It seems Monster (and similar) job boards are an ideal situation for headhunters and agents. But, what about finding a direct-hire job? Can it be done, or do these boards cater more to the headhunters?
I’ve been using them for years, and most of these boards seem to offer a lot more jobs through headhunters and agents than through direct employers.
There are direct hire jobs advertised (e.g. Jobsite has them down the side on the first page), but to be honest when I want to contact a company directly I usually use the students sites like Prospects and get the address of the company’s careers site from there.
I found my current job at Monster, but I find that it’s very difficult to get usable prospects anymore. Too many headhunters and staff agencies are putting up misleading or blatantly false job openings, as well as people with “business opportunities” of various kinds.
You can find direct hire work, but it requires a lot of sinnowing through the crap.
I got my last two software jobs that way – someone in the hiring company saw my resume on Monster & contacted me directly. I also got spammed by lots of recruiters, only a couple of whom set me up with interviews.
It can be done - I landed the job I had before my current one through a Dice ad. My current employer saw my resume on Monster and contacted me. (Does that count as being headhunted? I dunno.) It can work.
The noise/signal ratio is very poor, though. If you get contacted by a prospective employer once per one hundred feelers you send out, you’re doing well. And you WILL be inundated by hundreds of offers from everything from simple scam artists through MLM schemes to resume services. And, of course, headhunters/placement agencies - I think I actually had one interview arranged through an agency. It happened to be a gadawful job, but still…
I got my last job as a direct hire through Monster, about a year ago. The third party stuff was much worse than it had been the last time I looked, 5 years previously. I also had some luck just going directly to relevant company websites and seeing what they had on offer. Craigslist had good local listings, too, if that’s an option.
My company posts job openings on Monster and culls it for potential new employees.
My hiring was because I had my resume on Monster, our recruiter saw it, and called.
Yeah - it can work.
I was, but it was almost five years ago. My husband just found a direct-hire job through CareerBuilder, so you might try there.