We’ve got a new color scheme (check the link at the top of the page) and some awesome new functional features. An interactive job board with sendable features and faster resume upload will make job searching and applying incredibly easy. Our blog will be more beautifully crafted, our images more striking. To boot, we have some new testimonials, recruiter bios and downloadable tips on how to interview.

Basically, after 25 years, we’re all grown up.

You want a new job. You need to jumpstart the monotony of perusing Reddit for hours on end. The routine of waking up puffy-eyed at 1:20 in the afternoon with no place to go until your buddies get off work is getting old. Your unchallenging job is boring you to tears. So like the springtime, you’re ready for a change.  And that change could come April 25th, when 450+ NYC tech startups convene in the same place for an entire day.

It’s free to attend the “biggest science fair for start ups” known as New York Tech Day.  It’s only in its second inaugural year but the attendance and sponsorship for such a massive event is awash with so much media coverage it’ll make your head spin. You’d be wise to make some attempt to go. Like taxes and Groundhog Day, this event only happens once a year.

Oh, and we’ll be there. With some pretty sweet tech jobs. Drop by our booth, say hello and pick up a couple of freebies (like a super fun aero-prop copter) and soak up all the brainstorming and career advice you could want from a group of pros. You might also want to find out if your favorite start up is attending and track them the day of the show on Twitter or Facebook.

Check out the NY Tech Day site and sign up (again, for free) here. 

By Managing Partner, Michael Reiss

With high unemployment and the plethora of industry job boards, why turn to an outside recruiting company and pay fees for people that are waiting to work at recession prices?

#6: Candidates that use recruiters are more serious about their career

Candidates that employ the services of a recruiter want professional representation for many reasons. Here are a few:

• They are currently employed and do not want to use company time to search for a new position.
• The service does not cost them anything and they know the recruiter will advise them on their resume and can market them to opportunities that are not publicly available.
• As a candidate gets to know a recruiter over their career and builds a solid relationship, they come to rely on their recruiter for up to date career advice, helping them pick and choose opportunities that allow them to advance their career.

Wouldn’t you want to hire the kind of person who cares about the decisions they make?

#7: If you use a recruiting firm, you are off limits as a source (what does this mean?)

That is correct. If your company is using a recruitment firm that cares about future relationships, they will not poach candidates from you while they have you as a client. The force field is turned on.

#8: You pay only if you hire

Even if you end up not hiring through a recruiter, you will get to see relevant people and get a better understanding of who’s out there and what people are making based on the level of experience you seek.  Since you have done your homework, the intelligence you’ve gathered will help you know who you really need, the compensation that is right for the role and when you are ready to make an offer, get the person you want.  If you do hire a person through a recruiter, the fee you pay now won’t even be a blip on your screen compared to the time you saved looking and meeting your project deadlines.  Also, the next time you need a person, you’re building a relationship, and the search could even take less time and easier.

By Managing Partner, Michael Reiss

With high unemployment and the plethora of industry job boards, why turn to an outside recruiting company and pay fees for people that are waiting to work at recession prices?

#4: Candidates are uncomfortable discussing reasons for looking

Recruiters can ask questions of potential candidates that may be tough for a company to ask directly.  Candidates tend to be more open with their recruiter since they feel the job is not on the line. Also, candidates may choose not to be totally upfront with a company not because they do not want to be truthful, but they do not know if it is proper to let a prospective company know about some of their desires or their other interviewing activities. For example, if they are interviewing elsewhere and they already have an offer that they need to decide on by end of day.  Or, they are not sure they can ask directly for an increase in salary without risking the opportunity or asking for a flexible schedule so they can drop their child off at daycare.  We make sure the candidates we represent understand that it benefits them to share their situation with us so we can advise them and take care of communicating their situation without jeapordizing their candidacy.  We uncover the real reasons that actually led to their job search and work closely with the candidate to figure out what is most important to their career and the kind of offer they would most likely feel comfortable and excited to accept. Bottom line: we spend the time to understand and make sure candidates and our clients are a good match. On the flip side we also handle passing along the feedback to a candidate if the company does not wish to proceed with them.

#5: Structuring a proper offer

Many offers between candidates and prospective companies fall apart as a result of poor offer presentation. We advise companies on how to structure an offer that is in line with the market and the candidate’s level of experience so that it won’t be too much but also not too little so that the candidate turns down the offer. Most times, you get one chance to deliver an offer. If it is not accepted and you suddenly follow-up with more money, it looks like you were trying to get them at a discount. No one likes to feel they’re being played. People are less inclined to accept an offer, even if it seems like a perfect job, if they feel that “money was left on the table” or their pride get in the way of accepting. In many cases,  despite knowing they were not given a fair offer, some will still accept the job since their financial situation dictates they cannot turn it down. Don’t you think that they will still be look for a new job and will accept the next better offer that comes their way?  So if you just hired someone and you paid under market, don’t be so surprised if you need to refill the position again soon.

By Managing Partner, Michael Reiss

With high unemployment and the plethora of industry job boards, why turn to an outside recruiting company and pay fees for people that are waiting to work at recession prices?

Glad you asked. This is a question many firms, big and small, consider when they need to hire.  This is not the case right now in the NYC tech scene where top programmers are in high demand.  Placing ads on job boards or on a firm’s web site is not the best way to actively recruit the best software engineers, when the best ones working in Ruby, Python or Java are in short supply and have their choice of projects.

For part-time jobs, entry-level trainee and administrative assistant roles, a firm can make successful use of Craigslist or other job boards and come away with good choices. But the choice to use an outside recruiter should be determined by the experience level and availability of the particular skill set of the person sought, and the speed in which you need to get someone on board.  When you need a permanent person with a very specific skill set and more than two years of experience in a particular industry, you would probably benefit by employing a recruitment firm.

Many firms decide to hire recruiters on staff or have their human resource departments add recruiting to their daily duties, feeling that it’s the better, more economical way to go. In most cases, human resources have other jobs besides looking for new hires, which dilutes the amount of time they have to spend recruiting candidates.

We’ll be showcasing this series in 3 parts, to ensure that you’ll be getting the best use of all our tried and true advice from the recruiting trenches.

#1: Recruiters have the inside scoop

These days, everyone is outsourcing to specialists.  This holds true with recruiting as well. Think about it-when you hire a plumber or an electrician, you do so because this is what they do every day and are accustomed to solving problems, as it is their expertise. They spent years learning how to get the job done right the first time, usually. Given the right training you could do it, but you will probably end up making a mistake that could result in a bigger leak or a fire, and even more time wasted and greater expenditure.

In most companies, especially the smaller startups, HR has responsibility to hire candidates for all departments, from technology to marketing to administrative. HR departments are spread too thin to recruit the candidates they need and most times cannot reach the best candidates they need to speak with during the work day.  In order to make sure their competitors do not roll right over them, it is important for tech hungry firms to move quickly and hire the software engineers they need to get their product or service deployed.

#2: Candidates represented by a recruiter are screened

Since the recruiter is looking to make a match and satisfy their client, they will refer only those candidates they feel have the best chance of being hired. This saves you the time of filtering though job boards and getting resumes that are not even close to what you are looking for, not to mention the hoards of spam that will hook on to your email address through the next millennium.

#3: Recruiters have access to passive candidates

Many candidates represented by recruiters are passive; meaning, they are not actively seeking a job. Recruiters go after these folks and recruit them for your specific role. With a passive candidate you are getting someone who was not in the market due to layoff or other extenuating circumstances but are taking your job for all the right reasons. The results? Higher candidate stickiness and less turnover.

Stay tuned for part two where we tackle the big topic: why are people more likely to discuss with a recruiter what they really want in their next position.

Soon, you won't have time to do this.

An outsider’s perspective of how recruiters hustle 9+ hours a day to get other people jobs. 

My job as Landover’s social media strategist is not to recruit. But being here certainly entails me to a ringside seat in watching a tight-knit team of recruiting pros manage hundreds of clients and candidates. Much of what I don’t see continues after office hours, as they still check email and follow up with candidates after they leave for the day. But what has recently amazed me is the swiftness with which they can land people jobs from start to finish. (I have a sneaking suspicion that I’m biased to us, but I’m also objectively inclined to believe that it’s actually not like this everywhere).

Case in point: A month ago, a job from a brand new client opened up before the holidays. Our recruiters were tasked to find top programming talent to fill the role. One meeting with the CEO, many strategic phone calls and several resumes later, our recruiters managed to schedule in-person interviews in…wait for it, 7 days of the job going live.

Get ready for the real kicker: after a mere two weeks of interviews with solid candidates, the client started to make offers. In this competitive economy, this is nothing short of miraculous.

If you’re a talented software developer, quant analyst or just overall tech pro with a talent for the taking, you’d almost be crazy not to use a professional recruiter. Job boards? Might as well call it application abyss.

If there’s any impartial advice I could ever give to someone who has reservations about this free (!) resource or to someone even tip-toeing around finding a new job, it would be to use one. While you may do fine on your own, you’ll definitely lose out more when you go about the technical job search all by your lonesome.

Did you know…

By Managing Partner, Michael Reiss

A new year is upon us, after navigating a tough year having to deal with the onslaught of Sandy, a pivotal Presidential election, the fiscal cliff and the end of the world. We are still cleaning up from Sandy and the economic effects it brought to families and businesses, while some of the major features of the fiscal cliff have not been dealt with, only pushed forward a few months for more political wrangling. But the world did not end. That in itself should give us hope. Which brings us to our industry insights for lucky number ’13.

So far, hiring is picking up, but with the utmost restraint. Each hire is being scrutinized with additional approvals and assurances to justify the need and their potential long-term value.  This puts the pressure on candidates now more than ever to research exhaustively each firm and prepare for every interview to make sure all cylinders are firing.

However, as in the past, we expect to see a spike of hiring around this time of year as new funds are released to kick off companies’ new year projects.  As the first quarter unfolds we are hopeful more firms will open up the hiring spigot as projects get approved.  In fact, we’ve already received the green light from the big banks to hire stellar programming talent.  In the tech arena, startups and more established software development and services firms continue to search for the top Python, Java and Ruby folks.

In 2013, we’ll see more firms spending their tech budgets on building up their mobile offerings. The dependence on tablets and mobile phones mean that the everyday consumer and businesses need more development to meet this need. Tech firms are responding by updating their web sites, development tools and products to make their offerings easier to use by people on the go who rely on new gizmos for purchasing stuff, retrieving information and providing services. The competitive area of e-commerce is making developing mobile apps for these firms critical to their survival. They’re prioritizing the user experience to make it easy for their customers to access their product or service anytime and anywhere the urge to buy hits them.

Similar to this time last year, we are hopeful that the economic climate that has held hiring in check for the past four years will brighten and we’ll have the extreme pleasure (as always) to place many of you techy folks with our clients.  Stay tuned.

Make your resume stand out from the rest.

By Managing Partner, Michael Reiss

When you respond to a job ad, how do you maximize your impact and chances with the prospective employer?

Whether you are sending a resume, calling them on the phone or visiting their office for an interview, consider how your response will be perceived.  If it were me, I would always try calling first.

If you’ve tried calling the hiring manager a number of times and haven’t received a call back, it is probably time to switch gears before you get accused of stalking, or just being plain annoying. By the way, do not leave more than one or two messages with people who are answering the hiring manager’s phone.

When you send your resume, you are trying to distinguish yourself to the employer and make your application stand out from others who are also responding to the ad. Chances are you will not have all of the skills and experience listed in the job description. If you did, you might as well forget about the job and play the lottery since the chances of anyone actually matching the exact job description would be just as lucky.

For the rest of us, here are four tips to perfecting your resume:

• Resumes should be sent as a PDF. And as text in the body copy. It should have a summary or objective that makes it clear at the outset why you are responding to this particular job.
• Write a cover email. Make sure it’s addressed to the appropriate manager. State in two paragraphs (at the most) why you feel you’re right for the position and why you want to work for them, noting an aspect of the company’s product line or service that appeals to you.
• Give an example of when you learned quickly. Discuss a past project where you were given the opportunity to do something you never did before and the success that resulted. Let them know up front what skills or experience listed in the ad you do not have, but why you still feel you are a good candidate. This approach shows the employer that you have the courage to risk not being considered at the expense of your integrity.
• Thank them for the opportunity. Give them specifics of when you can meet in person over the next two weeks.  Let them know you understand they’re busy so that if you do not hear from them after a week, you will follow up with them. This approach shows that you recognize they are busy (which everyone likes to be reminded of) and that you understand professional follow-up etiquette. What’s more, it represents you as an organized and a determined person.

Who wouldn’t want to hire a person with these traits?

Don't Make This Mistake

If you want to maximize your impact and chances with a prospective employer, you must consider your audience. Whether you are sending a resume, a follow up letter, giving them a call or visiting their office for an interview, you must consider the reaction of the hiring manager to your response. By the way, I would call first.

Actually, that’s not the job I advertised…

As an employer, I advertise now and then to augment my staff. Most recently, I advertised for a Tech Recruiter with 1-3 years of experience working for an employment agency. Most of the responses I received were not even close to someone who I asked for. Instead, I received resumes from people who decided (apparently, on their own) that I am not looking for a Tech Recruiter after all.  Instead, they changed the title of my opening to one that would better fit their experience like a Human Resource Assistant. Do I need a Human Resource Assistant? Should I change my opening since they are telling me that I need a Human Resource Assistant? No, not a chance.

So how does that make me feel about this candidate sending me their resume saying they are interested in applying for a job that doesn’t exist?  Not good, since they wasted my time–and their own.  If you were hiring a plumber and someone called responding to your job for an electrician, what would you do?

Don’t let your email get trashed!

There is a better way to send a resume for a job in which you do not have the requisite experience but would still like to be considered.

A better response to my ad would be acknowledging right off the bat that they do not have actual experience as a Tech Recruiter, but feel that they have relevant skills and accomplishments, that would make them a good Tech Recruiter. They should ask to meet or speak with me.  This approach would probably end with at least a phone call with me, giving them the opportunity to find out more about a career as a Tech Recruiter in my firm.

In the end, a connection would have been made instead of another email in the trash and a lost opportunity. So make sure when you respond you make reference to the actual position title advertised and not one you wished it was.

Flooding in NYC

By Managing Partner, Michael Reiss

Since last Tuesday we all went through some tough times that have tested our resilience and who we are as people. The loss of life, property and business from the devastating effects of Sandy are still being felt. There is also the incomparable yet unfortunate loss of some much needed uplifting annual events, like the Halloween Parade and the NYC Marathon added to a week that we will never forget.

At the same time we are all going to the polls to figure out who will be leading this country for the next four years. With the polls showing the race a dead heat and the loss of power still to homes, the lack of gas for cars, the need for generators to run the voting machines, I think we are in for a tough election day. Let’s look out for one another through these rough days and hope that the people in charge of running the electoral process are not overzealous and push our nation into disarray with ugly legal maneuvering.

I would have hoped that with all our advances in technology we would have come up with a better way to vote by now, so that those who are home bound or away would have been able to vote without much effort.  Here’s to all the great software engineers, hoping they will create a better way to elect our legislators next time around.

Best to all, stay safe today and please do your best to get out there and vote because it will matter.