A Former Recruiter Supports My Judgement

Comments about my blog come in two flavors.

One is "yes, that is just what I have experienced" and "excellent post", "residents need to know this", "Why do they not tell us this in residency" or something along those lines. This opinion usually comes from fellow physicians, who ran into similar problems and experienced similar frustrations with recruiters.

The other flavor is "You have no idea what you are talking about" "Of course there are a few bad apples among the recruiters, you just have not spoken to enough of them". That view would be, you guessed it, from active recruiters themselves.

I have plenty of experience, ooohhh, yes, do I have experience with recruiters. Too much for my liking. That is exactly what turned me against recruiters. But in the last few posts I have happily demonstrated that my views are actually shared by recruiters themselves, or by former recruiters. Of course they know what they are doing, they are not blind....And here is another one of these statements from a former recruiter. It could have come from my keyboard, I love it...

By Rahulazcom, "Senior member", SDN student doctor network

Start quote...

I used to be a recruiter before I went to medical school...

...I would advise you to not use recruiters at all. Recruiters are like Real Estate Agents. They provide the impression that they have certain resources or skills that you don't possess until you see what they actually do and realize you can do that on your own. This is what they do. They cold call groups and hospitals to see if they are interested in their services. Then these recruiters pay a large fee to Monsterboard or some other major search engine to post job descriptions. No, they don't have secret sources in high positions like you think. That's what they want you to think. Candidates will usually respond through e-mail and then they forward their resumes (with their names blacked out) to the hiring person. Recruiters will also send flyers or e-mails to program directors or specific departments "fishing" for applicants.

Be aware that the best companies are not actively looking for people. The companies that are willing to shell out 30-60K in recruiting fees are those that are desperate to find someone or are really struggling to find someone. This is not alway true but it's true most of the time.So if a recruiter is discussing a job opportunity, please keep that in mind. Ask yourself why is that job open and why have they contracted a recruiter?

Also, see if you can assess the experience of the recruiter. The bad leads are dumped on the new guys to see if they can close them; the senior guys will not want to work those bad leads. Also, if a recruiter calls you and starts rehashing information from a database, that's usually the newbie that is calling old leads that is stored in a database which is an ominous sign.

Back to my original point...., by applying directly to hospitals and groups, you will actually increase your chances of landing a job because the group/hospital doesn't have to pay a larger recruiting fee (30K to 50K) to hire you.

Okay, so here is what I would advise all of you to do if you are in the job hunting stage.

1. Have an idea where you want to settle down. Narrow your search to one or two cities

2. Create a portfolio by having your CV, photo and LORs photocopied and placed inside a large envelope.

3 Mail the packages directly to groups and hospitals and make certain to let them know you are not being represented by a recruiter and that you are representing yourself. Make sure to address your portfolio to one of the physicians. Don't address it to the title of the practice or the hospital department because it could end up in the HR/Office manager's hands and they could just dump it in the trash.

4. Follow up with them to see if they received your portfolio.

5. Be aware that the best groups are not actively looking to hire someone, but if the right candidate lands on on their desk and they don't have to pay a large recruiting fee to hire him or her, they will strongly consider hiring that individual.

6. AVOID the HR! That's a recruiter basic! Talk to the decision-maker or one of the partners. You can talk to the HR later in regards to benefits etc. but the physicians/partners are much easier to deal with.

End of quote....

He has it almost right. Just mail a letter to every single doctor in your area of interest, not just to the groups and hospitals! And I should mention that "thedoctorjob.com" could do it for you for a modest fee...