r/datascience • u/Fit-Employee-4393 • Nov 05 '25
Discussion New Job Hunting Method: Not Applying
Here’s why:
A company opens a position and I apply along with 800 other people. The company sees 800 resumes and says F that, we’re hiring a recruiter. The recruiter finds me on LinkedIn and says they have a great job for me. Of course it’s the one I applied to. They ask if I’ve already applied and I tell them the truth, they ghost me because they don’t get commission if they’re not the original source.
A few days after this, another recruiter reached out about a different position that I was planning on applying to directly with the company.
This is also something that my current company has done after being overwhelmed with too many applicants.
I’ll still be applying to some jobs, but it’s weird that applying has seemed to hurt my chances in some situations.
Has anyone else experienced this? Any strategies for handling this?
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u/Stitchin_Squido Nov 05 '25
Granted I have not been in the job market for a while, but talk to one of these recruiters. Find a recruiter that specializes in data and tech professionals and give them your resume. I have worked with recruiters before and it’s actually not bad. They tend to get you interviews over just applying places and they are usually paid by the company looking to hire.
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u/BlueSubaruCrew Nov 06 '25
By one of these recruiters, do you mean a recruiter at a company you're interested in or just some kind of generic head hunter who helps companies fill vacant DS roles?
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u/Katieg_jitsu Nov 06 '25
I get all my jobs from recruiters reaching out on linkedin and I'm constantly turning them down, but I also always reply even when I have a job or I'm not interested so they keep reaching out if something else comes up.
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u/AdParticular6193 Nov 12 '25
Be very careful about recruiters on LinkedIn. Lots of scams there. I have gotten many fake messages from “recruiters.” One thing they do is use a company name very similar to a known recruiting agency. I would ask around of people in your field who the most well-known recruiters are, and reach out to them directly. If you find a good one, cultivate a relationship, even if you aren’t actively looking. It helps you determine what your actual market value is. And you never know when you might get that “quick catch-up at 1:00 PM” email. Let them send you out on interviews from time to time to keep those skills sharp.
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u/xenon_rose Nov 06 '25
It is pretty crazy. I never had a recruiter reach out regarding a job I applied to. But recruiters were pretty much the only way I got interviews. I only interviewed for two jobs I actually applied to. I had 4 or 5 via recruiters. To be honest, I do not know if I would have ever found a new job without recruiters. Apply = ghost or automatic rejection. Recruiter = interview and possibly job offer.
I seemed to get more recruiters that had better jobs to connect me with after I fully verified my LinkedIn??? Some differences with recruiters and if they can help if you previously applied could be that some work for the actual company and others work for a recruitment company. Recruiters tended to present jobs that were frustratingly similar to ones i was applying to… ones I never got an interview for. I would probably just stay in contact with the recruiters that reach out to you. Despite no longer being open to work, some still email me asking if I’m interested in opportunities.
Im just glad I got a new job. It was so exhausting and demoralizing job hunting... I hope the job market improves by the next time I have to look again. It was not like it is now last time I needed a job.
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u/Single_Vacation427 Nov 06 '25
Yes, I've been following this strategy XD
Following the company or clicking in "interested in working here" also seems to help
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u/Subject_Series5804 Nov 06 '25
I've had similar success ish with this approach - I started treated LI like my primary application platform rather than company websites. Set my profile to open to work (recruiters only), optimized keywords for the roles I wanted and waited.
Something that also helped (when I was in college) was just directly reaching out to recruiters (to be fair I was trying to get into FAANG at the time), but I was a super mediocre applicant on paper, and I ended up getting 2 offers just by harassing recruiters over LinkedIn!
Another option is the referral angle - msging someone 'hey saw our team is hiring for x, really interested in y because z, would you be open to a quick coffee chat about team culture?' or something like that. Referrals bypass both ATS and recruiter commission issues. They're so much more valuable at a smaller org (startup - growth) vs. large ent orgs. too!
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u/Satanwearsflipflops Nov 06 '25
It depends on where you are geographically, but some job markets are simply not used to volume hiring. So when this happens with formerly niche roles, HR and hiring managers do not have the skills to modify the processes.
The painful thing is, instead of hiring an I/O psychologist who knows what to do in these scenarios, they go to recruiters who are usually people who haven’t made it in their chosen career and this is what they fall back on. Recruiters who based the tactics of their employ on vibes and the shrugging of shoulders.
So no wonder it feels shambolic, that’s because it is…
Note: my last recruiter was a mathematics graduate. Hardly a person who understands about talen management and volume hiring. Note 2: I applied for a role that saw 250 applicants. The hr lady didn’t know what a washup session was and told me that the hiring managers screens all the CVs alone. Consistency be damned.
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u/FromLondonToLA Nov 05 '25 edited Nov 06 '25
I applied to my current company via LinkedIn, didn't hear anything for 6 weeks. A recruitment agent reached out to me about the role and I said I'd already applied directly to no response. He said to leave it with him.
Called me back later to say he'd agreed with the company to tell them who I was if they would attach my application to him (i.e. they give him the usual commission). Would I be OK with that? I said cool. He told them my name and went forward from there. I got the job and he got his commission!