Published on efinancialcareers
As middle men (and women) we recruiters often feel like ping pong balls; bouncing all over the glorious Square Mile between arrogant coffee slurping candidates and two dimensional internal recruiters/’hiring managers’ who never look up from their Blackberries. As Freddie Mercury once sang, “it’s a hard life”.
Candidates complain about the poor quality service we provide them regarding issues such as interview feedback. However the reality is, much of this is simply the fault of hiring managers. To help candidates understand what we are up against when representing them, I have compiled a list of the kinds of HM’s who make us wish we worked harder at school so we would not have to chase these morons to pay for our beans on toast.
The four genres of investment banking hiring manager are:
1): The process followers:
These risk-averse dullards are guaranteed to have been accountants at some point in their lives. Hence, they have PROCESS drilled into their unimaginative brains. This means they cannot do anything without the permission of fat middle aged women who eat too many muffins, known as HR staff. HR staff are glorified secretaries who bizarrely have more authority than HM’s. This silly obedience to HR delays things, leading to exceptional candidates taking offers elsewhere and many of us recruiters downgrading from Heinz to Tesco Value.
2): The bored ones:
Banking is becoming less and less exciting by the day. As a result, an increasing number of hiring managers are happy to meet even more bored recruiters during hiring freezes, just to get out the office. Unfortunately, these guys immediately negate the affects of a double espresso when it is needed most. Stuck in the rat race, they give off very little enthusiasm, and oblige recruiters to over-compensate. For all of you who have been sold jobs that were not accurately described, now you know why.
3): The schizophrenics:
Now that their bonuses have disappeared, these guys need an extra kick from work which they seem to get by giving us a hard time. They call us every few months on our holidays with “exclusive mandates”, frantically begging for Ndebele speaking mining specialists willing to spend half the year in Zimbabwe. As soon as we dig up the earth and find them such an idiot, they tell us the candidate is no longer needed. This is why some candidates never hear back from recruiters.
4): The decent ones:
Last, and certainly least in terms of quantity, are those who are pleasant enough not to have the following recorded message on their answer-phones: “If you are a recruiter, speak to HR”. Sadly, that is the only nice thing about them.