State of the Market

[edison]

I keep applying for stuff but 99.9% of the time I never hear back at all.

It's disheartening when you don't even get automated rejections and ghosting is common but you have to keep persevering.

On the plus side, I saw a contract role on Jobserve last week where I now seem to get no replies to any applications. A recruiter's name was listed with a phone number so I chanced my arm and called it and got the switchboard. Thought I would get fobbed off but the recruiter spoke to me and after just 30 seconds outlining my experience he asked me to email my CV directly and he would call straight back.

I now have an interview with the client today. If I had just applied straight via Jobserve my CV might just have got lost in a pile of others.

So always try to speak to the recruiter. 90% of the time now it's impossible but you never know.

[edison]

Bad news in the US, inflation came in a bit hotter than expected yesterday.

Instead of 3 rate cut this year there may be now only be 1 rate cut this year.

Some are even saying more rate rises might be needed instead of cuts.

The Bank of England follows the US Fed most of the time so not good news for the UK Contracting market either.

That is bad news. We might even have a scenario where there are no UK base rate cuts before an autumn election.

[Fraidycat]

Bad news in the US, inflation came in a bit hotter than expected yesterday.

Instead of 3 rate cut this year there may be now only be 1 rate cut this year.

Some are even saying more rate rises might be needed instead of cuts.

The Bank of England follows the US Fed most of the time so not good news for the UK Contracting market either.

[hobnob]

Im assuming scraping is what those dudes do at - whats the site called? OnlyOutSideIR35.com? Cant remember

It's "Outside IR35 Roles", and I think you're right about the scraping. E.g. this role says:
Salary: £65,000 – £80,000 Base Salary plus bonus and benefits
Workday Senior HRIS Specialist - Outside IR35 Roles Limited

That doesn't sound like an outside contract to me!

[hobnob]

I was speaking to an agent today who basically said they don't advertise roles unless they can't find someone they already have on their books.

The agent I spoke to today also said most of the roles on the boards are just CV harvesting.

That's why I'm dubious about the logic of "tailor your CV for each application". Suppose that I see an advert for a Cisco role, so I add extra detail to my CV about my Cisco experience and chop out all the bits about other switches/firewalls to make space (keeping to a 2 page limit). If the agency then gets another vacancy for someone with Aruba or Palo Alto experience, and they search their database, my CV won't match.

So, I go with the simple approach: keep my CV up to date and send the same version to everyone. I might use a covering letter to provide more details, but I'll only amend the CV if the agency specifically ask me to.

[edison]

Workday - the worst thing to happen to applying for jobs in 30 years. Lets make you choose a username and password for EVERY company advertising roles. Even though they all use Workday.

"SSO is for losers" - Head Of Product - Workday

Just seen exactly this on LinkedIn. Job spec was literally a one man digital agency. Wasnt even 3 roles in one more like 5.

Roles and responsibilities of a Scrum Master, Product Manager, Head Of Design - cant remember the rest - just ridiculous

I only discovered this in the last few weeks having applied for quite a few perm roles. I thought it must be a mistake at first then the same thing happened again and again.

Back in 2018/19, I was struggling to hire PMs for HR and payroll implementations even though I was offering about £700-750/day. One of the agencies told me that many potential PMs were getting gigs at around £1000/day for Workday or SuccessFactors such was the demand at the time.

Unbelievable to think that such a product treats users in this way.

[tsmith]

The agent I spoke to today also said most of the roles on the boards are just CV harvesting. We all knew that already but getting it from the horses mouth makes me feel a bit better about my low hit rate.

Looks like the best option at the moment is to befriend as many agents as you can and hope one of them comes through for you.

Im trying engaging with some of their posts. I pretty good at that. Some Agents do have relatively interesting takes.

Social Selling I guess would be the technical term - mostly feels like p*ssing in the wind though. Or a teardrop in an ocean of career shaped despair.

From what Ive seen in the last 2 years - as a 10 year + contractor. Its direct to employer to have any hope if you wanna go perm that is. Agents are useless to me now.

Anytime the agent places you in a perm its gonna be 20% commission. Thats a big risk on an ex contractor.

Friend of mine built a tool that auto applies for jobs on one particular job board.

If I had the time Id build some sort of giant scraper that scrapes jobs from various locations. Ive heard thats already a problematic trend for employers now. Auto applications

Im assuming scraping is what those dudes do at - whats the site called? OnlyOutSideIR35.com? Cant remember

[pjt]

I keep applying for stuff but 99.9% of the time I never hear back at all.

The agent I spoke to today also said most of the roles on the boards are just CV harvesting. We all knew that already but getting it from the horses mouth makes me feel a bit better about my low hit rate.

Looks like the best option at the moment is to befriend as many agents as you can and hope one of them comes through for you.

[Peoplesoft bloke]

I keep applying for stuff but 99.9% of the time I never hear back at all.

[Peoplesoft bloke]

I know this is a cliche, but although I am pleased to hear from recruiters, 90% of the time when they are messaging me it's for roles I can't do even if I wanted to.
Workday's a typical example - I only know a tiny part of it (UK Payroll and absence) and although there are skills and knowledge that apply overall, I can't create integrations for example which seems to be the main in demand skill. I also can't get (even if I pay for it) training on that except by being employed by a partner firm. I keep getting offered integration gigs and various other stuff I can't do.