Shoddy (and lazy) recruitment practices

I was chatting with a recruiter (who I'm calling Stuart) the other day who said he'd recently had a couple of instances of recruiters, from another agency, phoning up pretending to be a candidate in order to get names of companies who have live vacancies.  Stuart asked the recruiter (who at that stage he thought was a jobseeker) to send over his CV so they could talk about suitable opportunities.  The chap must have just picked up a CV from his inbox and sent it over after changing the name and current job.  Sadly for him, Jason recognised that the rest of the CV was from one of their current candidates! 

Surely the rouge recruiter would have been better using his resources to call potential clients rather than try to pinch them off the competition. I like to think I'm pretty aware of many of the tactics recruiters use  - but surely no one still teaches them this stuff?!

Comments

[Stephen O'Donnell]

I wouldn't call it shoddy, or shady, practise to keep a close eye on your competition. Let's face it, if you specialise in a particular sector, and a competitor is advertising related vacancies, you really want to know who his/her client is. Recruitment is a very competitive business, and you cannot ignore your rivals, who are likely to be working on the same contingency assignments, for the same clients - and therefore pursuing the same candidates. As a recruiter, I have received many calls from rivals, purporting to be candidates, enquiring about my vacancies. They usually give themselves away under some direct questioning, and sometimes even when you only ask for their phone number.
I would draw the line at sending a fake cv (which is fraudulent) to a recruiter, but must confess to having made placements as a result of this method. Equally I have often called rivals, openly stating who I was, and asking about their vacancies. You'd be surprised how open they were about their clients.

I say, that in order to ensure you are providing a better service to your clients, you need to know about you competitors. Ignore them at your peril.

[Stephen O'Donnell]

PS. In 1987, as a trainee with HMS, we were encouraged to go and register with rival agencies, to see their interview technique, and find out about current vacancies. I was too embarassed to do it, though.