Another Recruiter Sullying Our Good Name

I think Sandra posted a blog a few days ago about an embarrassing email (obviously automated) looking for a lower level candidate sent to a C-level candidate/friend of hers. So naturally a few days later, I got a similar email.

I am 24 years old, 2 years out of college and still in my first job (as a recruiter, which I love). I in no way shape or form even remotely qualify for this position, not to mention I don't have any of the certification requirements. My experience is essentially as a bartender and an intern in college and 1 year as a recruiter.

I am debating sending a response telling her how lazy she must be to not even have read my resume to see if I qualify, but I thought it would be interesting to hear everyone's thoughts on how I should word this (unless you think I should just hit delete and ignore the email altogether). Here is the email:

Megan Flynn

Hello!

HIM Manager / Director Bring your Him or coding experience to one of the leading hospitals in Pennsylvania. Looking for a top HIM/ Coding professional with supervisory experience for the Perm Position. This position will lead to a director level position for the “right person”. This is a great opportunity to work with one of the more innovative hospitals in the country. You will help plan and coordinate all services provided by the Health Information Department. Responsible for supervising and maintaining the Medical Records department including helping with goal setting, planning, policy and procedure development, quality assurance and improvement, and supervision and competency of staff.

Experience: Two years in coding or Health Information Management hospital setting with supervisory / administrative experience required.

Certification: American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) Registered Health Information Administrator (RHIA) OR Registered Health Information Technician (RHIT) Prefer ICD-10 Certification as well

If you are interested in the HIM Manager / Director position, please send your updated resume along with salary history to kathyw@thorgroup.com. Thank You.

Comment by Amy Ala Miller on February 21, 2012 at 12:53pm: The Nigerian Princess of Recruiting... lol Sandra you are oh so right. I know those who wish to be more diplomatic have their hearts in the right place but it is wasted effort. Frankly I don't have that much "nice" in me to go around so the Nigerian Princesses of the recruitosphere won't be getting any kind words from me. Also, I'm glad we have a place like RBC where we can post these kinds of vents and recognize that the Sandras of the world are out there, totally understanding where we're coming from and that we're not alone in a room of idiots screaming without being heard. :)

Comment by Trish Ferrett on February 21, 2012 at 1:04pm: @Sandra, no... I most certainly am NOT that type of person. Interesting that now I'm getting berated for making the suggestion that you actually be nice to a fellow recruiter--but since you asked--I don't give telemarketers my best friend's number... nor would I give them yours. That being said, I don't berate them for calling me during dinner either, because they're simply doing their job. My point is... you've got to remember the human in all of this. We are in a human business, and humans make mistakes... particularly when trusting technology to create efficiencies. However, humans can also be quick to correct them if you'll do the kindness of pointing out the error instead of making their mistake public. Unless you've never sent an email by mistake, or made some sort of bumble in your career, consider how you'd feel if your folly was judged so harshly.

@Elise @Terra--glad to see you representing kindness, understanding and humanity in our ranks!

Comment by Megan Flynn on February 21, 2012 at 1:31pm: I completely agree with you on the "thinking of the human" factor here -- only in this case, I'm pretty sure there is no human attached to this email address. As Sandra said, it is just a spam bot. I have received emails before that actually spoke to my experience and offered me a position that I might possibly be interested in; and by all means I take the time to respond to each and every recruiter thanking them for their interest and giving a referral if I can. It is pretty obvious in this case, however, that there isn't a real recruiter attached to this email.

The lesson that I learned from these types of emails: If I am emailing rather than calling a candidate, I make absolutely, 100% sure that I make that email personal and I speak DIRECTLY to their experience listed on THEIR resume and explain why they would be a good fit for whatever position it is I am contacting them about. That way, I will never end up on a recruiting website as a topic of a heated (ok, lukewarm) debate. :)

Comment by Trish Ferrett on February 21, 2012 at 1:36pm: Oh... so Kathy Williams, Sourcing Manager at the Thor Group, couldn't possibly be real? Might want to check Linked In...

Comment by Kyle Schafroth on February 21, 2012 at 1:56pm: Real person or robot the point is that this is a poorly targeted email/solicitation to apply.

In Megan's original post she merely indicates that she is pondering how to reply given that it's clear Kathy took no time to review her actual qualifications before firing this one off. Were this a position that might match Megan's interests/background (which it sounds like it's far from) I would be all for sending a polite albeit generic response thanking the person for taking the time to review my credentials and considering me but I was happy with my current situation.

This is not the case. I'm not advocating we all head to Thor Group with torches and pitchforks but the intent of the post and people's comments I feel is to highlight the fact that we have a recruiter who is building up the negative stigma associated with this profession...junk emailing about jobs the 'candidate' is neither qualified for or likely interested in.

Being as Kathy seems to be a real person the point is that she needs to target her emails so that she doesn't end up in the highlight reel on a blog somewhere and instead gets viable candidate interest.

Comment by Amy Ala Miller on February 21, 2012 at 2:03pm: Took Trish's advice and looked on LinkedIn. Kathy looks real enough, 2nd degree connection to me. However, Sandra and I both know of a recruiter who claims 23 different profiles. All those "people" are connected to someone as well. So is Kathy real? Not sure. Furthermore, there's the possibility that Thor Group has outsourced this function and they're just listing Kathy's email as the contact. Doesn't mean that Kathy actually wrote the email or knows where the email is going. I agree with Kyle that we're certainly not headed to Thor Group with pitchforks but it's still an important discussion. If nothing else, maybe recruiters and firms will think carefully before hiring sourcers...?

Comment by Amy Ala Miller on February 21, 2012 at 2:14pm: ...and I don't mean there's anything wrong with SOURCERS. I'm just saying that regardless of who Kathy is as person, real/not real, we all now have a perception of Thor Group and how they operate. We also have a perception of who Kathy Williams may be - harried recruiter who made simple mistake at best (I'm not buying that one) or Nigerian Princess of recruiting spambot (thanks Sandra for that lol). I'm sure the real Kathy Williams is a perfectly lovely individual and Thor Group might be an awesome company - unfortunately this form of "marketing" (I can't bring myself to call it recruiting) has sullied both their names IMO.

Comment by Kyle Schafroth on February 21, 2012 at 2:20pm: @Amy Completely agreed - given all the articles we circulate for candidates about perception and first impressions we've hit the "D'oh" moment here.

Not specifically Kathy or Thor Group, but those who purposefully engage in marketing (thanks Amy for that thought) of this type have earned a ticket to dumbassisland.com (thank you Sandra for that) to live amongst one another.

Let's just close the book on this one in saying that we're going to all learn from it rather than repeat.

Comment by Sandra McCartt on February 21, 2012 at 5:09pm: There are many recruiters with as many as 50 different phony profiles on Linkedin. I feel like i may be visiting dumbassisland. Do we think that because someone sets up a linkedin profile they are a real person. Please if you believe that do not every try online dating. Don't buy something from somebody on Craig's List who wants you to come pick it up. In the next five minutes any of us could set up all kinds of profiles all over the place. Recruiters are prostituting themselves like a bunch of cheap camp followers by the thousands.

I am not berating you guys for wanting to believe that everything you see on the internet has a lovely person connected to it. I thought Rebecca of Sunny Brook Farm was a doll and i love her basket of daiseys.

As Kyle so well stated, we hold ourselves out there as the authority, telling candidates not to spam companies with their resumes, not to do mass mailings of their resumes flung like dung against a wall. then we have a debate about writing nicey nice notes to a dung flunging spammer cause her really did flung dung. Or the question may be how much dung did a dung flunger, flung if a dung flunger did flung dung. An incredible amount and this one got some dung flung back at her for dung flunging. No sweet girls i am not going to write nicey nice notes to a dung flunger, the nigerian princess of recruiting or anybody else who fills cyberspace with bulk emails. Every candidate i have who is above the level of high school is getting this crap from lots of somebodys who have a computer, a linkedin profile and a twitter account.We used to say that anybody with a desk and telephone could call themselves a recruiter, now it doesn't even take a desk or a telephone. Just internet access and they can be anybody they want to be.

If Kathy at Thor group is a real person, she done flung dung and it splashed back on her. Maybe she learned something if she is real. If she is a phony profile maybe Thor will raise their magic hammer and quit spamming every email address on the internet.

Let's practice what we preach to our candidates, what we preach to other recruiters about driving clients crazy with unsolicited phone calls and emails about that perfect candidate who doesn't fit anything they ever wanted or needed or asked for ever. Let's not say it's just an itty bitty mistake when a recruiter spams the populace at large. It's shoddy business practice, it irritates the living hell out of most people who get the spam just like it did Megan.

The reason there are "no call lists " to block numbers for telemarketers is because of the abuse and intrusion of unwanted irritating calls. Maybe a few more Kathys and people will start blocking all emails that have the word recruiter in it. Trust me we are fast approaching a situation where this is going to be addressed, along with phony profiles on Facebook , LInkedin and every social network where recruiters are blasting the multitudes.

Ticket to DumbAssIsland has been punched. All ashore who are going ashore. Dont think i will take that cruise.

The First rule of sales is don't irritate the customer.

Comment by Sandra McCartt on February 21, 2012 at 5:26pm: And for the record, No, i have never sent the wrong email to the wrong person any more than i have called an accountant and tried to recruit him for a job as a pathologist. I don't do mass emails or roll up email lists because even those insult the intelligence of the people who get them. An email should be a personal correspondence in my book. I take the time to write each one of them just like i was going to sign my name to it, put it in an envelope and mail it snail mail. Let's talk about human. If we want to be human, let's try to address each person like one human person and not turn them into cannon fodder to target with crap spam marketing. If you are too lazy to make each contact a "human" contact then go get a job as a telemarketer so you can pretend that driving people crazy is in fact just your job..gag. Get out of recruiting, it's a people business. People are individuals and should be treated like individuals. If you are oh so busy that you can't do that you are overemployed and need a career change.

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