I’m in the middle of looking for a different job (currently unhappilly employed), and two different headhunters have strongly suggested that I be open to “contract for hire” positions. As I understand it, the new employer pays the headhunter, and the headhunter pays me with the explicit understanding that the new employer will hire me at the end of 6 months or whatever.
Is this legit? Have other people done this? Is this an arrangement being pushed by headhunters to get guaranteed fees, or by HR departments to replace the “evaluation period?” Or a little of both?
I had just never heard of this before, but I haven’t been looking for a job since 1999 or so.
TD
“Contract For Hire” … ugh. It has become more and more common in recent years, particularly after the dot com bust. Is it “legit”? Mmmm … well, it certainly is not as good as being hired outright, IMHO. Personally, I’d accept such a position if I absolutely had to, but if I had other options, I’d take the other options first. When I was unemployed last year I was able to successfully avoid the contract-for-hire situation, but just barely.
While your description of it is accurate enough, the devil, as usual, is in the details. Some companies are on the up-and-up and use it as an “evaluation period” as you say. I also know several people who have ended up at sweat-shops that have absolutely no intention of hiring “full-time”. They’ll work you contract as long as they can get away with it. If you complain or make noise, poof, out the door you go.
That’s pretty much what I’m afraid of. Since these headhunters came to me, I don’t really know anything about them (both found my resume on Monster or CareerBuilder). Is there any way to check on their track record? And even if the headhunter is legit, is there any way to know if the hiring company is on the up-and-up?
The best that can be said with the info you provided is that maybe it’s legit. I may be inappropriately delving into advice and opinion here, but some mod may come along and move or close this if they feel the need.
These head hunters…If you want to better guage their legitimacy, think about their method of contact. Phone call? snail mail? email? The closer their commique approaches to a form letter (that may have been sent to thousands), the less likely it is that you will find a follow-up worth your while. Conversely, the more indicators you find that a person actually laid eyes on your resume aand is making personal contact with you about it, the more likely it is to be a legitimate offer. —Buth that’s MHO, I can’t claim that as unvarnished fact.
Is there any reason you won’t post the names here? Have YOU head of them? Do they advertise in your local paper? Have you Googled their company name?
Do you have a very unusual skill that very few people are hired to perform? The more offbeat your skill, the more likely it is you’re being hunted.
The first firm is CDI Corp. The guy I’ve been talking to took a great deal of time on the phone and asked me some pretty tough questions about what I wanted to do, etc. He told me his firm would handle me as a W2 employee during the “contracting” period, after which I would start working for the new company. He seems like what he claims to be - a recruiter who’s been doing this for 20 years. And I mis-spoke in my OP - he got my name from my friend, who reffered me. He got my friend’s name off of Monster. In both cases he approached us with a phone call.
The second firm is Sapphire Technologies. The woman I’ve been talking to there is much more pushy, talking up contacts that she has (“I’d love to work there if I could” is one quote from her). She approached me by email, but it seems like a personal email.
I’m a Java/J2EE developer with lots of experience working on Web applications. I’m in demand, I’m pretty sure, but I’m not super-rare.
So, looking through this, I would probably trust CDI, which looks like a large, well-established company. I don’t think I would contract through Sapphire.
Temp firms have been doing this for a long time with lower end positions. I was hired 10 years ago as a shipping clerk just that way and it wasn’t at all a new idea then. I hadn’t heard that have moved up to positions like yours, but I’m not surprised. This give you the opportunity to evaluate your potential employer as well, and makes any separation a very simple thing with little chance of a lawsuit, which, by the way, is why my company went that route.
These kind of headhunters are every bit as legitimate as the more traditional kind – which means keep both eyes open, both ears open, get everything in writing, don’t believe half of what they tell you and beware you don’t get someone who is just trying to get you into any job at all so they can get a quick commission.
These both appear to me to be legitmate businesses, and their offers are real. but not quite what they appear to be.
What they’re REALLY asking is for you to give them permission to add you to a list they will shop around to their corporate clients – a list of people willing be hired under those conditions. That makes your name somewhat more valuable to the headhunter-- sometimes their contract call for perfomance criteria like being able to show x number of new, qualified candidates for job y with skill z. Even if the comanies never talk to you, you have some value to the headhunter.
This is all really a numbers game. Corporate HR departments are judge to a large degree on “retention” statisics. When they hire someone is it a good match, does the person really have the claimed skills, does the employee “stick”? One reason incompetent people last so ling in jobs is that no one involved in the hiring wants to admit the mistakes made. So they use this as an alternative, and people feel much more free to get rid of you if you’re less than perfect. Getting rid of you wan’t be a corporate failure, just another temp moving on. Their statistics won’t even show a blip it they go through a hundred of you.
This is all about reducing their anxiety about you. Again, this is opinion, but I would not walk out of a permanent gig with bennies for this situation, unless your present situation is desperately bad.
Ask what haapens if your boss decides he doesn’t like you two weeks in. Is the headhunter going to pay you while they show you around more? I doubt it.
I got my initial position in a Fortune 4 company via a headhunter. While I was recruited specifically for a particular direct-hire position in my company, we did come to an understanding that if I didn’t get the position (which I did) I was open to “contract for hire.” I only assume that since they were on the up-and-up with ultimately getting the job I did, that they were also on the up-and-up with the contract-for-hire offer, too.
Prior to that I worked for a contracting company for another huge, competing company to my current company. There was never a promise or word uttered, but there was always the unspoken possibility that we could have been direct-hired from the contract pool, as we saw it happen quite frequently.
Has anybody had a bad experience with a contract for hire? Did they not hire you in the end? Ponder Stibbons, is this sweatshop story from personal exprerience?
Basically, I’m looking for both sides. But I’ll keep it all in mind, and go into anything I get with my eyes open.
Doppers rock! Thanks to everybody for all the info.
TD
I currently push it for my hires since the first time I tried to fire a new employee.
I hired a man in his mid 50s. There was a hiring board and we all agreed he seemed to have the stuff. After the first 8 weeks it was clear he couldn’t do the business. I went to HR and asked how long of a probation period I had before it was difficult to get rid of him. She said that my company had none as such but we were an “at will” company. I decided to give the guy another project and more personal attention. He failed miserable. I went back to HR and said that it was time to get rid of him. They said that he had been with us too long and I needed to go through “the process” to get rid of him. The Process was a three month chore that really added to my work load and stress levels, with a daily journal needing to be kept and weekly progress meetings.
Since then, I do temp-to-perm. If the guy is really good, I convert to permanent very quickly. 3-4 weeks. If the guy is average, I give him the full 6 months to prove himself. If he sucks, I get rid of him very quickly.
I get fewer candidates because of it. Many have the same concerns you do. If a person has a job they are often reluctant to risk quiting for a “temp” position. But the truth is, this is no more “temp” than other companies who have an offical 90 day probation period. The only difference is the process that I go through to make sure that the probation period will be recognized. Still, this narrows the field for me because usually only people who are out of work will apply.
If you have doubts, ask both the head hunter and then the interviewer why they are doing temp-to-perm. I am usually very up front when I’m asked this.
Sorry, I just thought of more that might help you.
From the head-hunter side, they never ever send me a resume without running it past the candidate first. Just this week I spoke to one head-hunter that I use regularly. He said he had a hot prospect and would be sending me a resume on Friday. He called me back Friday and said that the woman decided it was too far to drive. If the head-hunter is a good one, you will get to say who sees your resume and who doesn’t.
I’m feeling a lot better about the whole situation - it kind of sucks that a company wouldn’t trust me to do a great job, but I guess they can’t know how awesome I am until I show them, right? 
Has anybody had a negative experience with contract for hire? What I’m particularly worried about is “contract for hire” turning out to just be “contract.” Is there any way to know for sure? I’m guessing not, since that would defeat the purpose - the company wants easy separation if things don’t work out.
TD
Oh, all three of my headhunters assured me that they would run a potential position by me before submitting my resume.
I continued to receive calls from other headhunters for about two years after I assumed my previous position (in the same company). They presumably had my resume from Monster and the State of Michigan sites. They always asked before submitting my resume.
Every once in a while I still get headhunter calls. I imagine that it comes from references, such as, “I’m not interested, but xxx may be.” (which is the original headhunter got a hold of me).