What can a headhunter do for you?

I've been in ER for 3 years at a BB, but need a change as I'm having problems with my manager, a star analyst who will never allow me to gain exposure. A couple months ago, I started meeting a few headhunters to explain my situation. I've been set up to meet several heads of research and heads of sales at lower-tier banks, but so far not the places that I'd really like to work at. These headhunters seem to operate by blasting some kind of summary they've made up about me in order to fish for meetings, and I wonder if they are presenting me in the right way. I also suspect that one of these guys has been working against my interests by pitching someone I know for a position that I mentioned I had interviewed for. My question is - if the objective is to get meetings with research and sales heads, why can't I just contact these people directly (email or linkedin) without the services of a headhunter? Would it violate protocol or seem too desperate, or be indiscreet? Is there some advantage to being introduced through a headhunter? If anything, I would think that the involvement of a headhunter makes me a far more expensive candidate for a prospective employer.

3 Comments
 

A legit headhunter will have to contacts to get your foot in the door. Simply sending out mass emails on Linkedin will just get you put on spam list.

However, you get what you pay for. Make sure the headhunter is legit.

 

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