recruiter wants me to lie about my experience

by Alison Green on October 1, 2013

A reader writes:

Lately I’ve been troubled by a recruiter who appears to be encouraging me to lie about my qualifications to the companies he wants to submit me to. The first time, I lacked many of the qualifications listed in the job description and told the recruiter that I didn’t think that position was suitable for my level of experience, but he insisted that I had those qualifications because he looked at my resume (which didn’t say anything at all about those qualifications), and encouraged me to just say I had experience with those technologies and then look them up on the Internet before the interview. He also pressured me with repeated calls, asking me to give him permission to forward my resume to the job without even telling me anything about the job other than the list of qualifications required.

I strongly insisted that I didn’t think I was right for the position, and eventually he got the message and backed off…or so I thought. Now he’s contacting me again with jobs requiring experience in a half-dozen things I’ve never done before, claiming that my resume says I’m competent to do the job and that it doesn’t really matter if I lack the experience as long as I can claim I have it. Once again, he’s told me nothing about the jobs except for the list of required qualifications. Naturally, I’m planning to push back strongly against him, but should I be reporting him to the company he works for as well? Is there anyone else I should be reporting this to as well, maybe some kind of blacklist for bad recruiters? I feel bad for the companies that are dealing with him, being force-fed young ineperienced recruits who are being pushed to deceive the interviewers about their experience.

Wow. He wants you to say you have experience with specific technologies and just look them up on the Internet before your interview?? And it doesn’t matter that you don’t have experience as long as you’re willing to claim that you have it?

Obviously, do not work with this recruiter. The next time he contacts you, say something like this: “I’m not comfortable misrepresenting my experience, and I’m uncomfortable that you’re suggesting I should. I don’t think we’d work well together, so please take me off your contact list.”

If you’d like to get more expansive than that, feel free to add, “I don’t think the companies you’re recruiting for would appreciate what you’re saying to me.”

But as for reporting him to the company he’s recruiting for … you certainly could look up the hiring manager on LinkedIn or the company website and send them a short, professional note letting them know how this guy is operating. But I’m hesitant to advise you to do that — because as much as I would want to know about this if I were in their shoes, you risk it impacting the way they see you (because you might just come across as disgruntled).

But you can take solace in the fact that this guy isn’t likely to keep companies happy with his services for long. If he’s sending them unqualified candidates, any company with a halfway decent hiring process is going to pick up on that very quickly, and it’ll come back to bite him in the ass … with a lack of hires (which means no commissions for him) and eventually a terrible reputation and little to no business.

You’re right that there should be a site like Glass Door for recruiters though … and if there were, I bet it would be filled with stories in about 48 hours.

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{ 55 comments }

{ 55 comments… read them below }

  1. Christina*

    Many recruiters play the numbers game – that is, the more resumes they submit (well qualified or not), the greater chance they have landing someone quickly.

    I have recruiters call me all the asking me if I’m interested in jobs I’m not even qualified for. I’ve taken to removing resume files from job boards to prevent recruiters submitting my resume without my knowledge.

    When recruiters call, I tell them in no uncertain terms to stop calling and to take me off their contact list. Being blunt is the best recourse here.

  2. Mena*

    Run – you’ll only look bad for being in any way associated with him.

    This reminds me of when my husband and I bought our first house. While getting qualified for lending, the broker told us to ‘fudge’ our numbers. Huh? Yes, he said to white out the previous year’s tax return and change the numbers, then submit to the bank for approval. He rationalized that since my husband was self-employed he surely lied to begin with so there was no risk for us to change the numbers and take on a bigger mortgage than the lender would otherwise deem us qualified. Yeah, we dropped him pretty quick.

  3. voluptuousfire*

    OP, I’d check out Yelp to see if this recruiter’s company has any reviews mentioning him in particular. Definitely post about your experience there.

    Otherwise, just tell the guy to piss off (like Alison did in a much nicer, more professional way). If anything, if you actually did what this recruiter asked and lied on your resume, your own professional credibility comes under fire.

  4. MiketheRecruiter*

    Always good to see my fellow recruiting breathen doing shady things.

    This is par for the course in the industry, unfortunately. I promise you not all recruiters are like this, and there are enough of us out there that you should very directly tell him “please do not contact me again. Any additional contact will result in me reporting you to the national do not call list.”

    My guess is this is either one of the shady, jaded 15+ years experienced recruiters or a new recruiter at a big firm who is being pressured by the higher ups to hit his/her goals/quotas and he/she is in panic mode as there is no way in their mind to hit the rather ludicrous numbers.

  5. Arbynka*

    Well, I google foreign political affairs quite often so I find idea I can be granted a post of ambassador based on that very cool. Anything open in Australia, New Zealand perhaps ?

    But seriously, what a bad idea.

  6. Lily in NYC*

    I had a recruiter who changed my resume without telling me and sent it to a company to set up an interview. I brought copies of my resume with me and gave them to the interviewers and one noticed right away that it was very different than mine. The recruiter took out the fact that I got promoted twice from an administrative position because he thought it would make it look like I am not a career executive assistant. I guess they complained to him later because he called me and screamed at me for giving them my resume on my own. It also caused me to wonder if I should take out the promotions on my resume – but our very own Alison told me that would be crazy (best $99 I ever spent was to have Alison look over my resume for me).

  7. tesyaa*

    What is fudging and what is fudging? I was out of the workforce for 9 years. The employment application asked what my proficiency was in Excel. I had never used Excel, only Lotus 123 (dating myself). I lied and said my proficiency in Excel was 7 out of 10. Since they also asked about proficiency in Lotus 123, I don’t think they intended Excel to mean “any spreadsheet program”.

    Got the job, used Excel a little bit at home before starting the job (and when I say “a little bit”, I mean 10 minutes). Within 3 weeks I was up to speed using Excel, even advanced functions etc.

    Was it wrong to lie? Or was it not lying because I knew that I’d have no trouble becoming proficient? You tell me.

    1. MiketheRecruiter*

      That’s a pretty big difference then what a lot of recruiters will ask candidate to change – mid to senior level technical roles (ie, software engineers, tech leads) need to have candidates who understand in depth functionality of technologies – if they don’t understand best practices, how certain features can screw things up, etc., they can severely damage a companies product by pushing terrible code, and it could take a week or two to undo the jam – and in certain industries that can result in a catastrophic loss in revenue.

      Sure, sometimes you can transfer skills from one to the next, and obviously going from one spreadsheet tool to another isn’t too hard – but going from say, .NET development to Java development to SQL database management/development can be very tricky, and that person won’t have time to “get up to speed.”

      1. meh*

        I’m not sure you really have an in-depth understanding of the technologies that you claim. For anyone who’s even a remotely qualified to be a technical lead, Java and .NET should be roughly equivalent to Excel v. Lotus 1-2-3.

        Sure, there are library differences, and some runtime differences, but the paradigms are largely equivalent (object-oriented, managed runtime environments). If a technical lead can’t transition between the two in a matter of weeks, you have deeper problems.

        SQL is a very different way of thinking, and it’s harder to bridge that gap. But it’s also the difference between someone who’s done no database development and someone who has. This should be glaringly obvious to any technical interviewer.

        1. MiketheRecruiter*

          I’m not saying I have in depth technical knowledge of programming – sure, going from one object oriented language to another might be doable, but I think you overestimate how different the nuances are and the type of impact they have (and if you are a tech lead who has done it, kudos to you – there are definitely people who can do it). I only say this from watching tons of consultants/experts claiming “it’s no problem!” and then bombing on either the technical interview or when they are starting the job (because the client didn’t tech them out thoroughly enough).

          We screen tons of tech people here a day and the amount of developers who claim to have expertise in OOP languages and then struggle to write arrays of objects is rather staggering – including engineers who worked for years at major software development companies in lead/senior roles.

          It’s not getting up to the “7” in a skill thats the hard part – it’s the true 9’s and 10’s that are rare. I can do plenty in excel, and then I see some advanced excel spreadsheets that blow me out of the water – and I’m sure doing those in excel compared to lotus is vastly different. It helps if there is a universal rating scale somewhere (IE, a 7 in excel would show that you know how to do vlookups, pivot tables, etc.).

          1. meh*

            You’re complaints fall into two categories: (1) there are nuanced differences between languages, and (2) many people with years of “experience” in one language lack basic programming skills. You then seem to conflate them and claim that screening for “N years of experience with technology XYZ” will somehow save you from failing due to problem #2.

            My position is simple: if you have a candidate with problem #2, then you’re screwed, and no amount of pre-screening for “years of experience with technology XYZ” will help you. If you have candidates with solid programming skills, then problem #1 is seldom a real problem.

            Regardless, this is really the job of the technical interviewers, and not the recruiters.

          2. WhereAreAllTheTechs*

            Oh it is staggering how many terrible tech leads there are out there!

            I interviewed a programmer with 30 years experience in IT, some programming some in support. I needed a Junior Java developer, he had no professional Java experience but I figured his .NET skills should translate. Also he’d been out of work for a year but with his experience he could teach me a few things. He said he had done a course in Java and the instructor rated him as Intermediate. So I asked him to do FizzBuzz in Java, he couldn’t even start. So I had him write it in pseudo code, he easily plonked out a procedural answer. This demonstrated that he had no understanding of OOD. The complete lack of OOP in the Java application I’ve taken over is it’s number one issue. Anyway I thought I’d give him a final chance I asked him that now he had the pseudo code could he at least give me the method signature. Nope, couldn’t even do that. This was his second interview, he had a week to prepare for me, 30 years experience and couldn’t give me a method signature. Sorry but if you claim to have a skill, even worse advanced standing in a skill and can’t even do the most basic stuff that skill demands I’m not going to hire you.

            1. Casey*

              That’s interesting. The jobs I have applied for, I have always had to jump thru hoops and be *over the top* in order to be even called back. Some interviews are more where they are looking for “chinks in the armor”. In other words, “Yeah – you may know this – but I bet you can’t do – Ah ha! Now I’ve got you!”

              BTW, by “some obscure task”, I mean something like : “Customer A has 2TB of data and the system needs to be copied. But – the target system has 100GB – oh, BTW, you can’t nfsmount any disks or add additional storage to the target system”

    2. fposte*

      Depends how we’re defining lying and fudging. To me it’s a lie, but it’s a lie that ended up not mattering.

    3. businesslady*

      what Mike said. also (since you asked) I think it would’ve been ideal to explain–assuming the application would allow it–something like “I’m not as familiar with Excel but given my expertise in Lotus I feel confident that I’d be able to pick it up quickly” or some variant thereof. an answer like that helps demonstrate that you’re honest & realistic about your skills, which are assets in an employee.

      but I realize that applications often don’t allow for that kind of nuance, & given the choice between being immediately disqualified & offering an untruth, I’d choose the latter. it really depends on the type of job & the skill in question, though–if you’re wrong about how quickly you’ll get up to speed or about the importance of that facet of experience, it could end up coming back to bite you. (in your situation above, for example, what if they’d asked you a simple interview question about Excel that you mysteriously couldn’t answer?)

    4. Allison*

      Excel can be learned quickly, but not all technologies are that easily picked up. Not sure what kind of technologies the OP was asked to lie about knowing, but if it was a programming language, or a complex operating system like AIX, that’s not something most people can fudge and ultimately pull off.

    5. OP*

      OP here, and grateful for the advice! I think everyone’s familiar with a little bit of fudging, especially since employers might be willing to compromise on the listed requirements for the top candidates. And I’m in a technical field, so I’m familiar with quickly transferring skills and learning on the job. But when the job requirement asks for two or three technologies I’d never even heard of and then puts “IMPORTANT – MUST HAVE” next to one of them in big colored letters, I don’t think I’m close enough to the fudge margin to justify wasting both my time and the hiring manager’s time.

      1. Jessa*

        Exactly, I like your idea of the “fudge margin” and depending on how specific the requirement is, the wider the margin is. If you’ve never even heard of it, I think the recruiter is completely out of line.

      2. WhereAreAllTheTechs*

        Yeah I’d wouldn’t slightly fudge tech requirements. It’s been my experience and now what I practice.

        If I listed a technology on my resume you can be damn sure I was asked about it by the tech leads, and they would dig hard at everything I said. When I interview, I do the same, then I will continue to dig on your answer to figure out what exactly you know and what you don’t. I’d be worried to work for a place that didn’t screen it’s candidates like that.

  8. Hidey for this one*

    Someone close to me who used to work as a recruiter told me to tweak a job title on my resume to make it sound more impressive. Bohuh? Anyone reading the description could tell in two seconds it was an office wretch job. And what would happen when a hiring manager called the company and asked about it?

    She also told me to lie about what I could do (copy writing–no, I’m not going to lie about something I’ve never done) and then get up to speed when I was hired–that “all my friends who are creatives do it.” I was gobsmacked–someone with a marketing degree who can’t tell the difference between basic copy editing (which I can do–it got me this job) and copy writing (which I have never, ever done)? I’m pretty sure she went to the same recruiter training this guy did. It’s just a basic case of someone not realizing that just because a person writes books doesn’t mean they can write advertising copy. When I pointed this out, I was told I was being “negative.” Um, okay, whatever. That was the last time I asked for advice there.

    And remind me not to hire any of her dishonest friends!

  9. Anonymous*

    Perhaps the recruiter(s) know(s) that prospective employers lie, so to balance the scales, they recommend fighting fire with fire.

    2. Ask a Manager* Post author

      What Lily said. And also, that simply makes no sense, when your job is to place candidates in jobs that they’re qualified for, and when your repeat business depends on you doing that well.

    3. Tax Nerd*

      Employees get fired (and permanently blacklisted) for lying on their resumes.

      Companies that omit key details on job descriptions is still considered fairly normal.

      Fair? Maybe not. But “I only lied because X lied first” is not a great defense to. . . anything.

      2. Colette*

        I’d say the equivalent to lying on your résumé would be a company who lied about the salary, benefits, or vacation – and people can and do quit over things like that.

  10. Dongxi Kong*

    I’ve dealt with sketchy recruiters before too. After a co-worker of mine left Company A to work at a Company B, the recruiter who worked with him contacted me. This recruiter was trying really hard to get me to put specific language on my resume; stuff he thought would go over especially well with hiring managers at Company B. He was very high pressure and a fast talker. At one point, he gave me my former co-worker’s resume as a example to work from.

    Imagine my surprise, when the experience listed on my former co-worker’s resume had him taking credit for work that *I* had done! As well as other projects by other team members, that he had no part in. I was astounded. We always got along well, and he was a capable engineer; he didn’t need to lie.

    I think the recruiter must have pressured my co-worker to pad his resume. I decided not to pursue any opportunities with such a sketchy recruiter.

  11. Former Agency Recruiter*

    Unfortunately, people like this are exactly the reason why I left recruiting.

    Many agencies do play a numbers game – every month recruiters at my agency were given numbers they had to hit (business development calls made, candidates brought on, resumes submitted to jobs, etc.). They’re also given an amount that they need to bill each month, and rewards are given to people who bill above expectations.

    While I worked with many honest, wonderful people who tried their best to fill roles and make solid matches, I also worked with some awful, dishonest people who would do anything to make the sale.

    When I recruited, I would contact candidates who maybe didn’t fit all the qualifications on paper if I had solid information from the company that this was something that wasn’t an issue. For example: one company I hired for valued personality/cultural fit above everything else and was willing to pay for training to supplement any lacking skills. I would also contact candidates about positions that didn’t necessarily fit what they had said they were looking for to give them a chance to consider the opportunity (I didn’t think it was my job to make the choice for the person about whether or not they would be interested in a role). At the same time, I tried to provide a pressure-free environment, and if the candidate said they weren’t interested in the job I would drop it and move on.

    I have, however, heard former colleagues over-sell candidates or misrepresent them (for example: describing an older, more serious candidate, as being “25 and super bubbly!” – something I never understood, since when you met her, she was obviously not 25 or bubbly). I’ve also heard people twist job descriptions to match what the candidate is looking for.

    The problem is, people would rarely draw attention to these bad recruiters through the proper channels. Rather then reporting to the appropriate people (like someone senior at the agency) people ignore them and move on, which leads to more unhappy people. One of the worst recruiters that I worked with was also one of the highest billers, and no one who had a bad experience complained about him. As long as he was billing, the company thought he was doing a great job. Report your story to someone higher at the agency. Recruiting is a reputation based business, and any agency worth their salt will want to hear feedback and make changes to keep their reputation intact.

  12. Burnt*

    I’m glad there are recruiters commenting here to give another point of view but due to too many bad experiences I would never recommend that someone I know use an agency. Unfortunately you don’t know you’re working with someone unethical until they’ve screwed you over.

    1. Former Agency Recruiter*

      “Unfortunately you don’t know you’re working with someone unethical until they’ve screwed you over.”

      Isn’t this the same for everything though? If you’re smart in your use of recruiters, don’t spam out your resume to every single agency, and create a solid relationship with your recruiter they can be a useful tool in your job search kit. There ARE good recruiters out there, unfortunately, people tend to focus on the bad stories rather than the good ones.

      1. Burnt*

        How do you suggest someone create a solid relationship with a recruiter? In my experience it’s:

        1. you send resume,
        2. you meet face to face and they spin a wonderful tale of fantastic jobs to be had,
        3. (a) never hear from them again even when you try to contact, or
        (b) they get back to you months later and act like everything’s fine but still blow smoke up your ass

        1. Former Agency Recruiter*

          Here’s how I suggest building a relationship with your recruiter:

          1. Be honest. So many candidates are not honest when speaking to a recruiter because they don’t want to hurt their chances. Give detailed answers when talking about your experience, and don’t be afraid to tell them what you want/don’t want. Being open about interesting things you do in your spare time is also a great thing to do – so many companies hire based on personality fit that knowing about your hobbies outside of work can turn into a great selling point.
          2. Be clear on YOUR expectations, and make a plan with your recruiter. If your recruiter isn’t willing to meet what you expect from them, then they aren’t the recruiter for you.
          3. Make sure you’re using a recruiter for the right reasons. Recruiters are paid to find a company what they are looking for. Chances are, they will contact you because you have in-demand skills in a certain area. If your skills aren’t in demand, or you’re looking to make a career change, then you’re probably better off searching on your own.
          4. Be patient. When I was working as a recruiter for senior level positions I had around 80-100 active candidates at a time. Not all of these candidates had skills that were in demand at that time, or would be a fit for the roles I was recruiting for at that moment. I always made it clear to my candidates that they were welcome to check in, but that I wouldn’t contact them unless I had a role to discuss with them.

          If you don’t feel your recruiter is meeting your expectations, ask them to remove you from their active candidate list and find someone who does. I don’t believe a recruiter should be your only form of job searching, they should be used as a resource, but not your only form of generating jobs. I will also openly admit that some recruiters are not very good at what they do, so you may have to try a few out before you find the recruiter that works for you.

          1. Former Agency Recruiter*

            You may also dislike recruiters (I know! The cold calls are annoying!) but remember that they’re people too. Treating your recruiter with respect goes a long way in making them want to help you. If you think recruiters are rude and inconsiderate, I can tell you a few candidate stories that fall into the same category.

            1. Former Agency Recruiter*

              Exactly! And it’s something I didn’t even consider until I worked in recruitment.

              At the end of the day, the client is paying the bill (sometimes that bill can run up to $30,000+). I can think you’re the coolest person in the world, and the best candidate I have, but if a client looks at your resume and says “no”, then that’s it. (I can also tell you some ridiculous stories from the client side, such as telling us they would not consider anyone with a “foreign” name, or that the senior exec would only hire men so not to bother sending any female candidates. Not things I agree with AT ALL, but if I wanted to make the sale, I’d have to give them what they want)

  13. JenTheNiceHRGirl*

    Wow, that’s extremely unethical, not to mention, stupid. Even if you did lie, once you were hired, you wouldn’t know the technology to successfully perform your job, which would make you look bad (since you lied) and make the recruiter look bad for submitting you for a job that you were not a good fit for! I would just advise you cut ties with this recruiter and look elsewhere. If you must work with a recruiter at a staffing company, try to find someone with a good reputation, ask around and see if someone can refer you to someone who they had worked with in the past who is knowledgeable and specializes in your industry. I can’t say that I have a lot of experience working with independent recruiters or staffing agencies, but there are a few who I have worked with whom I would recommend if someone asked me for a referral. There are certainly great recruiters out there who take pride in their reputation and would not ask you to lie or try to convince you to interview for a job you are not a good fit for.

    1. Amy B.*

      “…which would make you look bad (since you lied) and make the recruiter look bad for submitting you for a job that you were not a good fit for!”

      Or maybe just make the OP look bad because after the company had fired the OP the recruiter would just say, “Wow, I can’t believe she lied about her experience. I had no idea!”

      1. JenTheNiceHRGirl*

        LOL you are probably right, I imagine that this recruiter would continue to lie as much as possible to save their own butt, However, I do have to say that a good recruiter knows how to find out if a candidate is a good fit. If a job requires that you know a certain type of technology asking them to tell you what they use it for is a fairly quick and simply technique to tell if someone actually knows their stuff or not. Of course, I am talking about good recruiters, not this one.

  14. MiketheRecruiter*

    Yeah, I don’t even consider myself a great recruiter (I’d say I’m average to above average, still learning and figuring it out) but it’s not like candidates don’t do their fair share to screw themselves out of roles – I’ve had plenty confirm an interview only to not show up (no call/no show), others eat during an interview, run insanely late and call 5 minutes before hand to let me know “hey I’m about 45 minutes away, hope its not a big deal”, and my most recent favorite one – having someone reject their offer because the offer letter wasn’t sufficiently personalized (the company used a template). Mind you, the most recent one was with a very well known company in a very high paying role, and it was all specified beforehand what the offer would be including benefits (this person asked 4 times if he could use corporate housing, and we explained all 4 times they didn’t have corporate housing).

    1. Tina*

      Turned down an offer because it wasn’t sufficiently personalized? As long as your name and the details of your specific job are on it, what more did they want? I can only guess that person had a wide range of other options to be so selective.

    2. JenTheNiceHRGirl*

      I feel your pain Mike. We get those candidates sometimes too. Most of the time I work with great candidates who act professionally, but every so often I get one that does something really rude and it just blows my mind.

  15. Rich*

    SMH.

    This is just poor recruiting. The guy is trying to hit his numbers for submittals and is either a greezeball and/or poorly trained. Possibly both.

    Never work with someone that encourages you to misrepresent yourself. Last thing you wanna do is get skewered during the interview and burn bridges with a potential company by being exposed. You also never know where members of the hiring team may land in the future. Stay clear of this guy and recruiters like him.

  16. MiketheRecruiter*

    Oh, and I forgot to mention another one:

    A staggering amount of fake resumes for entry level tech positions. For example: QA. You find real people, call them, ask them tech questions (and they know every answer), and present them to a client. You then find out this person has never done QA before, their references who work at major companies and have linkedin accounts are fake, and has simply been locked in a room for 3 months studying QA, is hoping to get on a project and “hide” for 3 months in a giant corporation development/QA team to get actual experience on their resume/money in their pockets.

    1. Windchime*

      I think we interviewed this guy. Seriously. It was actually for a QA role, and he was surprised and confused (and unable to answer) when we kept asking him QA questions. His resume was a mess; it was just sentence after sentence of buzzwords. Now I’m wondering….did he have an unethical recruiter who changed his resume? Did he think he was applying for a different job?

    2. Hidey for this one*

      That is almost exactly what the person who wanted me to tweak my title suggested–that I get the job by lying, then learn it as I go. “You can have experience to put on your resume then! Everybody does it!” Well, I’m not a lying everybody. Hmmf!

  17. ingeneria*

    Can we have an open thread where people recommend great / not bad recruiters in different geographic areas and different fields??

  18. Shane Watson*

    My first real IT job was one I shouldn’t have had. I didn’t find out until my last day on the project that my recruiter had lied to my supervisor about my helpdesk experience. Because of that, I was placed in a job I was unqualified for, which ruined my reputation with that employer.

  19. Ruffingit*

    This is easy. Stop working with that recruiter immediately. Don’t push back, don’t argue, don’t discuss. Just move on. Someone wanting you to lie like this has serious problems and so will you if you stay with them.

  20. Casey*

    I had a recruiter tell me to change the title of my employment from just “Consulting” to something like “Oracle Consulting”. Let’s call this JOB A. I was working with internet technologies during that time and had not worked with Oracle in a year. So, I go through the interview, the people hire me.

    I also got another job (JOB B) at another company around the same time. I took it because I was a little low on funds and thought I would leave it once the second job (JOB B) got started (which was to be in a month or so).

    Well, while headhunter from JOB A was doing his “investigation” he said he needed the names of the companies I worked for when I was doing “Oracle Consulting”. His words were: “Just as it is stated on your resume!” I was angry because it was HE who suggested I put “Oracle Consulting” on the resume – not myself.

    Anyways, I sent him (headhunter from JOB A) an email (from JOB B) noting that – from the new employer (JOB B) – basically indicating he could play the games if he wanted but I was already gainfully employed and only HE stood to loose.

    After that, he dropped it 9000% but that (for me) left the relationship so damaged that when I did get to the customer site for the job (JOB B) I allowed a sequence of events to take place whereby I had to just quit it. I did not quit JOB A – so – I had 2 jobs at one time. To go to JOB B, I told JOB A I needed to do something important and took vacation time (without pay).

    JOB B (also a head-hunter setup) told me that I would be getting X$/hour as “take home” pay. When I got my first check – it was more like X$-$15 (they took $15 for taxes). So he lied. I was working from home so I could deal with it better. I was later informed by the lead that (for JOB B) “the middleman is taking most of your money”.

    Why did I not just resign from JOB B? Because I was working from home. JOB A paid $20/hr. more than JOB B but JOB A wanted me to pay for my own travel, hotel, car rental, meals, etc. AND don’t forget that this was the one where the guy wanted me to provide references for my experience that he told me to lie about.

    Could I have relocated for JOB A? Yes, but I did not feel comfortable having my money come from a head-hunter with shady practices. If it was directly with the company itself (with benefits, and even a SMALL relo package), I would have been there yesterday.

    JOB B headhunter wanted me to relocate as well but – because they lied about the money and it was low to begin with, I just could not go with them either. I did not feel comfortable being in the contracting position that was so incredibly unstable. In other words, the reasons for not relocating for JOB A were the same as JOB B – because of the headhunter.

    When I was hired at JOB B, it was because **no one** on site could do the work at all (they worked on it for over a year). My demise (at JOB B) was engineered by a Quasimodo-looking Oracle lead who could not even do her own job (that was why I had to solve the problem that she could not).

    Because she was treating all of the other workers like shit, she felt she could treat me the same way. When I bucked her off, she used the fact that I was a contractor (and not a permanent employee) to do strange things.

    The IT industry used to be a respectable one and lots of fun. Now it is a crap industry full of pimps. In foreign countries, pimps get a finder’s fee (which is justified) – in the US, the pimps GET THE EQUIVALENT OF 50 PERCENT OF YOUR SALARY while you work for a company – and this is endorsed / encouraged / condoned and supported by the government (unfortunately). Ah yes, don’t forget no benefits of ANY kind – you have to pay for your own travel, medical, dental and/or relocation too. No retirement benefits either.

    I am in the process of leaving the industry and am fortunate that my skills are strong enough to do something independent like SaaS applications – the thing I have to learn how to do is cold-call/sell.

    The employer does not get the best candidate – just the candidate that makes the pimp the most money (but they – employer – does not seem to care about this so much) – well, at least not until things fall apart – then that’s when I get called in – how good for them, I won’t be there to be called in anymore LOL.

  21. Help I'm Stuck In Web Of Lies!*

    I’ve had this same thing happen to me, where my recruiter falsified my resume so that I would get a job that required 5+ years of experience, when in fact I’m really just looking for an entry-level/junior position in programming. I had sent an email to my uncle (who had recommended me to join the recruiting company’s training program for Build and Release Engineering in the first place) towards the end of last year asking him to explain the falsified resume. He had sent an email back asking me to call him back, instead of explaining right then and there. I then told my dad about it, who talked to the uncle for a long time… and then he got back to me saying I should go along with the lie!

    Since last December, I have been stuck in this situation where companies are responding to me based on the falsified resumes sent to them by my recruiter, and if I say the truth at any point, I’ll find myself in trouble with the clients AND the recruiter! I’m currently working in an entry-level position that I’m over-qualified for (requires no computer science knowledge whatsoever), but am working honestly there and slowly starting to move up. I want to leave the bad recruiter and not have to worry about getting calls from companies who think I have 5+ years of experience, but I don’t know how. Someone please help me!!!

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