Haldane Associates - Any HR people out there?

Or anyone who has used this company?

They want me to sign up with them. They will teach me interviewing and negotiation skills (which I can get for free from another company as part of my severance), but more importantly, they will identify other types of jobs that I am qualified for and may be able to get me a job in something besides programming. While I love to program, my skills are starting to become obsolete.

The downside is that they want a fee which is more than one month of expenses. So, if it takes more than a year to find a job, I’m going to be in trouble sooner than I would have otherwise.

Has anyone heard of this company? Any experiences?

Is this true: Headhunters won’t place people who are out of work, because when they place a person from a company, they can contact the company the person is leaving and get more business.

I’ll probably have more questions later.

One more question - if you have been involved in hiring, has the person’s salary history affected your decision to hire?

Bumping this to help Zyada get an answer.

To that, I’ll say yes. It didn’t exclude someone who was qualified-but we were definately cautious about those whose salary history was far more than what we planned to pay.

I know almost nothing about Haldane Associates.

I’m sure there are some headhunters who work the way you describe, but I think more often it’s simply that they call the company and ask to be connected to ‘X’ department, and hope they get someone who’s qualified for what they are looking for.

That is one thing I thought would happen.

The headhunter types always tell me that if your salary is low for your experience, you may not get hired because you aren’t being “valued” and therefore must not be wonderful.

BTW, I’ve decided to not take their kind offer. 2000+ dollars up front and they won’t guarantee that I’ll get a job does not sound like what I need to do right now. If I get a job and then want to look at different options I might give them a call.