Appropriately handling rude external recruiters?
Recently ran into an external recruiter who seemed to cross many lines in their behavior - was rude, aggressive, and possibly deceptive. Said person was over the top in so many regards.
I won't share the deets on exactly what happened but think about the triple entendre of bad recruiters - 1) Inappropriate questions like how much were you making previously and how is your relationship with your manager; 2) Being caught in a lie red-handed and then proceeding to yell at you about "do you know about the looming recession, right?"; 3) Flaunting how good they are at their job and their company is when no one asked.
I've been a jerk before so I get why someone might behave like this but even when I explicitly told them the way they were behaving was inappropriate, this person doubled down on their behavior. I was stuck on a call for 25 mins but had to cut it short because it got bad enough.
How do you deal with people like this? Send a note to their manager? Send a warning to the company they're recruiting for? Just let it slide and let them implode?
What if they're having some mental health issues? What happens then? What if they're slightly autistic (in all honesty I can empathize, despite the fact I'm not supposed to be good at it)?
If a recruiter is being pushy, I have always given vague answers. How much do you make? - I will not entertain roles unless the salary is over $xxx,000. How do you like your current job? - I am always open to interesting roles that will further my career. etc.
If they just keep pushing, I just say that I am not at liberty to share any more information. You are the product to them, there is no reason that they should be dicks to you.
He continued to put words into my mouth. Which was very uncomfortable.
Do you have an example? If someone tries to put words in my mouth I usually just tell them straight.
Honestly, in my opinion, some recruiters are incredibly unfit to recruit.
I had one person actually reach out for a position that required a niche ~5 years experience, I don't even have five years of work experience let alone in a specialized sub-field of finance.
I tend to lean on the side of silence or vague pleasantry where I give non-commital responses.
My guess is someone is on their last straw and is trying to push a sale to meet their numbers to keep a job. Let's not forget they only get paid if you get hired and therefore paid. Could also be that they already have someone in line and just need to say they talked to x amount of candidates per HR/admin rules.
PeRmAnEnTiNtErN 's advice is spot on too.
I hate recruiters, one pissed me off so much I created a bunch of fake applications for their job postings. Petty but worth it.
Recruiting has zero barriers to entry I’m only aware of two credible recruiters for public finance
Would appreciate if people didn’t vent and starts to complain about “how they like to create bunch of fake job postings to mess with recruiters”. I’m sure you got better things to do and not representing your best selves.
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