The Gene Pool

Well.. you probably now i’m working in the financial sector. And after a few years it becomes time to look around, especially if you have never worked at another company like the case is with me. I had spoken to a couple of recruiting firms in the past years, but nothing ever came out of this. Lots’of talk about trying to find the correct position for you, based on your expectations and all that… But never really a serious position.

Some weeks ago i got a profile which was quite to my liking. A big international company was looking for staffing in the line i’m in. I called for more information, but it wasn’t what i was looking for. Too much international travel. Some is good, but 50% – 70% is too much if you cherish your relationship. But no harm done, they had other opportunities as well.

Before that could take place i had to have an interview with them. Their HQ is in Amsterdam, so that is a bit out of the way for me.. and at that time there wasn’t really time for me to go to Amsterdam and spend half a day like that. Having allready told them that, i still got a phonecall from a secretary to schedule a meeting in Amsterdam. I refused, sent an email to my contact person telling him that that would have to wait a couple of weeks, until i had time. Strangely now there was a possibility of that person to come to my place of work (in the area) and meet there… Why they at first tried to get me to Amsterdam I don’t know..

This was the first struggle, I won

Then they had a job opportunity. Looked good, but there were a lot of company specific terms in the notice… That didn’t really help. Asking around i couldn’t get some one at the firm to give me som answers. The only answer was: “go to the meeting with the prospective employer and there they will tell you more”. That meeting took about 4 hours, 1 interview and a testcase, and still no answers…

The employer wanted to go on with the progress, but first i wanted my questions answered and the feedback from the first interviews. They seemed a bit suprised when i told them the second interview was not going to happen before i got the feedback and my questions answered.

Finally.. the questions answered.. someone who knew what he was talking about told me everything i wanted to know. The position was not what i was looking for. So, 4 hours spend uselessly, and still no further because if i had the information first the meeting would never have taken place.

So i called i wasn’t going further in the progress, and that this partly had to do with the way they did business.. And what happened then?

Within 4 hours i had had 4 different persons from the same company calling me with new and socalled interesting profiles…. I saw three profiles, and in all these cases, had the company paid any attention to what i wanted, and to my reaction of that morning, they would have known i wasn’t interested.

So when i called the fourth back i told her that this was definitely not the way to do business.. and even if interested, if you get 4 profiles and phonecalls a day, this won’t work in your favour.

Don’t get me wrong, there are smaller companies that truly pay attention, and only pass on things they think you might be interested in, based on the first interview you had with them… but the bigones, they are just into it for the money. They just want to place as many people as they can to earn their fees, and care nothing for the fact whether this would be a good fit or not.

Well.. another personal ranting.. but this really pissed me off today!!

Well, what i learned: that staying where you are is maybe the best option… i like what i do (most of the times), the people are nice.. and there is still a lot to learn

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