! Before you send a resume to a recruiter, make sure you know exactly what they will be doing and not doing with your resume.

1. Provide the recruiter with current salary information and expectations.Most people (including most recruiters!) find it hard to discuss something as personal as compensation. And that’s fine. However, there are at least three people in this world that need to know your current salary: the IRS, your spouse, and your recruiter. The first two need to know for obvious reasons. Recruiters need to know for the following reasons:
   • Suppose you are making $50,000/year, but you wouldn’t tell us this fact. How many interviews would you want to go on where the job paid a maximum of $40,000/year? How many times would we continue to call you until we “guessed” your current salary?
   • Suppose you are making $50,000/year, but you wouldn’t tell us this fact. Suppose we asked you to interview for a great career-enhancing position that paid a maximum of $40,000/year, but since we didn’t know how much you currently make we neglected to tell you how much the new job paid. Suppose you went on that interview, you loved the company and the job, the employer loved you and made an offer of $39,000/year. What would you think of the employer? What would the employer think of us?
   • Suppose you are making $50,000/year, but we “guessed” you were making $70,000/year. Would we call you to interview for a great opportunity in your field that only paid a maximum of $65,000/year? Probably, since we seldom ask our candidates to take salary cuts.

Don’t put important facts in the cover letter you send to a recruiter. Cover letters tend to get lost in the shuffle, are often not even read, and most recruiters only keep the resume anyway. Keep your cover letter short and specific. On a cover letter, you may include:

• your salary expectations
• your geographic limitations
• specific things that you want to say, but are not normally found on a resume

Make it easy for a recruiter to get and read your resume. Don’t assume that every recruiter has every possible technology in place to receive and read your resume. We sometimes hear:

• “Use your Web Browser to logon to my personal website and download a copy.”
• “I’ll send you the latest copy of my Multimedia resume on a ZIP disk.”
• “Watch your Email. I’ll send you a copy of my resume in Quattro Pro format.”

Web Browser? Download a copy? Multimedia resume? ZIP disk? Email? Quattro Pro format? A recruiter is usually a businessperson, not a technology person. Before you send your resume, ask the recruiter how they prefer to receive it (fax, email, postal mail, etc). And remember to send the best, cleanest, and clearest resume that you can. For example, when faxing a resume always use “high resolution” mode. The fax’d image that the recruiter receives of your resume is much sharper in “high resolution” mode.

• Recruiters are usually NOT good vehicles to help you change careers. For example, a technical person with great programming skills and no sales experience wants to become a sales person or account manager. Or a seasoned project manager wants to return to the “technical trenches” and become a Web Programmer. In both cases, the people described above probably have great potential to do the jobs they really want to do. However, employers do not usually use recruiters to find them people with great potential. Employers use recruiters to help them find people with a particularly well-honed skill set, and several years of practical experience in a particular field. If you’re an unrecognized “super star”, recruiters are usually quite good at helping you get recognized and accelerate the advancement of your career. We are not very effective at helping you change careers.
• Executive recruiters recruit; career counselor’s counsel! Recruiters are inundated with requests for free career counseling, free resume writing advice, free practice interview sessions, etc. Although most recruiters are very qualified in all of the above, our “real” job is to find qualified people to work for our client companies. Most recruiters spend half of their day uncovering great job opportunities with their clients and prospective clients, and the other half of their day searching for qualified candidates to fill these jobs.

Recruiters are usually pretty good at career counseling, resume writing, and interview prep sessions. However, a recruiter’s “real” job is to uncover the best career-building positions in their specialization, and then recruit qualified people for these positions. Although part of the recruitment process often includes some career counseling, some resume “tuning”, and some interview practice sessions, if you really need extensive help you may need to hire a professional career counselor.

• Executive recruiters recruit; bus drivers drive busses! Recruiters get lots of calls that go a bit like this:Monday afternoon, a Systems Analyst gets notice that he will become part of a major RIF at his current employer. He immediately calls a recruiter that he just found in the phone book and says: “I’ll fax you my resume. Now go find me something!”Two days later, the same Systems Analyst calls the same recruiter and says: “You guys find me anything yet?”Two weeks later, the same Systems Analyst calls the same recruiter and says: “You guys aren’t worth a #$%^! You never find me anything when I need you to.”

The above scenario happens much more often than you may think. We affectionately refer to these candidates as “ticket to ride” candidates! These candidates must think we are bus drivers waiting to collect their “ticket” (aka “resume”) and move them along to the next “stop” (aka “a better paying job”).

See Tip #1 for a better way to work with a recruiter!