Recruitment Consultant Database (was: Re: Perl jobs in London?)
I've found that some agents are definately more clueful than others.. I think it helps to try and identify yourself in some way to them, so that *if* a job comes thru that you fit, that they will actually think of you and call you. I get the feeling that random people calling up about jobs just get transfered into a limbo part of their brain. Although I'm not in the CFT club, I have been before, and, like you, found that there's definite differences in the quality of recruitment consultants... Would we run foul of the data-protection act or some-such if we were to create a database of recruitment consultants, along with thoughts and experiences of them by people who've used them? +Pete -- Slavery is now no where more patiently endured, than in countries once inhabited by the zealots of liberty. -- Samuel Johnson
Re: Recruitment Consultant Database (was: Re: Perl jobs in London?)
On Fri, 2003-02-28 at 09:03, Peter Sergeant wrote:
Would we run foul of the data-protection act or some-such if we were to
create a database of recruitment consultants, along with thoughts and
experiences of them by people who've used them?
It has been attempted before (davorg, were you apart of this?):
www.ars.org.uk
Ian
--
s@[EMAIL PROTECTED]@##@@#y^#@712($;='z')s(..)0$1gs$0s(.)([^01])
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$*+=$_)[EMAIL
PROTECTED]:$)foreach(map{hex}m(..)g);s.*$.$/s(\b.)\U$1goprint
Re: Recruitment Consultant Database (was: Re: Perl jobs in London?)
On Friday 28 February 2003 09:27, Ian Brayshaw wrote: On Fri, 2003-02-28 at 09:03, Peter Sergeant wrote: Would we run foul of the data-protection act or some-such if we were to create a database of recruitment consultants, along with thoughts and experiences of them by people who've used them? It has been attempted before (davorg, were you apart of this?): www.ars.org.uk I think that back in the days when there were more jobs than programmers, such a thing had a chance of working. These days when there are no jobs, its a rather moot point. -- Robin Szemeti
Re: Recruitment Consultant Database (was: Re: Perl jobs in London?)
From: Ian Brayshaw [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: 2/28/03 9:27:52 AM On Fri, 2003-02-28 at 09:03, Peter Sergeant wrote: Would we run foul of the data-protection act or some-such if we were to create a database of recruitment consultants, along with thoughts and experiences of them by people who've used them? It has been attempted before (davorg, were you apart of this?): www.ars.org.uk Yep. That was me. The Agency Rating System. The idea was that you could rate agencies in a number of categories (professionalism, number of jobs, number of beers they bought, etc). Turned out to be more trouble than it was worth as agencies either a) got so few votes that it wasn't statistically significant, b) bribed their mates to give them artifically high votes or c) threatened to sue for libel. Oh and people were constantly inventing new agencies with obscene names. If anyone wants to do something with the domain then I'll be happy to help. Dave... -- http://www.dave.org.uk Let me see you make decisions, without your television - Depeche Mode (Stripped)
Re: Recruitment Consultant Database (was: Re: Perl jobs in London?)
On Fri, Feb 28, 2003 at 02:05:49AM -0800, Dave Cross wrote: c) threatened to sue for libel. Is it possible to list agencies as we can't say because they are threatening to sue for libel without getting sued, so that one can make a judgement based on that? Or was the problem that you were deemed as publishing the individual libellous comments of contributors? Nicholas Clark
Re: Recruitment Consultant Database (was: Re: Perl jobs in London?)
On Fri, Feb 28, 2003 at 11:10:39AM +, Adam C Auden wrote: On Fri, 28 Feb 2003, Nicholas Clark wrote: Is it possible to list agencies as we can't say because they are threatening to sue for libel without getting sued, so that one can make a judgement based on that? Or was the problem that you were deemed as publishing the individual libellous comments of contributors? You could always provide your opinions of agencies through a site such as eopinions or dooyoo. People post reviews both good and bad, and you would have a degree of seperation from being in the legal firing line. I think it's much cleaner only allow complementary stories about agencies. This should work providing that there are sufficient occurrences of helpful agents at a few agencies that some get several favourable reviews. That way when people come to look up the agent that they are thinking about, the can read something into the fact that there are no favourable reviews. And the important part is that you can't get sued for what you don't say. Nicholas Clark
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Wednesday 26 February 2003 22:08, Dave Hodgkinson wrote: Contrary to other answers I'd actually say it's not as bad as it has been. Not according to www.jobstats.co.uk Bottomed? Maybe. given that the stats are just the use of the word 'Perl' in any job add, I'd say the figures are now so low that what you are seeing is statistical noise. They'll be the ones that say 'programmer wanted to port site from Perl to .asp or NT systems administrator, also useful would be unix csh and Perl and even where there is a real job, its difficult to make decent money in a market where people are prepared to undercut each other just to eat. it's dead, it has ceased to be, it has gone orf to meet its maker ... it is a dead parrot. -- Robin Szemeti
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, Feb 25, 2003 at 10:35:38AM +, Nigel Hamilton wrote: Unfortunately some agents do a naive acronym match, between job spec and your CV. Because they often can't discriminate between the important acronyms and the less important ... they often wait until they find a CV that is fully 'acronym compliant.' Which is also, scarily, how their CV databases do information retrieval - and unfortunately the acronym count helps the order in which CVs are displayed. I hope that their CV databases weed out CV's that contain acronym 'payloads' hidden in whitespace, headers and footers. For example, snip Don't laugh. One agency told me my CV wasn't acecptable, and that I needed to send it back with more buzzwords in it. The agent then listed off a long list of them as examples to be spread throughout. -Toby -- Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, Feb 25, 2003 at 10:33:25AM +, Ian Brayshaw wrote: On Tue, 2003-02-25 at 10:14, Simon Wistow wrote: I think that's your problem right there. 50 agencies is too many I think it's been discussed before that it's better just to find one or two good agents and stick with them. Agreed. But when you need a job you apply for all the jobs you can find. Those 50 agencies represent over 50 jobs that I feel I have the skills for and would like to do. It's more a measure of how flooded the market is with applications when most recruiters don't read most CVs that come through to them. My experience of about 5 months of hunting for C/C++/UNIX/Perl jobs is that job agencies are useless. I've had several interviews in the past few months, but every one of them has come thru an alternative channel.. Either a friend, or a technical-group-mailing-list (such as this one). All job agencies have done is waste my time and my (phone bill) money. I've found that some agents are definately more clueful than others.. I think it helps to try and identify yourself in some way to them, so that *if* a job comes thru that you fit, that they will actually think of you and call you. I get the feeling that random people calling up about jobs just get transfered into a limbo part of their brain. When I have had job interviews, I've found that the interviewers have thought highly of me.. but there's just a lot of other good people out there, and some are both better and cheaper than me. I'm still looking for work currently, but luckily I am semi-employed at the moment, finally. Still, it's a temporary IT position, and if you extrapolate the wage out to a yearly amount, it's about £15k/annum before tax. But one takes what one can get, and one is happy for it. Toby -- Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Thu, Feb 27, 2003 at 01:52:19PM -0800, Toby|Wintrmute wrote: On Tue, Feb 25, 2003 at 10:33:25AM +, Ian Brayshaw wrote: On Tue, 2003-02-25 at 10:14, Simon Wistow wrote: I think that's your problem right there. 50 agencies is too many I think it's been discussed before that it's better just to find one or two good agents and stick with them. Agreed. But when you need a job you apply for all the jobs you can find for some reason, this email came back to me containing none of my reply.. wierd. I'll repost below: My experience of about 5 months of hunting for C/C++/UNIX/Perl jobs is that job agencies are useless. I've had several interviews in the past few months, but every one of them has come thru an alternative channel.. Either a friend, or a technical-group-mailing-list (such as this one). All job agencies have done is waste my time and my (phone bill) money. I've found that some agents are definately more clueful than others.. I think it helps to try and identify yourself in some way to them, so that *if* a job comes thru that you fit, that they will actually think of you and call you. I get the feeling that random people calling up about jobs just get transfered into a limbo part of their brain. When I have had job interviews, I've found that the interviewers have thought highly of me.. but there's just a lot of other good people out there, and some are both better and cheaper than me. I'm still looking for work currently, but luckily I am semi-employed at the moment, finally. Still, it's a temporary IT position, and if you extrapolate the wage out to a yearly amount, it's about £15k/annum before tax. But one takes what one can get, and one is happy for it. -Toby -- Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, 2003-02-25 at 07:58, Simon Wistow wrote: On Mon, Feb 24, 2003 at 10:18:49PM +, Bill Corr said: No, I'm not looking for a job, although I might be forced to in a few weeks time. What I'd like to know is what the job market is like for Perl programmers in the London area. Contrary to other answers I'd actually say it's not as bad as it has been. Not according to www.jobstats.co.uk Bottomed? Maybe. -- Dave Hodgkinson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Mon, 2003-02-24 at 22:18, Bill Corr wrote:
snipI might need a London job.../snip
Well, as everyone else has said, the market ain't what it used to be.
I'm currently looking for work myself at the moment and have found it
to be quite tough. I have my CV with about 50 agencies, and feel as
though I'm getting no where. As someone else said, the best strategy is
to speak to humans, not inboxes. When you send your CV[0], make sure you
ring the agent/employer/waste-of-space you sent it to and discuss the
position. This is possibly the only way to guarantee that they will look
at your CV as they get flooded with CVs for each position these days.
Also, make sure you apply for jobs that exist. Gone are the days of just
firing your CV at any old agency and having them respond with job
possibilities. Agencies are getting selective on which skill sets they
are handling, perhaps because employers want them to be slightly clueful
about the CVs, so it might take time to find an agency who regularly
deals with Perl people.
If you've got J2EE, EJB, JDBC, VBA, .NET or C# on your CV you'll go a
lot further than if you don't. I've applied for numerous jobs that I
know I have the skills for, but I'm failing to get considered because
the employers are putting weird requirements in. One job was for a
Senior Unix/Perl/C developer, but unless you had VBA and .Net on your CV
they didn't want to know. It seems to me that any senior Unix/Perl/C
developer would be able to pick up .Net/VBA in no time as a no brainer,
but unless you can show X years experience you won't get a look in.
Like the front-end web designer, with extensive Photoshop and Flash
experience, who also needed to be a senior Solaris admin and security
expert. ... It's a strange market out there...
... Sorry, I'm ranting, aren't I? ... Think it's time I rang another
agency to create a feeling of doing something
Good luck with the job hunting.
Ian
[0] Don't delude yourself about the cluefulnesss of agents/employers:
they are not and will never be clueful. If your CV doesn't open in
Word then they'll probably just bin it. If you're lucky, they'll ask
you to resend in a standard format which does not include PDF.
Others may chime in with war stories about sending two non-editable
versions of your CV, one with and one without your contact details,
but from my experience, that's not working anymore. If the agent
can't play with your CV to help you get the job then it's too much
trouble and they won't do it.
--
s@[EMAIL PROTECTED]@##@@#y^#@712($;='z')s(..)0$1gs$0s(.)([^01])
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$*+=$_)[EMAIL
PROTECTED]:$)foreach(map{hex}m(..)g);s.*$.$/s(\b.)\U$1goprint
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, Feb 25, 2003 at 09:54:24AM +, Ian Brayshaw said: Well, as everyone else has said, the market ain't what it used to be. I'm currently looking for work myself at the moment and have found it to be quite tough. I have my CV with about 50 agencies, and feel as though I'm getting no where. I think that's your problem right there. 50 agencies is too many I think it's been discussed before that it's better just to find one or two good agents and stick with them. And word of mouth is good as well, or finding a reliable sourc - uknm-jobs at http://www.chinwag.com/uknm-jobs/ isn't strictly a programming list but a fair few programming jobs come up. [0] Don't delude yourself about the cluefulnesss of agents/employers: they are not and will never be clueful. If your CV doesn't open in Word then they'll probably just bin it. If you're lucky, they'll ask you to resend in a standard format which does not include PDF. My cousin is an IT recruiter and, I was glad to hear, one of the more clueful ones. He successfully convinced my Dad that it wasn't worth me registering with him because he dealt with Sys Admins and I was a Programmer and that I worked in small RnD type roles whereas his firm deals with city type contracts. He also admitted that, and lets face it - we all knew this, the first sweep is looking for keywords and their frequency in a cv. I've missed out on a job because the recruiter was searching for MIDP and my CV listed J2ME. Simon -- the test for truth is still quicker than the addition
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, 2003-02-25 at 10:14, Simon Wistow wrote:
I think that's your problem right there. 50 agencies is too many I think
it's been discussed before that it's better just to find one or two good
agents and stick with them.
Agreed. But when you need a job you apply for all the jobs you can find.
Those 50 agencies represent over 50 jobs that I feel I have the skills
for and would like to do. It's more a measure of how flooded the market
is with applications when most recruiters don't read most CVs that come
through to them.
And I agree, if you can find a good agent, stick with them. However,
it's been over two years since I dealt with a good agent (my last one
ran off with 4 months of my wages), and so I'm having to find a good one
all over again. Mailing my CV out to all jobs ads that appear to fit the
bill is part of this process.
Still, no matter how bad the market is, if you've got the skills,
patience, and a little bit of good fortune, you'll find a job.
Ian
--
s@[EMAIL PROTECTED]@##@@#y^#@712($;='z')s(..)0$1gs$0s(.)([^01])
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Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, Feb 25, 2003 at 10:35:38AM +, Nigel Hamilton wrote: I hope that their CV databases weed out CV's that contain acronym 'payloads' hidden in whitespace, headers and footers. For example, The ones I've looked at certainly don't. Before you know it the average CV will be two pages long but 100 Meg in byte size. ...i.e. a normal Word document? R
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, Feb 25, 2003 at 10:35:38AM +, Nigel Hamilton wrote: Unfortunately some agents do a naive acronym match, between job spec and your CV. Because they often can't discriminate between the important acronyms and the less important ... they often wait until they find a CV that is fully 'acronym compliant.' Which is why I *always* phone the pimp before sending in my CV, ostensibly to find out whether I've already applied for that job through another agency, but really so that I can explain to them just how well my skills fit even if I don't mention all the right buzzwords. -- David Cantrell | Looking for work | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/cv See the creativity that comes from misery! Without misery people who would otherwise relax at home with a drink are spurred to great heights of expression. Art thrives on constraint and unhappiness. -- Arp
Re: Perl jobs in London?
Nigel Hamilton wrote: It's quite scary when they advertise for someone with 'Pearl' and 'SeekWell' skills. Unfortunately some agents do a naive acronym match, between job spec and your CV. snip I hope that their CV databases weed out CV's that contain acronym 'payloads' hidden in whitespace, headers and footers. One wonders if you could use hidden lameronyms to make your CV idiot compatable However it would require you to think on their level :-O ~~~ Michael John Lush PhDTel:44-20-7679-5027 Nomenclature Bioinformatics Support Fax:44-20-7387-3496 HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The Galton Laboratory University College London, UK URL: http://www.gene.ucl.ac.uk/nomenclature/ ~~~
Re: Perl jobs in London?
Ian Brayshaw wrote: Agreed. But when you need a job you apply for all the jobs you can find. Those 50 agencies represent over 50 jobs that I feel I have the skills for and would like to do. It's more a measure of how flooded the market is with applications when most recruiters don't read most CVs that come through to them. Sorry but in my experience those 50 agencies probably represent the same 10 jobs if you are lucky. I found 12 agencies with perl jobs in brighton than came down to the same job at absolute internet 11 times - and it isn't even in brighton. The twelth job didn't actually exist. YMMV
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Tue, 2003-02-25 at 14:06, Peter Hickman wrote:
Ian Brayshaw wrote:
Agreed. But when you need a job you apply for all the jobs you can find.
Those 50 agencies represent over 50 jobs that I feel I have the skills
for and would like to do. It's more a measure of how flooded the market
is with applications when most recruiters don't read most CVs that come
through to them.
Sorry but in my experience those 50 agencies probably represent the same
10 jobs if you are lucky. I found 12 agencies with perl jobs in brighton
than came down to the same job at absolute internet 11 times - and it
isn't even in brighton. The twelth job didn't actually exist.
Only found that in a couple of positions, and then only chose one
agency. No, I've made sure they are all different positions.
Ian
--
s@[EMAIL PROTECTED]@##@@#y^#@712($;='z')s(..)0$1gs$0s(.)([^01])
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PROTECTED]:$)foreach(map{hex}m(..)g);s.*$.$/s(\b.)\U$1goprint
Perl jobs in London?
No, I'm not looking for a job, although I might be forced to in a few weeks time. What I'd like to know is what the job market is like for Perl programmers in the London area. Is working as a contractor a viable proposition, or am I deluding myself? What sort of level of experience is generally the minimum level required (contract or full time)? Any feedback gratefully received. Cheers, Bill.
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Mon, Feb 24, 2003 at 10:18:49PM +, Bill Corr wrote: [stuff] Just in reply to the subject: hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha -- Lusercop.net - LARTing Lusers everywhere since 2002
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Monday 24 February 2003 22:18, Bill Corr wrote: No, I'm not looking for a job, although I might be forced to in a few weeks time. What I'd like to know is what the job market is like for Perl programmers in the London area. Is working as a contractor a viable proposition, or am I deluding myself? What sort of level of experience is generally the minimum level required (contract or full time)? umm http://www.jobstats.co.uk see that ... ? thats a graph that is. The concensus seems to be that the graph gives the impression that there might still be the odd one or two jobs, but this is most likely a statistical error. I think I know more unemployed programmers than employed ones .. even if you include the ones that have changed 'careers' to other such things as lorry driving, and stacking shelves in supermarkets -- Robin Szemeti
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Mon, Feb 24, 2003 at 10:18:49PM +, Bill Corr wrote: No, I'm not looking for a job, although I might be forced to in a few weeks time. What I'd like to know is what the job market is like for Perl programmers in the London area. Depending on your personality type, one suggestion is to build something that has a specific, defined revenue stream, be it a product or service. Work like crazy, and meet as many people as you can in the hopes of finding funding and marketing expertise. (This is what I'm doing, and it seems to be working.) Is working as a contractor a viable proposition, or am I deluding myself? What sort of level of experience is generally the minimum level required (contract or full time)? I find looking at jobsites a waste of time. You have to meet actual humans, and IME do it a *lot*. There is a skill in finding people, definitely. That a *lot* is probably just quite a few in skilled hands (i.e. not mine yet). Another way of looking at the job market: rather than how many perl jobs are there? is how can I find people who have a problem I can solve with perl, and persuade I'm the person to do it?. From my experience the latter technique yields orders of magnitudes more work opportunities than the former. In other words, you become a sales person selling yourself and your skills. Your Why Perl is better than Java elevator pitch gets really good :-) Don't ask me for mine as I don't deliver a canned one but use more eliciting techniques to diffuse objections. YMMV, HTH, keep your eyes wide open, good luck, Paul -- Paul Makepeace ... http://paulm.com/ If I was on fire, then the speakers would pound out crazy tractors. -- http://paulm.com/toys/surrealism/
Re: Perl jobs in London?
Another way of looking at the job market: rather than how many perl jobs are there? is how can I find people who have a problem I can solve with perl, and persuade I'm the person to do it?. From my experience the latter technique yields orders of magnitudes more work opportunities than the former. In other words, you become a sales person selling yourself and your skills. Your Why Perl is better than Java elevator pitch gets really good :-) Don't ask me for mine as I don't deliver a canned one but use more eliciting techniques to diffuse objections. This is reckoned by most decent contractors to be the way forward. For perl, select any skill at all. If you let me do this for you, you will get that (which you will really, really like) and it will cost you . And, if it is a likely to be a seriously large amount: this is how you account for it, you can get a grant from the EU/DTI/Uncle Tom Cobbley here, and you can write the rest off against Tax thus is also a good line. Understand discounted cash flow. Use it. Good Luck Dirk -- Please Note: Some Quantum Physics Theories Suggest That When the Consumer Is Not Directly Observing This Product, It May Cease to Exist or Will Exist Only in a Vague and Undetermined State.
Re: Perl jobs in London?
On Mon, Feb 24, 2003 at 10:18:49PM +, Bill Corr said: No, I'm not looking for a job, although I might be forced to in a few weeks time. What I'd like to know is what the job market is like for Perl programmers in the London area. Contrary to other answers I'd actually say it's not as bad as it has been. That's not to say that it's good but it'd definitely better than it was 4 months ago and that, in turn, was infinitely better than it was a year before that. That's not to say that it's brilliant but, and correct me if I'm wrong here other peeps, it's not that hard to get a job within a few months, especially if you're not being picky or you've got specialist sk177z. On a quick finger survey of people I know most of the persistent CFT-ers seem to be blissfully ensconced in fulltime or contract work and people who've recently been laid off seem to be able to find work without too much difficulty. YMM definitely Vary though. Simon -- the test for truth is still quicker than the addition
