A good friend of mine just relayed that he has left two decades of high profile record company and marketing agency jobs behind to become an executive recruiter - and I couldn’t be happier – for a couple of reasons.  This is a good man, who is smart enough to write the majority of his own proverbial ticket.  I’m happy because he has chosen a career path based on his interpersonal skills and his desire to connect people with professional situations that suit them.  I fix people’s computers when I go over to their houses, he hooks them up with a good job – he wins.

I’ve had my own fair-to-midland experiences with recruiters and hiring execs.  Most are pleasant, but ultimately not in a position to help everyone they come accross due to the unfortunate mathematic ratio of candidates to open positions.  Certainly very few of them seem cognizant of, let alone sympathetic to, the tough situation most job seekers are naturally in.  And even fewer seem compelled to display even a basic level of professional courtesy.  In the music industry, good people have adopted very very bad habits and no one can do much about it given the industry’s current state.

My personal and professional propensity for start up and tech-oriented companies has put me in some exciting yet ultimately short-lived work situations.  Dot coms, indie labels, and HD concert companies have been damn exciting, but not too good for the ol’ longevity fix. I do love being employee #3 of a start up, but that does seem proportional to the amount of times I’ve been, ehm, “in between opportunites”.  So, I know better than most what it’s like to be blown through or ignored by an entertainment marketing executive.   The accumulation of roughshod treatment I’ve received while job seeking has made me keenly aware of how my own behavior will change when I am in a position to hire and/or deal with applicants.  And that brings me back to my friend and his new career path.  He has already erased, in one week of communication, my feeling that recruiters are basically the human resources version of a overcaffeinated day trader who has swapped jockeying commodities for resumes.  Now if he could only get more entertainment marketing executives to realize that it’s good form to reply / respond to that small group of 2nd interviewers when you hire someone else…