Further Information

Who has your CV?

The REC Code of Good Recruitment Practice states that “REC member recruitment consultancies will not transmit a candidate’s CV without the candidate’s permission”. Despite this, there are many reported cases in the recruitment market where your CV’s are sent out to clients, without the candidates’ prior knowledge.

Why should you be concerned about this?

If your CV is reaching potential employers and you are therefore being considered for relevant opportunities, then you could say that this is a good thing. However, how would you feel if your CV was sent to an ex boss or a company whom you would not wish to work for due to ethical, political or simply practical reasons?

What if you were successful in gaining an interview for a job as a result of the CV being sent without your permission?

Again, you may argue that this is also a positive outcome. However, if the recruitment consultancy has not spent time with you, briefing you about the role and does not know your salary expectations, it is more likely, that the role or salary does not meet with your aspirations. In the end, you may end up wasting valuable time and even holiday entitlement for a position which does not suit your requirements.

Your Inside Out Recruitment consultant, will always brief you as fully as possible about the role before your CV is submitted, given the information they have available to them at the time. You will always be asked your salary expectations for that particular role, in that location at that point in time. This should ensure that any forthcoming interview is as a result of accurate information, meaning that you don’t waste time attending inappropriate interviews.

What can you do to prevent your CV ending up in the wrong place?

Companies often work with more than one agency at the same time. This will mean that the same position can appear on various websites with different agencies. If you apply to the same vacancy with various agencies, the duplication could end up confusing the situation, as well as not looking very good on you. A good agency will spend time briefing you about the role; meanwhile an unscrupulous agency may have already sent your CV across without your permission. Insist that a clients’ identity is revealed before you authorise them to send your CV.

How can you make an informed decision on whether you want to work for a particular company, and therefore have your CV submitted, without knowing who the company is? Except in very few cases where a vacancy is highly confidential, an agency which refuses to reveal their clients name should be treated with caution. You have every right to know where your personal details are being sent to.

You can also help by keeping a record of which agencies you are speaking to about each different opportunity, and most importantly be honest with them. Some candidates incorrectly believe that the more times their CV is submitted to a client, the greater the chance of an interview. In fact the opposite happens and clients will more likely assume the candidate is highly unorganised, and even worse, in some cases untruthful.

Be selective about the agencies you work with. Selecting one or two specialists will save you time in the long run. You won’t need to duplicate telephone calls and/ or meetings going through your background and it will cause less confusion for you.

Finally, be careful when applying to anonymous internet advertising – a good consultancy should always spend time with you on your first application to try and understand your requirements. If they have done this properly and identified a couple of preferred agencies to work with, whom you are confident have a good share of the market, there should be no need to continue applying via 3rd party websites.

Counter Offers

So you've secured a great role and successfully handed in your letter of resignation. Your manager wasn't happy about it but he seemed to accept it ok. Since then, you've been looking forward to the new challenge ahead. Until your current employer contacted you to ask if you'd re-consider...

Confused?

A counter-offer is an offer from your current employer to rival the one you have received from your future employer, to convince you to stay. Counter-offers can take many forms. A straight increase in salary - usually to meet or beat your new offer - additional company benefits, a sought-after promotion or new job title, additional responsibility, a change in role, more involvement in exciting new projects.

Counter-offers can be confusing. Leaving a job, especially if you have been there for some time, is difficult. Being put under pressure to stay, and having your reasons for leaving challenged certainly doesn't make it easy. Even though you worked hard to get the new role and have been really looking forward to it, you find yourself thinking: maybe I do owe something to my current employer. Maybe I do lack loyalty and maybe the company will suffer unfairly if I leave?

Counter-offers are more common than you think. Statistics on how many times it happens are hard to find. However, while researching the counter-offer issue, one fact just keeps on popping up. Most people who accept a counter-offer have subsequently left their job anyway within twelve months. In fact, a great many are gone within three to six months.

Reasons to keep you

Look at the logic behind the counter-offer. Of course, what we'd like to do is accept it as a sign of how we are valued by our employer, a definite signal that they'll stretch to serious lengths to keep us.

What you should be thinking though, is that besides boosting your ego, your employer may have other reasons for counter-offering you. These may include:-

• Replacing an employee can be expensive
• It might mess up their budget to re-recruit that time of year
• They haven't got time to re-recruit right now
• They want to have you cover while they hunt for your replacement
• They want you to finish the project you are working on
• They don't have the time to train someone new at the moment
• Losing staff might reflect badly on your boss

Should I stay or should I go?

There is rarely a good reason to accept a counter-offer and stay where you are. You wanted to move, you've been through the recruitment process, you've been successful and you have scored a job that meets your criteria. Think about these factors:-

• From the day of your resignation, your loyalty will always be in question
• This lack of loyalty is likely to be an obstacle to future promotions
•  Your colleagues will look at you differently - after all, you don't really want to be there do you?
•  Your boss will probably start casting around for your replacement immediately - whether you stay or not
• Why are they offering you what you deserve now, rather than before your resignation?
• Has the real reason you resigned been adequately addressed?
• How guilty do you really feel? After all, shouldn't you be putting yourself first? Would the company think twice about getting shot of you if the chips were down?
• Don't let an unexpected counter-offer stop you in your tracks. Take it in your stride, thank your employer for the opportunity and reaffirm your intention to leave. Stand your ground.

But say you decide to stay. Just because you've accepted your counter offer doesn't mean your resignation has been forgotten. You are going to have to work extremely hard to win back your employer's trust. You'll probably find you have to strive harder than your colleagues to prove your company loyalty and worthiness as a long-term prospect. Your new post-resignation life with your old company is not going to be easy. And accepting a counter offer is definitely not the safe option.