Best recruitment companies in Cork?

JackieChang

I've spent the guts of yesterday on job searches and it's getting extremely boring. I've been lucky enough to basicaly fall into my two jobs over the past 8 years with little effort so this is all kind of new to me.

I've never worked with recruitment companies before so not really sure where to start.

Which ones in Cork do people here recommend?

Actually I should also ask - is it worth letting recruitment companies take care of the job search for you or should I stick with it myself?

I'd be looking for IT roles / Data Analytics / Big Data stuff.

I already have a job so I'm not in a huge rush.

Reccomendations / advice?

horgan_p

Treat them all like they are liars.
Believe what they say only when you see it in writing from an actual employer.


Remember their client is the employer - not you. Their job is to produce X number of CVs in response to Y job avert.
They have no loyalty to you whatsoever.



Harsh ? Yes. True - double yes.

blindsider

If you have a job, I would wait a few months....

Pretty sure that most companies are currently doing the absolute minimum - even where you could work remotely.

JackieChang

blindsider wrote: »

If you have a job, I would wait a few months....

Pretty sure that most companies are currently doing the absolute minimum - even where you could work remotely.

What exactly do you mean?

For example, I get a new job in Apple.

Apple are "doing the absolute minimum".

What does that mean for me?

blindsider

Have you just started a new job in Apple? If so, congrats....are you looking again?

Many companies have scaled back their activities (COVID-19), including recruitment, because 'onboarding remotely is challenging.

jgalvin

JackieChang, your next career move is a big decision and it’s worth taking the time to maximise the options. How a recruitment firm works: they will have a certain number of clients looking for people like you, their objective is to get you hired one at one of those companies but it’s just a subset of what’s out there overall. And they might try to convince you to take something suboptimal, because they’re just incentivised to get you hired, and your long term career path and job satisfaction is not really their concern.

Cork is a relatively small city, you can easily map out the kind of opportunities that are out there. Treat this like an IT project and take the time. Spend 4 hours on a Saturday making a database.

Make a list of job titles similar to your job title, or a particular keywords that defines your job (for example, “cloudera” or “Hadoop”) and search on LinkedIn and job boards for those job titles and keywords with location=Cork. Also consider further afield with remote work option? Maybe there are 50 potential companies in Cork but only about 12 companies you would realistically want to work for, and 3 that are outstanding? These are the rows in your database. Don’t restrict yourself to companies that are actively/publicly hiring. Your skill set is in high demand.

Then, about the kind of company you want to work for, the environment, the tech stack that you want to work with, etc. These are the columns in your database. Large multinational/Local tech startup/Remote-first distributed org/IT Service Provider? Process-heavy or agile? Remote work options? Oracle or AWS stack? Weight these factors and score and rank each company.

Once you have your list of companies as a starting point, check out job boards and career sites for active and recent opportunities in the ballpark in order to get the name of the company’s recruiter or hiring manager if possible. Contact that person on LinkedIn with a short note to introduce yourself _even if you don’t intend to apply to that job_. Add all those contacts in your database too. I guarantee you, any Talent Acquisition professional in Cork who hires for your skill set will be happy to receive your connection; at this point don’t bombard with a long email, list a brief hello and open the door for further conversation at a later date.

This is before you have even applied to any jobs yet!

Now you’ve got the lay of the land, you can make better decisions.

When it comes to applying for jobs, you will get contrasting advice, and speaking only for myself I would say to actively apply to _few_ jobs. Cast the net as wide as you like in terms of casual / ongoing conversation with hiring managers and internal TA; but once you click “apply” then there is a sense of commitment there and you want to make sure you give 100% to the application, so don’t spread yourself too thinly at first. Maybe start with a goal of getting your dream job at your dream company and pursue that first (even if it’s not actively being advertised). Maybe you strike gold and get the dream job, maybe you have a conversation with hiring manager and you end up in an adjacent role, maybe they’re not hiring for your skill set right now but will be in the future; definitely you will learn some things. In the case of dream job at dream company, you might consider finding some people currently doing that job at that company and subtly and politely asking for advice, what it’s like working for their team, etc. Don’t be shy; I think most people would be happy to help you and would not consider it spammy.

^ this advice does not apply across the board, but in Big Data space definitely I think it’s important to take a longer term view.

After all this you can still go ahead and hit up some recruitment firms but start by telling them exactly what you’re looking for and aim high; make them work. If after awhile you haven’t found any “bullseye” opportunities then by all means start branching out / compromising on some of the “must haves” — but not too soon.

Some people might say “nothing to lose!” but I disagree. Time, energy, focus, momentum. Doing your research, building your database, light introductions, probing conversations, etc, will build your momentum. But entering into application process on a job or company you don’t like; or wasting time with a busy recruiter who doesn’t understand what you really want... these things will sap your momentum.

Also, set your LinkedIn as “Open to Opportunities”. Good luck with the search!