I Didn’t Do It

Last week the news sat smack-bang in the middle of denial territory.

Pauline Hanson denied starring in those glam nude pics. Gemteq denied forum allegations that they publish fake jobs.

Pauline reckons she never had a boyfriend called “Jack” and that she feels for the young woman in the bondage outfit featured in the photos.

Gemteq reckon the reason for the similarities between their credible job adverts and ads from overseas job boards is that they look to the latter for “inspiration”.

Shortlist March 13. He said recruiters had historically referred to other job postings for inspiration when writing ads, and this may be the reason for the strong similarities between certain Gemteq IT job ads and other ads posted on overseas boards.

See any similarities here?

I won’t comment on the Gemteq saga. Jobseekers can make up their own minds about the validity - or otherwise - of Gemteq’s job postings. But the issue raises an interesting point. How can the industry be regulated? Seek has made an attempt to set the standard by releasing a statement saying it is making attempts to obliterate fake ads from its job board.

Shortlist article March 13. SEEK is launching a new “job seeker charter” designed to encourage candidates to report job ads which might be fake or misleading.

And sometimes it takes the market leader to set an example of best industry practice. There’s also the RCSA, but they can’t achieve much with the few members they have.

Anyhow, I don’t want a regulatory body in the industry. This causes unnecessary bureaucracy. But surely all of this could be avoided if folks just acted ethically. I mean, and I’m not accusing Gemteq specifically, it doesn’t take much to figure out that posting fake jobs to reverse market candidates is not good for anyone. You don’t need to be goddam Aristotle to figure this out. It damages the industry enormously and ultimately, if you tarnish the industry to which you belong, your business will suffer.

Tread lightly, my people.

“Every job advertised on SEEK, My Career, and Career1 is fake.”

Okay…settle down.

The words in the title, they’re not mine. They’re a quote from an email I received from a distressed ex-employee of a graduate recruitment agency. And I don’t want to go into the particulars of her experience, or others like her. I want to broach this issue in a more general way. (here’s a link to the discussion, in case you’re interested)

As we’re all aware, the recruitment industry is unregulated and this has resulted in some pretty dodgy business practices, especially in regard to reverse-marketing. The results of this affect folks in the industry, but also cause misery on a larger scale.

How so? While there are instances of reverse marketing being ethical, the practice often requires an all-out lie. That is, recruiters place an ad. for a job that does not exist, in order to attract a cohort of people who might be then on-sold, or reverse-marketed. If we consider the lowest common denominator of good and decent human behavior, lying to folks does not rate as a cool thing to do, and not an accepted way of behaving. It does not improve the credibility of recruiters, nor the validity of the work we do.

Further, the cohort that is frequently preyed upon is the graduate population. Good one. With each time this occurs, there is a group of people, possibly embarking on their first experience of searching for professional employment, left with a very sour taste in their mouths.

It also calls to question the validity of job boards, which the public doesn’t easy separate from the recruiters themselves.

Then there is this: the work we do, looking for it, choosing a career, arranging our lives so that we are available to do it, these things take up a large portion of our lives. Our work is important. So why would anyone in their right mind choose to stuff people around by placing fake ads., by building hopes where none deserve to exist? Consider the last time you knew someone on the job hunt. How excited were they to get an interview? I’m ticking the prospect of an opportunity meant heaps to them….and probably to you too, if you cared for them any.

People who wanted work would probably be just as likely to turn up for a cattle-call interview if they knew the truth, that at the end of the day they would be used as bait for recruiters looking to make placements.

And just while you’re thinking on it, recently a recruiter that built a substantial part of their business on reverse marketing sold out for a pretty hefty sum - forty-odd mil, in fact. Good on ‘em, some might say…I’m suggesting that the purchasers of this business weren’t the only ones paying a price.