Bone In The Throat

In anticipation of loosing my job, I recently updated my resume on one of the big web search sites.

Within the site there is a field that says “Available Date” in that field I wrote 06/30/2011. That seems fairly straight forward don’t you think?

So WHY am I being bombarded with emails and phone calls describing “Immediate” openings? The  most annoying come from Indian (dot, not feather) headhunting agencies.

Frankly these “opportunity” emails are badly written, (Doesn’t India still have a British based education system?) and the voice mails were completely unintelligible.

I have some problems with these offshore headhunter agencies.

First, these people have no idea about the distances involved. The last “opportunity” was in San Francisco and was gasp! a 3 month gig.

So let me get this straight, these people think it’s reasonable for me to give notice, move 400 miles to San Francisco, rent an apartment, and work with no benefits for 3 months for less than a 1/4 of what I’m making now?

That is preferable to staying with my current employer taking my full pay, getting a severance package, and being eligible for unemployment if I need it HOW? I don’t have a business management degree, but common sense says hold onto what you have.

About 6 months ago out of the blue I got a call during my daily commute. This one was straight from Bangalore the young lady was very polite and explained a lovely opportunity.

She wanted me to be at the interview the next day and I was thinking ok what the heck? I knew my current job was probably going to come to an end, so I say sure whats the address? She very precisely gave me the company name and the address. The kicker was that the company in question was in Maine.

I asked her to repeat the state thinking I’d misheard. Nope! She wanted me to interview in Maine @ 8 am local time the next day. I asked if she had access to a map of the United States. She said she did, I asked her to locate Southern California she did, then I directed her to Maine. She found the state and said “Well it’s not too far is it?” I said no, only about 3000 miles… This also was a short term contract with no insurance. Needless to say I suggested she narrow her search to the North Eastern part of the United States.

I have other colleagues that have similar experiences. In general my colleagues and I are not responding to emails and phone calls from these folks.

It’s just too difficult to work with them and they seem to have an attitude that they’re doing you this great favor. Hey, we know the score… the headhunter places us, charges the company at least double for our services and pockets the difference.

When was the last time a prostitute thought her pimp was doing her a favor?
 When my colleagues and I say we’re not interested, many of these folks get really nasty. I was told, “This is why America is failing.” when I declined a 4 week contract in Chicago for $35 an hour.

Don’t take this wrong, for a real opportunity I’d relocate and I might even relocate for a sort term contract of say 6 months in another state. It would give me an opportunity to figure out if I liked the area well enough to consider moving there. But I’m not going to relocate for a 1, 2, or 3 month contract.

Perhaps I’ll reconsider when I’m actually unemployed but I don’t think so. First and foremost, I try to run my life like a business. As such I’m going to look at any opportunity from a “how does this benefit me?” position.

It’s nice to know that I’m apparently marketable, but I do wish that people would read the entire profile.