gamerecruiter.com are these people legit ???
polycounter lvl 18
edited for privacy
*removed gamerecruiter.com/kenny carvalho email*
*removed gamerecruiter.com/kenny carvalho email*
Replies
My .02
all in all i am a big enemy of the "middle man" concept so even if these peopel are legit i think they are trying to screw me over.
PARANOIA MODE is "SO" ON ^^
I have worked with many artists and level designers in the past and they are placed, it is legit. When I wrote this email, I knew about you back in the Make Something Unreal contest because I wanted you to join my, then Mod at the time, called Dissonance.
I saw your work and thought you were talented but after this whole situation you really showed your professionalism. I don't mind questioning a company in anything you do...whether it you talking with an Indie studio when they are promising you crazy "perks" or us at GameRecruiter.com, but to do in this way is really uncalled for.
If you don't deal with Recruiters, that is fine, ignore the email or respond professionally that you don't want to get contacted anymore, etc. Whatever bad rep recruiters have in the industry, don't think everyone is the same. We are not like some of our competitors that just flood your Resume around and hope to get lucky. In the same time they are screwing your value in the Marketplace since now companies won't hire you for a while since they have your Resume on file from a Recruiter. You should interview your Recruiter. Ask for references, see what type of credentials he/or she has. Ask them what is their favorite game and why. See if they are gamers or just a used car salesman.
At Poop: That is not true Ben about the exclusive searches. We do have many jobs that are on WebPages...true. It is just when we get a contract from a company we get all their jobs. But I can assure you that we get exclusive searches and have placed many VPs and have started many studios here. We are recruiting for a division of a studio right now exclusively. You can go on Monster or even their own site and you won't see this position. If they were announcing a job such as Sports Programmer for Bioware they would then in tern reveal they are getting into the Sports arena. Some studios want to keep what types of projects they are working on to a minimum. Not even employees at the studios know. Execs give recruiters a bad name to the artist and programmers sine they dont want anyone to see that they can get a Lead title and/or pay raise if they leave. We deal with many of the Execs and Hiring managers rather than HR, so we get usually a good 3-4 week advance before a job is even advertised. Does it stay exclusive at a company like us...no of course not. A company will lose many dollars if a project gets delayed all due to not advertising and dealing with a Recruiter that takes 6 months to fill a single job.
Like I said, you dont have to like Recruiters, but you should hear them out sometime. Notice I did not use template emails. I hate that more than anything, especially to artists. I have an Art Degree and love Art even though I was never a very good Game Artist. We also Interview the person to make sure they are qualified and fit the company culture we are recruiting for I wonder if other Recruiters do that...
We take to time to get to know the candidate to not just place them but to build a relationship. Most of our business is based on referrals. To end, just one word of advice when you get a recruiter contact you .interview them and make sure they interview you.
Another thing about hat example you used. Say there was a 70k salary and get 10k.....You would think that they will give you 80k instead if you did it alone. Not true. That means you will get 80 k plus say 85k the next year....that is 165k in 2 years. If they had only 70 k for the position then its 70 and 75k....145 k total....so for our 10k commission the company already saved 10 grand in the budget, They are going to just pay us to get that 70k and in the long run paying us a small fee will save them money. It is not coming out of the salary at all.
Hope that made sense .but trust me I had the same idea of Recruiters as you did, before I see all the work we do with getting travel arrangements for interviews, looking for schools for someones daughter that is part of the Swim team or is an Equestrian and needs to know where all the local stables were located, or research school systems, crime rates, etc for each one of our candidates that have any worries about moving. Especially for candidates that have families. It all pays off in the end when 2 years later they contact you and thank you for the tremendous job they are at now etc .sounds cheesy but it does make you feel like you affected someone in a positive way.
why didt you just say your form parasyticmoon than i would have known who iam talking to
Thank you for the edit post.
And I am not mad at you....just mad at George Bush...ahh so much easier taking everything out on him...feel better already...sorry, from now on I will recruit with the Parasytic Moon sig...heh
It's like "hey, you have experience now, i'll talk to you". I emailed 3 recruiter companies when looking for a game development position and they said i'd be updated on my status and not one kept me informed.
Just email the company directly, you stand more of a chance at HR or someone in the company reviewing your work than you will with a recruiter unless you have some experience.
Just email the company directly, you stand more of a chance at HR or someone in the company reviewing your work than you will with a recruiter unless you have some experience.
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If you have experience you still have a better chance with HR/etc. When I first started looking around at game dev jobs maybe 1/10 places would get back to me. Now that I've got a bit on my resume half of them at least write back and I managed a lot more positive interviews.
The thing about middle men you stated ..isn't a Liquid Development, that you have worked with in the past, like a Middle Man for Art Outsourcing? Isn't that the same thing...they get contracts from a Developer/Publisher and then charge outside artists at a lower price and make profit. They bring a service since it is harder for an individual artist to get individual contracts from a studio since Producers usually want that 1 point of contact to deal with hence where a Liquid has a benefit. Companies that contact us want for instance a top Graphics Programmer, if they are not getting the Resumes for this job, and really need this position filled, then they come to us We will then call other companies and use a heavy referral system and see if any of the Graphics programmers are interested in a change. The companies we represent will not be doing that. We then heavily Interview them and really make sure they will fit the position and culture. That is what they pay for IT WILL NOT AFFECT YOUR FINAL PAY.
For an artist or anyone else we really walk the candidate throughout the whole process. Rewrite Resumes, fill people in on the company culture and bios of the people who will be interviewing them, taking care of living situations, deal with VISA issues, etc. For the client we really make sure that when we submit someone to them that we did all our due diligence on this person. So when we do send a final resume and matrix to a client they pay attention to it since they know all the steps we take to make sure this person matches at least 90% of what the company was asking for.
The thing is Recruiters are not for everyone. An example of people that need to use Recruiters are the very seasoned people for one (VPs, Leads, Directors, etc). These people can not just submit to a company since they want to remain confidential and do not want to deal with the He Said, She Said rumors that travel very fast in this incestuous industry. We usually deal with the Hiring Managers and usually they are the only ones who see the resume. So we are a great way to remain confidential so that your current employer doesnt know that you are currently looking for a new career.
Lee3Dee: Lee, unfortunately Companies that we represent are looking for the experienced talent. People with less than 2 years experience our clients can get themselves. When someone approaches us and doesnt have the experience at the time, like yourself, we will then offer to help you in other ways. I did offer lists of companies to contact and try and help your search at that time. I am not sure if any other Recruiter took the time to help you in that way. Some people just see $ from a candidate, I want to build relationships in this industry. I love it and have a great passion for it. You are an artist and I have a deep respect for artists and feel like One of You. I am really excited that you have a great position. I wish you the best of luck in your gig.
Malcolm: I, and I feel all recruiters appreciate that. We have a database of over 50,000 names and we keep track of who has been contacted and have notes. Every email is recorded from the late 90's on. If you mention you are not interested and are happy, we usually put a note and will not contact you for a while. Recruiters will also read past emails to see what was said in the past, for instance if someone said yes if something ever came up in Alaska then I would be interested kind of thing.
We don't just recruit for random jobs...we recruit for specific jobs.
This is a good topic of discussion, for those who are interested in recruiters and headhunters.
Everyone of the people that work at GameRecruiter.com come from the Game Industry, either as an internal recruiter for a Game Company, HR department, Producer, Programmer, etc.
That is why I mentioned interviewing your Recruiter. I am still running an Indie Game Project and am the South Florida IGDA Chapter Coordinator. I help out the community and even flew Mr Rockstar here to Fort Lauderdale to give a 2 Day Zbrush Workshop.
So if anyone else has any questions please ask...I am happy this thread got started like Lee said since it will answer many questions that people have about us.
Every company we deal with offer benefits, so that should not be a deterrent for moving to the states. We won't reveal the money range until we actually feel that the person is qualified after an interview process and see what the candidate is looking for in terms of projects, company culture, and things of that nature.
Sledgy: No problem, I just really wanted to explain what we actually do and how we go about doing it. Recruiters are synonomis with sharks or leeches or skumminess. I can assure you that not all Recruiters are the same. Any other questions you might have about GameRecruiter.com I would be happy to answer.