Recruiting in China

Hiring Manager: And that sums up what you're looking for.
Staffing Account Manager: I think we can find what you're looking for. Let me ask you, what salary range are you looking at and do you already have an approved budget for this position?
HM: We're looking for someone in the $60-70,000 range, preferrably the 60 - that's what we start people out at in this department, and they'll need about five years of experience.
SAM: $60,000-$70,000 is a bit low for this position - especially if it's as important as you say. Do you have any flexibility?
HM: My best developer is making $70,000 right now and he has 12 years of experience. If I bring someone else in higher, my whole team will be at my door hollering for a raise.
SAM: What about someone with good potential but maybe not the degree of experience you just detailed. Entry level programmers are making $50,000, and that's just with an IS Degree.
HM: I don't need entry level - I have to have someone with real experience who is going to stick around and finish this project. Send me what you have.

**Back at the Staffing Office an hour later**
Staffing Account Manager: And that's what we need - in the $60-70,000 range.
Recruiter: Does this one have to walk on water or would the trick with the fishes and loaves do it?
SAM: Let's just send him what we have.

That little scenario is fictitious, but it plays out at staffing firms across the country every day. Salaries and job skill lists are written for positions and sent out to third party firms with the hope that a firm will turn up the diamond in the rough who has perfect skills and doesn't know their own worth. Recruiters out of desperation send what they have, and hiring managers, desperate themselves, often hire whatever they can get.

It's a bit like a woman asking you if she looks fat in her pants. If you're a contingency recruiter (dating), you'll be booted out the door. If you're in house (married), you can't be honest without taking the blame for the nice dinners and never going with her to the gym.

Honesty. Is that what we really want in business and life, or do we just want everything to magically work out?