December 12, 2018 at 9:52 am
I live in New Mexico (yes, we're part of the USA, despite opinions to the contrary). New Mexico is primarily a rural state. Albuquerque (I live in that area) is the largest city, then Santa Fe and a few others. But basically, small population. Two of the primary employers in the area are Kirkland Airforce Base and Sandia National Labs. Occasionally, I'll get a phone call from a recruiter trying to woe me away from my full-time with benefits job, to work a 6 month contract at either Kirkland or Sandia. Yesterday, I got such a call. The position is only 6 months, "with an option to offer full time employment at the end of 6 months", no benefits and pays $15K to $10K less than I'm making now. I am open to new opportunities, but due to my wife's medical condition, as far as it is within my control I need to take jobs that offer medical insurance from day 1 - not 6 months later, and only "maybe we'll offer to bring you on full time". I've come to the conclusion that the recruiters in this area primarily recruit for contract jobs of various short term durations (some as little as 3 months). I'd say about 10% of the time, when they call me, is it a full-time with benefits job.
I'm wondering about other job markets? Say in Dallas, Houston, Denver, Seattle, San Francisco, etc., when you get a call from a recruiter is it nearly always for some short term contract, no benefits and only a possibility of getting hired?
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
December 12, 2018 at 10:01 am
I have been contacted for both contract and full time positions. Recruiters are typically driven by the clients needs and some clients want a try before they buy. It is easier to to let a contractor go than letting go an FTE employee even in a Right to Work state. The recruiting companies I have worked with have their own benefits packages that they can offer they just tend to be minimal packages that aren't usually on par with what employers usually offer to FTE employees.
December 12, 2018 at 10:23 am
The cold calls I get from recruiters when I'm not actively looking for a job are pretty much exclusively for contract work. By that I mean recruiters who have someone managed to find my resume or contact info somewhere despite it not being online publicly for years. When I've put my information out there with the intention of actually finding a job I get a pretty even mix of people contacting me.
December 12, 2018 at 10:31 am
In Pittsburgh, it depends!
The "cold calls" from recruiters who have found me via LinkedIn or wherever are largely contract or contract to hire.
If I have previously dealt with a recruiter, it's for full time positions.
One thing I have discovered is that MANY companies are doing strictly contract to hire. The reason is that there are far too many impostors in IT, and it's usually way easier to get rid of someone who is not working out.
Michael L John
If you assassinate a DBA, would you pull a trigger?
To properly post on a forum:
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/61537/
December 12, 2018 at 10:58 am
Michael L John - Wednesday, December 12, 2018 10:31 AMIn Pittsburgh, it depends!The "cold calls" from recruiters who have found me via LinkedIn or wherever are largely contract or contract to hire.
If I have previously dealt with a recruiter, it's for full time positions.One thing I have discovered is that MANY companies are doing strictly contract to hire. The reason is that there are far too many impostors in IT, and it's usually way easier to get rid of someone who is not working out.
Get about 5 of those cold calls every day, find it funny that when I'm in a contract or fixed term (problem solving), there is too much, once one has finished the task, it's like the dark side of the moon. My advice, line them up when you are still busy 😉
😎
December 13, 2018 at 8:19 am
Michael L John - Wednesday, December 12, 2018 10:31 AMIn Pittsburgh, it depends!The "cold calls" from recruiters who have found me via LinkedIn or wherever are largely contract or contract to hire.
If I have previously dealt with a recruiter, it's for full time positions.One thing I have discovered is that MANY companies are doing strictly contract to hire. The reason is that there are far too many impostors in IT, and it's usually way easier to get rid of someone who is not working out.
Pittsburgh. Must be a big job market. Not so much here. I have connected with recruiters on LinkedIn, but for some reason most are outside of the US. And I've had some of them contact me, but I'm not interested in working in the countries they're in. I used to accept any invitation to connect with someone on LinkedIn; now I'm being more careful and only accepting invitations from people I know, or they're either in the US or some country I would be interested in relocating to.
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
December 13, 2018 at 8:31 am
Rod at work - Thursday, December 13, 2018 8:19 AMMichael L John - Wednesday, December 12, 2018 10:31 AMIn Pittsburgh, it depends!The "cold calls" from recruiters who have found me via LinkedIn or wherever are largely contract or contract to hire.
If I have previously dealt with a recruiter, it's for full time positions.One thing I have discovered is that MANY companies are doing strictly contract to hire. The reason is that there are far too many impostors in IT, and it's usually way easier to get rid of someone who is not working out.
Pittsburgh. Must be a big job market. Not so much here. I have connected with recruiters on LinkedIn, but for some reason most are outside of the US. And I've had some of them contact me, but I'm not interested in working in the countries they're in. I used to accept any invitation to connect with someone on LinkedIn; now I'm being more careful and only accepting invitations from people I know, or they're either in the US or some country I would be interested in relocating to.
I have to be careful who I connect with on LinkedIn, but for other reasons than not wanting to work in certain countries.
December 14, 2018 at 12:56 pm
I'm in the San Diego area.
I've gotten recruiter contacts for full-time, contract-to-hire, and contract. I get a lot of cold contacts for completely implausible contracts -- I'm not interested in a 3-month contract 8-10 hours away from where I live looking for skills I don't have! -- but those tend to be from non-US recruiters, and I ignore them. There are a few reputable firms with a local presence that I've worked with -- my current job started as contract-to-hire through a recruiting company, and there was another job they would have put me in for if I hadn't already applied in response to an ad the hiring company had elsewhere; I believe that one was a direct hire. Like the OP, I need to maintain health insurance coverage, but ended up on an individual plan for a while during my last transition; it took longer to convert to hired than we expected, and switching to the contracting group's plan then to the company's plan would have been a lot of trouble.
December 16, 2018 at 7:42 am
Getting great feedback here, thanks. Looks like it is more where I live and the nature of many of the jobs here, that I'm getting overwhelmingly short term, contract jobs rather than companies looking to hire on. But I also see that people from job markets with more jobs still get cold calls from contractors looking for someone to work for a short time. Thank you for this great feedback!
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
December 16, 2018 at 10:29 am
Rod at work - Sunday, December 16, 2018 7:42 AMGetting great feedback here, thanks. Looks like it is more where I live and the nature of many of the jobs here, that I'm getting overwhelmingly short term, contract jobs rather than companies looking to hire on. But I also see that people from job markets with more jobs still get cold calls from contractors looking for someone to work for a short time. Thank you for this great feedback!
I've seen such a whole lot although not as much as you have. I believe it's the "we don't really want to pay for a full time DBA because databases are just a place to store data but we need some help with performance issues" or the "we finally figured out that the database is more than just a place to store data but it must be simple, right? and we just need some temporary help to "flip this burger"" syndromes. 😀
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
December 17, 2018 at 8:48 am
Thinking about what you said, Jeff, I believe you're right. There's a lot of "a database is just a fancy file folder" mentality. Therefore, those who tend and maintain it, are little more than somewhat higher level power users. No so, of course, but that's the perception. My take away, though, is to try and find recruiters with the companies I want to consider, more than just waiting for the recruiters of short term contracts to contact me.
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
December 17, 2018 at 9:30 am
Rod at work - Monday, December 17, 2018 8:48 AMThinking about what you said, Jeff, I believe you're right. There's a lot of "a database is just a fancy file folder" mentality. Therefore, those who tend and maintain it, are little more than somewhat higher level power users. No so, of course, but that's the perception. My take away, though, is to try and find recruiters with the companies I want to consider, more than just waiting for the recruiters of short term contracts to contact me.
I guess I'd start by asking the recruiters that are contacting you about the short term jobs. The answer is always "No" unless you ask. That's provided that you actually want to change jobs.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
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