That hell called LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a wonderful place. I’m kidding. It actually gives us a taste of what hell must be like. Even though we, IT professionals, did not commit any sin. It is a place on the internet to host a recruitment mockery. Out there, bad recruiters thrive, unchecked, wasting your time with senseless job opportunities and network invitations you’d better ignore. Here is a sample of the worst of them. It ain’t pretty.
Before we enter the gallery, let’s get some things straight.
Some recruiters are professional and do a decent job. They know their customer, they understand the project, they proof-read the job description, they take some time to match candidate rather than relying on a large spammy fishing net.
They are the exception. They are the 1%.
For the large part, recruiters on LinkedIn are clueless. You would think that LinkedIn would weed them out, but they don’t. Instead, they seem to maintain a delicate balance, letting in as many recruiters as possible (quality doesn’t matter, quantity brings money), while maintining a bare minimum to retain enough of us and keep the system running.
Why don’t I close my account instead of complaining? Because LinkedIn is unfortunatelly the goto place to check someone’s professional profile. Same reason why I have a Facebook account: it’s because everybody’s there. Not because I enjoy their product.
This being said, time to have fun.
Urgent send CV
Greetings for the day. They have an urgent job. Send ur CV. Straight to the point. No funny business here. Why won’t I reply?
Job opportunity :D
Sometimes they don’t even bother scrambling a vague message because #yolo
"Quotes"
You can guess they used improperly configured or poorly written programs whenever the placeholders are not right. I specially appreciate the "quotes". For instance we have a "Java" job. In "Brussels,Belgium" (no space). Or even @ Belgium — country is not that large after all.
Desperately talented
Sometimes they get desperate. No, wait. She’s looking for a desperately talented developer. For some customer in Brussels. Is she the one desperate, or is she desperately looking for a candidate, or is the candidate desperate? I’m confused. Or more likely, she is.
Batman
Being different is fine. We are all different. Some are a bit eccentric. Some a lot more. I don’t mind yellow or blue hair. But wearing a Batman mask raises too many questions. Like: is he actually the Batman?
Wrong language
Targetting can be as inaccurate as using a language your recipient does not understand. David pefers to answer with a snarky comment. The recruiter took the feedback well.
When your reply
The bar is already high, but some manage to put it even higher. And for some reason it’s often David who gets the top picks. Don’t know why, but that’s a fact. So this guy coming straight out of the 7th circle of the LinkedIn hell seems confident that David will send him his resume, for an unspecified job, in the US, no questions asked. And WHEN HE REPLIES, he will be given the confidential salary range.
And David is trying really hard to stay nice.
Their margin? 50%
This one raised her offer by 33% with no negociation effort. Imagine the margin they cash in!
Well, she then bluntly admitted that they take a 50% margin. You read well: half of the invoice will go to a fishy intermediary. At least that’s transparency (maybe). As you’d expect, David was not amused.
LinkedIn is that sweet hell I go back to every once in a while, just to check I didn’t miss that life changing opportunity I’ve been looking for (hint: I know I won’t find it there). And let the chore of discarding irrelevant invitations begin.
I tend to leave some invitations rot for a long, long time, way before the Epoch, when the Universe was still young, moments after the big bang, where time and space were severly curved, energy and matter were indistinguishable, and where there was nothing but NaN.
Let me get a refund
Cheap recruiter wants you to reply, so that he can get a refund for his InMail credit.
Don’t say you don’t know me
It’s okay to discard the invitation, but please do not click on "I don’t know this person". I thought this button was a placebo, but this recruiter at least fears the consequences. He knows he’s doing it wrong. He knows he abuses the invitation feature. They all know it.
Good luck
These are the worst samples I have gathered. Some recruiters do however stand out. They are the exception. The bulk of the offers is actually garbage. Often vague, ill-suited, with a severe lack of knowledge about the job itself.
And somehow in this mess, a company and their future contractor or employee are supposed to find each other.
Good luck with that. I do not believe the current state of affairs can be fixed. A profound shift in the system is necessary. And if it happens, I don’t think it will be on LinkedIn.