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I do really like the existence of recruiters (if only because it seems like a good separation of concerns), but my thinking is that if you aren't adding any value to the equation besides the mere knowledge of the name of a company that may or may not be interested in hiring me, then you haven't earned your commission. It should be easier for me to get a job with a company by working with somebody recruiting for that company than by learning the name and going straight to them. Why isn't that the case? Why does it seem like it's actually easier to cut you out than to work with you? (The royal "you".)

> We do not tell you the company name for a few reasons

Has anyone ever tried testing whether the downsides of revealing the company name (except in case 3) really do outweigh the potential upsides?

I'd like to say that I would respond to more recruiters if they offered concrete information about the opportunities. It's really hard to decide if I want to invest time in a relationship with a recruiter based on... well, nothing.

I don't like the way I do business but I don't really have a choice in the company I am in. It all boils down to the business model of the recruitment companies and who owns them. Most recruitment company owners are people who have excelled at sales in recruitment and have risen up through the ranks to get enough money to fund their own ventures. They then want to rip people off to make as much money as possible, they see candidates as cattle and think there is enough companies out there to rip them off and still have a viable business model. I love all these start ups that are trying to disrupt the industry but your gonna have to lift you game to beat these people, they are quick and ruthless and the phone is their weapon, its the cheapest and most effective way to make money

> they see candidates as cattle

I think most candidates sense this and this is why they shy away from and react negatively to recruiters.

My last comment wasn't necessarily directed at you personally -- more wondering if the recruiting industry has locked itself into its own paradigm and whether anyone has done testing to see whether or not that actually is a valid paradigm.

I understand I was just mentioning that people do try new things but the majority of managers and owners don't want to break a model that makes them serious coin, it will happen sooner or later but until then they will beat it to death.

The essence is that recruiters are salesmen, and sales and engineering have ever been at odds. We cannot do our jobs without the raw, steaming, unvarnished truth, and they cannot do theirs without polishing, perfuming, and airbrushing the product.

From the other end, it looks like you are intentionally withholding information from us--information that has a meaningful impact on our decision process. While that may be expected in the world of sales, to people like us, it is a mortal insult.

While you might have good reasons, in your own opinion, to do it, you should be aware that your sensible business practice is making your product hate you.

I won't waste my time on recruiters that won't tell me the company name for a few reasons:

1. The recruiter that expects me to screw them by cutting them out of the loop is probably projecting--they screw candidates so often they think that no one has any integrity.

2. I hate recruiters and think I can get a better rate without one. The one time I actually got an offer with a recruiter involved, it was for 60% what I was currently making at another job. I rejected it on the spot, and the CEO said the offer was low because they would have to pay the recruiter based on what they paid me.

3. A company that doesn't want anyone to know they are hiring should be getting cold calls from psychiatrists, not just recruiters.

But really, the only reason I need involves trust. If you can't trust me to deal with you faithfully, how can I trust you to represent my interests to the company faithfully?

> If we tell you the name of the company straight off the bat, the next recruiter will ask you some sneaky questions and get the details of the role under the guise of trying to find out where you are in the process of looking for a job. This works more times than you can believe.

Can you rephrase this? I don't understand what you're trying to say.

It's other recruiters fishing for the names of companies that are hiring. And with that information they will call the company and try to get in on the game.

The questions are usually along the lines of, "I'd hate to be putting you forward to a company you're already communicating with, can you name them all for me please?". Although perhaps a little less blatant.

So one part of a recruiters job is to find jobs to work in companies - companies don't just give you these you have to go and find them its a sales job. I mean you can see which companies are advertising on job boards and then call in and try and get the job on but 20 other recruiters have already done that, and most jobs aren't even advertised.

The easy thing to do is to call to get leads of candidates you are calling:

"oh you worked for IBM, great company, I work with John Smith did you work with him?" "No i work with Jane Doe" "Where are you interviewing at the moment?" "Facebook, Google, etc" "oh I'm working the Facebook role did you meet with Jim? "no i interviewed with Sam" "was that through a recruitment agency or direct" "agency" (This last question is great news because it means that the company are open to using agencies and not just looking direct on job boards)

The list goes on, most people are clued up but we do this day in day out we are tricky with our questions and most people will eventually 'bleed' as we say

He means that all the recruiters are in competition with each other, sometimes even at the same recruitment company.

As a result, they will all back-stab each other in order to make their money... which comes from a surtax on your new employer, and thus reduces your bargaining position.

In the other direction, I've had the same person represented to me by multiple recruiters a few times. In all cases, the actual person was not at fault.

This. I live in a relatively small city, so I frequently see 3-4 different firms ping me on the same job. I'm the kind of person who feels guilty not sending a frendly no thanks. Usually by the 3rd or 4th recruiter on a gig, I'm able to respond with 'Oh, this is the <company name here> gig. Thanks, but it isn't a good fit for me.'

I never understood why recruiters aren't upfront about which company it is that they're trying to hire me for, and now I understand the reasons, so thanks.

I still don't like the practice though. My time and energy are valuable, and each correspondence with a recruiter uses a little of both. If recruiters are upfront about company name and details of a role in the first email they send to me, it saves me the time and energy of having to pull that information out of them through additional emails.

I can spend a few seconds (or a few minutes, if the company looks like it might be a good match) looking up the company website and blog, checking out if I like their product and team, etc. If I like what I see (or don't), I can follow up with the recruiter to let them know what I think.

I understand the point that candidates could just bypass the recruiter if they mention the company name, but unless the company is some kind of stealth startup, the candidate is going to have to find out the name of the company anyways, so what's to stop candidates from bypassing a recruiter anyways? (I've had recruiters give me the names of companies in their 2nd email, after I ask for more information, which I always have to do, since they never give enough in the first place :P )

Some candidates may indeed choose to use information like that to bypass the recruiter that reached out to them, but I'm sure that there are many more out there who have more honor than that and would not (me being one of them).

As it stands, I don't bother replying to recruiter emails that only give vague references to companies and roles, instead of explicitly naming them upfront in their initial email. I get these kind of emails all the time, and it's just not worth my time and energy to follow up on any of them. A lot of the time, the companies aren't a good fit anyways.

When looking around for positions at companies, I do so at Careers 2.0[1] and GitHub Jobs[2], and AngelList[3], because I can take my time to do all the research I want on a company and role, and it's far less a hassle than having to work with a recruiter, in my experience.

I get that recruiters have to make money and eat too, and that they've developed these secretive (and in my opinion, a little shady and dishonest) techniques to do so, but as I'm sure it's been stated many times before, those techniques and the recruitment system and culture as a whole are deeply flawed.

It's because of those flaws that web services like Hired[4] and WhiteTruffle[5] exist, to try to replace the jobs of recruiters.

[1]: http://careers.stackoverflow.com/ [2]: https://jobs.github.com/ [3]: https://angel.co/ [4]: https://hired.com/ [5]: https://www.whitetruffle.com