Ask HN: How much would you pay someone to get you a job? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How much would you pay someone to get you a job?

8 pointsceekay7 comments

Assume that someone writes your resume, markets it to the "right" companies, gets you in the door, prepares you for interviews, and hand holds you until you get a job.

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Market rate = Zero. In practice recruitment consultants will be taking 20% or more of first year salary, but that's from the employer and is therefore not net of income tax, and possibly not net of salary brackets, for employers that have them. More importantly the job seekers are able to take the recruiters' advice (for what its worth, which may be nothing) and go and find their own job through their own efforts and not owe anything.

There are companies and individuals that make a living from commissions paid by employees for getting the job, and there are probably individuals that would benefit from getting paid career consultancy, but when the competition is free at the point of sale it's not an easy market to get into.

I actually do something like this already. I don't do the cold calling and stuff like that, but since I work with developers and designers everyday (dealing with startup stuff), I do have many connections.

So I do headhunting for both sides. I get paid a commission from the company for finding them great talent(I use already established connections of mine so I already know if they are a good fit for the job or not), and the person that gets hired pays me a commission for finding them a job.

It's typically 20% of their monthly salary for 6 months from both sides.

Good deal for a person to make some extra cash on the side of whatever they do already, and they have time to do so.

With a number of companies, this already happens when you go through recruiters. You don't see how much money you're paying, as it's factored in before you see the offer.

If you look at it from the perspective of the employee, it's quite possibly their biggest single expense all year. 20-30% of salary is common. It's easy to see why recruiters are paranoid about getting stiffed by the hiring company.

Unfortunately, it also puts you at a disadvantage when negotiating with the hiring company. The next guy who applied for the same job but didn't have to go through the recruiter would cost the company the same even if they earned 20% larger checks.

Still, as bad as recruiters are, the companies themselves are worse, by and large.

This is a business where your performance can be measured easily, so just aim for a risk-adjusted commission. If you manage to score me a deal that improves my situation 50%, you can keep half of it. No strings attached. We share the risk of me not liking the job and leaving after a month or so.

In order to be successful you will probably require me not to leave the new job for at least 6-12 months. That can be an expensive term to have because of the risk being stuck in some crappy workplace, the risk of missing better opportunities and some other more subtle limitations that costs me money. That can drive your cut down significantly. On the other hand if you have premium companies like Google, you can claim a bigger cut and it's still a good deal.

I am very interested in this thing. I am not a US citizen/residence and I would like to get help finding a position in a certain area. I don't mind paying as much as my first 2 salaries or more for some help. How can approach help like this?

Zero dollars. Not to be flip, but someone else writing my resume wouldn't get me a job I'd want.

What about doing some calls and using their connections?

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