Making Placements Through Bounty Jobs While On The Clock-Is It A Crime?

Is it considered Grand Theft? Grounds for Termination? Grounds for Hanging?

A very good friend of mine uncovered a long-term employee stealing time, resources and candidates from her. The recruiter stopped producing any real numbers a few months back, and the company got suspicious, so they tracked her web activity. Much to their dismay this employee was working on several other jobs through several other independents as well as working through bounty jobs to make some extra money.

My feeling is...if she is NOT on a non-compete and it's after hours, and off site she can do what ever she wants. However on the company site, on their Internet, with their candidate database, well that is stealing. Kick her to the curb FAST.

What are your thoughts?

Is my friend being too harsh, and I being harsh?

If the company were generating orders would this have happened?

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Maureen Sharib on May 19, 2009 at 6:15am

Long term employee? Hmmm...Interesting.
It's a conflict of interest, to be sure but I have no way of knowing what the employment agreement calls for (or doesn't call for).
The bottom line is that if you don't kick her to the curb you imperil your workplace.
The others are watching to see what you do.
Heck, we're watching to see what happens.

"stopped producing...real numbers..." Let it be a warning sign in the future. Interesting that it happened in a downturn. What lesson is there in that?

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Permalink Reply by Steve Levy on May 19, 2009 at 7:55am

Even given the "what if" questions, why is this situation worthy of a blog post?

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Permalink Reply by Jerry Albright on May 19, 2009 at 8:07am

Is this a serious question? A recruiter has stopped making placements during the day for her employer and IS making placements at night through splits and bountyjobs?

This person is worth nothing more than an immediate firing in front of the entire team.

How is there any doubt about this? Really.

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Permalink Reply by Jerry Albright on May 19, 2009 at 9:06am

I'd like to add - I wouldn't be so sure this is a crime. If we all have to look at our specific written agreement to determine what is right or wrong this world is heading down the tubes.

Legal contract or not - this person has no honor. They need to be fired. (I'm assuming they have been already but would like to know for sure......)

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Permalink Reply by Margaret Graziano on May 19, 2009 at 8:19pm

Huge lesson Maureen, this $30,000,000 company is now implementing structures that should have been implemented years ago. That's good news for me. The bad news is, the people who are not up for generating results will now have a little demon on their shoulder, and will be scrutinized much more than they are used to; which ultimately is a good thing.

Maureen Sharib said:

Long term employee? Hmmm...Interesting.
It's a conflict of interest, to be sure but I have no way of knowing what the employment agreement calls for (or doesn't call for).
The bottom line is that if you don't kick her to the curb you imperil your workplace.
The others are watching to see what you do.
Heck, we're watching to see what happens.

"stopped producing...real numbers..." Let it be a warning sign in the future. Interesting that it happened in a downturn. What lesson is there in that?

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Permalink Reply by Margaret Graziano on May 19, 2009 at 8:23pm

Jerry, they canned her and pressed charges for grand theft. It seems as if she closed a 16k deal on their time, with their candidate and had them pay pal her debit card. OUCH !!! Not sure if the charge will hold up in court, and it is a great lesson for anyone 'toying' with moonlighting on company time.

The reality is this is 2009 and people will do what people do and if you are building a business over and above your desk, it is important to be cognizant of inherit risks brought about by the multitude of freedoms the role provides. All the more reasons to conduct really great behavior and values based interviews.

Jerry Albright said:

I'd like to add - I wouldn't be so sure this is a crime. If we all have to look at our specific written agreement to determine what is right or wrong this world is heading down the tubes.

Legal contract or not - this person has no honor. They need to be fired. (I'm assuming they have been already but would like to know for sure......)

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Permalink Reply by Margaret Graziano on May 19, 2009 at 8:25pm

LOL - yeah and hang her too ! She wont be working in California for anyone part of the CSP that's for sure. The conference is coming up and this will be the talk of the owners cocktail hour.

Sandra McCartt said:

Strip her of her CPC and throw her off the island. Are you kidding me, of course it's a crime and a conflict of interest.

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Permalink Reply by Margaret Graziano on May 19, 2009 at 8:27pm

hmmmm Steve, you must not have a large crew working for you. I hear stories like this more than I'd care to, and in most cases even the most astute business owner is caught with their proverbial 'pants down'. Maybe in certain cases, with remote offices, or at home workers, companies need to put in systems to prevent things like this from tainting their generosity. Typically when something like this happens the whole crew suffers. The owners gets freaked out and then...watch out.

Steve Levy said:

Even given the "what if" questions, why is this situation worthy of a blog post?

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Permalink Reply by Steve Levy on May 20, 2009 at 5:50am

Sorry Maggie but this really is a "duh?" post along the lines of moronic recruiters who fail to ask if the executive has a non-compete and equally moronic companies who fail to investigate the same (this specific situation is used by the irrational anti-rusing crowd to claim that recruiters will do anything to close an opening or earn a fee) - stupid is stupid.

Again, was your point to post a PSA? Why didn't you simply post all the facts up front? Perhaps a news link? Even a half brained company attorney and a half brained local prosecutor can combine their half brain forces into a full brain legal charge; did the charges stick?

Just tell the entire story next time.

Margaret Graziano said:

hmmmm Steve, you must not have a large crew working for you. I hear stories like this more than I'd care to, and in most cases even the most astute business owner is caught with their proverbial 'pants down'. Maybe in certain cases, with remote offices, or at home workers, companies need to put in systems to prevent things like this from tainting their generosity. Typically when something like this happens the whole crew suffers. The owners gets freaked out and then...watch out.

Steve Levy said:
Even given the "what if" questions, why is this situation worthy of a blog post?

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Permalink Reply by Peter Ceccarelli on May 20, 2009 at 5:15pm

It appears that they were essentially stealing. Candidates in this case for their own financial benefit. This is a person who obviously has zero ethics. Fired. End of story.

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Permalink Reply by Margaret Graziano on May 20, 2009 at 10:54pm

Latest update, I guess the company filed a grievance with Bounty Jobs, I am not sure anything will come of it -- my hunch is this is happening more than any of the staffing and recruiting business owners are aware of. BJ -- ha ha - even has a process for filing these complaints, which means......

Peter Ceccarelli said:

It appears that they were essentially stealing. Candidates in this case for their own financial benefit. This is a person who obviously has zero ethics. Fired. End of story.

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Permalink Reply by Jerry Albright on May 21, 2009 at 8:12am

As far as I can tell - Bountyjobs is such a joke I find it nearly impossible to picture anyone actually getting something done - let alone after hours. I've heard many MANY stories of recruiters spending weeks and months of their prime business hours and getting absolutely nowhere.

I would venture to say the "client" was most likely aware that something shady was going on. Then again many/most of BJ's clients are signed up to screw the agencies anyways....so finding a client who didn't mind working on the dark side was probably quite easy.