[Anonymous]

Do you think they undersell you to potential employers? Are they legit for getting you a good job with compensation that you deserve? What is your opinion about their reputation? Any personal experiences?

I went to speak with one of them long ago and I’m not sure I trust what they tried to tell me…which was basically that even though I have a few years of experience at a small CPA firm that I wouldn’t get paid as much if I left for an industry job. That doesn’t really make sense and then they were telling me that I would probably go into an industry job as a staff accountant and take a $10K salary cut compared to the Senior Accountant public accounting position I had. Then after telling me that, they pushed hard on selling me the idea of going the Big 4 route or go to one of the larger firms.

It just seems odd to me, I would think recruiters are supposed to be like agents who want to sell you to employers. What are your thoughts/experiences? This was years ago by the way, but considering a recruiter again for when I complete the exam.

[Missy]

And it's unlikely any recruiter will invest in skills assessment and trying to do the best by the candidates. They've got about 20 resumes to every position they need filled. It's not personal it's not that they don't want to see you do well it's just that at the end of the day you're not the one paying them. Lots of them aren't even qualified to be recruiters, they've got sales background in God only knows what industry and are there less than 2 years before the big six figures income they were promised for being rock stars never happens.

Licensed Massachusetts Non Reporting CPA since 2012
Finance/Admin/HR Manager

[Anonymous]

That's a good point to just tell them your minimum requirements and to be firm you are not interested in anything less.

I'm also hesitant about recruiters because even if you tell them you don't want them to send your resume out, couldn't they still use it anyway? There is really no way to confirm if they send it out or not, and that could hurt your chances of obtaining a position if you found a position and applied to it on your own (while the recruiter had already sent it out behind your back).

And plus when you interview with them, they ask all sorts of probing information such as your past salary and your experiences at past firms. I had a recruiter ask me how many CPAs were at one of the previous firms I worked for. I wondered why that was important and the only reason I could think is because they want to try to contact those CPAs to get them in their recruiting system.

What do you guys think about disclosing salary and other probing information to recruiters? Are those questions appropriate or are they unnecessary? I find it to be a bit sharky…a double-edged sword really.

[mad max]

I will not work with a large recruiter any more (like RH) but I have had successful positions through smaller regional recruiters.

Key is to work with them, keep up good communication, and if you are only looking for permanent placement then to make that clear!

[Author]

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