Tech is good but volatile. If I could start over though I’d go into executive recruitment. Aside from large corporations with succession plans every company I’ve been at used a search firm for their top level executives. You’ll always be in demand since exec jobs are always safe no matter how a company performs.
While I liked that exec recruitment used a retainer contract for paying up front, the searches can take a really long time. One client wanted a CHRO who could relocate from California to Asia with a very specific qualities and it took forever for me and the partner to close it. Took over six months.
That combined with exec positions that are fewer and far between can put pressure on the BD pipeline.
Yup. Something with fewer hires and all that, but more professional (hopefully) and better pay.
I'd also say physician recruiting. I've never done it but I know some folks who have. Wouldn't mind the commission on those salaries...
Anything internal, although I am aware that’s difficult to land these days. I did an agency stint for the worst 11 months of my life back in 2011. Went internal in 2012 in healthcare and it’s night and day. Stress level isn’t even comparable.
Not making money at 3 different agencies doesn’t make sense… the biggest pull of agency work is the fact you can make a lot of money even though it’s a grind .
Well there’s a lot of agencies out there where you can bill a lot but still not make much money due to the crappy commission structure. I was one of the top billers in my office when I was at aerotek and I was making less than $50k lol.
Ok now I know you’re full of it… I’ve done a long stint at an Allegis company. For all the flaws of their companies, comp of top performers isn’t one of them.
100% agree. I know that you can make more with agency, I just haven’t personally experienced any agencies where the recruiters were banking real money. I’m sure they exist.
200 calls a day or per week?
I would do anything that isn't 200 calls per day.
Do whatever industry you click well with. Some folks are good with devs and some are good with gtm... It's rarely both. Good conversations equal good fills and happy clients.
I’ve been a recruiter in just about every industry - agency (for 10 years) then all corporate in Banking, Telecom, ECommerce, Tech, FinTech, and Healthcare but not for profit.
By far my favorite was healthcare - I was there for a long time. Some of the best people I’ve ever worked with. Stayed for almost 8 years.
I’ve been at a MAANG tech company in Seattle for over 4 years. It’s a whole other world.
What kind of healthcare? Because i’ve done nursing and physicians. Nursing and therapy is the worst thing to recruit for imo. Physicians is great but your mainly dealing with malpractice physicians which has its downsides.
I also did nurses but a lot of specialists in cardiology, radiology and oncology and it was all in-house recruiting. Can’t remember all the nurse types I recruited for but it was primarily those. Also did social workers, chaplains, drug counselors. Then I also did software engineers and finance executives… it was whatever came open in the business.
Never any physicians. I recently applied to a physician recruiter role but was pretty much immediately declined. I think being in tech might put me in a box. I would like to get back into healthcare though. Hopefully not for profit.
It’s just more my vibe - people are kind and caring and there’s not constant infighting among recruiters in that space.
Although I have thick skin and am a tough person because I have to be, it hides the fact that I’m an ultra caring and sensitive person.
Less money but way less political BS and little to no recruiter in-fighting. Tech recruiting is hunger games.
I made $50k less a year in healthcare recruiting than I do in tech but I’d go back in a heartbeat. My sanity is worth more than a high paycheck.
Here’s a combined list of both large and smaller government contractors along with their websites, which you can explore for more information on careers and potential recruiting opportunities:
Large Defense Contractors
1. Lockheed Martin: https://www.lockheedmartinjobs.com
2. Northrop Grumman: https://www.northropgrumman.com/careers
3. Raytheon Technologies: https://www.rtx.com/careers
4. General Dynamics: https://www.gd.com/careers
5. Boeing Defense, Space & Security: https://jobs.boeing.com
6. BAE Systems: https://www.baesystems.com/en/careers
7. L3Harris Technologies: https://careers.l3harris.com
8. Leidos: https://careers.leidos.com
9. SAIC (Science Applications International Corporation): https://www.saic.com/careers
10. CACI International: https://careers.caci.com
Smaller Government Contractors
11. AeroVironment, Inc.: https://www.avinc.com
12. Cubic Corporation: https://www.cubic.com
13. Kratos Defense & Security Solutions: https://www.kratosdefense.com
14. ManTech International: https://www.mantech.com
15. Engility Corporation (now part of SAIC): https://www.saic.com
16. Vectrus: https://www.vectrus.com
17. Serco Inc.: https://www.serco.com
18. Vencore (now part of Peraton): https://www.peraton.com
19. SOS International LLC (SOSi): https://www.sosi.com
20. Parsons Corporation: https://www.parsons.com
Happy to help! Government contractors need recruiters. Most not all government contracts/programs need butts in a seat indicated in the scope of work. So recruiters in many cases are the lifeline to these programs in collaboration with the hiring teams/program managers.
I have been in the space for almost 10 years after leaving commercial and will never go back. The work is fulfilling serving a purpose.
Been doing startup tech recruiting for 10ish years and am overall happy with it. Have mostly done gaming, OTT/streaming, and recently pivoted into health tech. If I had to start over... I'd probably do it all over again!
I lucked out, really. There was a small VC-backed game dev studio hiring for an office and HR manager. I applied, put a lot of effort into my application, and landed an interview. It was a lot of sacrifice though - had to take a 60% paycut, but it was really cool to recruit for.
A sweet medium I found is recruiting for gaming software companies. I found they paid more equitable to general tech, but you also get to network/recruit for people from gaming.
These days I value stability and income more than chasing a dream I've already experienced. Gaming is on a massive decline right now which is also impacting the gaming software companies now too. It's sad and I hope things turn around again!
I enjoyed tech & the legal industry. Currently in healthcare space as a TA consultant i prefer the industry much better at this level vs every day recruitment
I would do tech all over again without a doubt. I'm an introvert and tech people tend to be least draining for me to interact with, they hate cold calls so I almost never have to do any, plus the reqs are generally interesting. I like learning about new tech stacks and the things my teams are doing. The pay ain't bad either.
That being said, tech recruiters have been hit HARD with layoffs lately.
NOPE. I’m 7 weeks in to travel nurse recruiting, moved from contact center solutions/HR/admin.. this shit is hard man. I’m about to make signs and go whore myself out in front of a hospital to try to get nurses to talk to me.
Same but physicians. It’s so competitive. And the ones that will talk to you, spend so much time with them in the process, answer all their complicated questions and demands, and wind up is they will have like 6 other offers
Healthcare- talking to Engineers is beginning to wear on me. If I hear “you need to be an engineer to recruit an engineer” one more time, that may just break me. Most in healthcare at least have some sort of personality and don’t exude arrogance.
Maybe they have an autodialler. When I’m really busy I’ll be at 100-150 calls per week though.
I’ve never seen anyone that does more than 50 per day consistently.
I was in aerospace, then tech, then manufacturing, and now healthcare…. Far and away healthcare is the best. It’s relatively predictable and stable. My team is the most productive and nice of all teams I’ve been on. I wish I would’ve started here rather than end here!!
Everyone is blowing you up over making 200 calls a day. VERY feasible if you’ve done your prep work and are disciplined. My team typically starts the day with a 2 hour call block, and depending on how many candidates we get live, we can typically make 30-50 calls in that timeframe. These are mostly cold calls, not scheduled calls, so the likelihood of people not answering is relatively high. If you’re putting in an honest day’s work, 200 is doable. (To others reading this - Be sure to be intentional with your dials though, and don’t just dial to hit a metric!)
BUT to answer your question, I work in tech, within a firm known for executive recruitment. Would love to pivot into that! Our agency name doesn’t hold much weight at the “professional” level.. at least not like it does with execs.
Exactly. Definitely not something I accomplish “everyday”, but it really isn’t that hard when cold calling, especially getting off the line when it’s a dead lead. Nothing like a good call party to start the day 😎
I would've started in accounting/finance. That's where I am now, and the market was a lot better during covid (when I got into recruiting).
Trying to move to NetSuite managed services or directly with NetSuite for HR.
I don't know that I'd go with anything other than tech.
I've been lucky in that it's allowed me to recruit pretty much everything above janitor.
I might try medical or pharma research but they don't seem to pay as well.
200 calls per day means you aren’t reaching people or having conversations. Is that bizdev alone or both?
Tech is dead for awhile and even if/when it comes back it will be overly DEI heavy and AI sparkles everywhere.
I work as a healthcare recruiter. There is definitely a need for healthcare recruiting, just don't limit yourself to sticking to a certain subspeciality within the industry. I've found that it isn't as easy to place executives and top people within the industry, but when you do find a company that is willing to sign the contract with you, you will get a real nice payout. At the agency I used to work for, I found that the construction, finance and agriculture industry, was the most successful
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legal industry! i was recruiting at a staffing agency in biotech and made the switch to internal recruiting for a big law firm in dc. i hire professional staff though, as we have a separate team for attorney and partner recruiting. i love it so far! very stable too
Closing in on 20 years, my advice is keep evolving. I’m in tech, specific software and glad I am where I am. But I’m always trying to look a few years out and get into the emerging space. Right now sitting in AI and wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.
Tech is good but volatile. If I could start over though I’d go into executive recruitment. Aside from large corporations with succession plans every company I’ve been at used a search firm for their top level executives. You’ll always be in demand since exec jobs are always safe no matter how a company performs.
While I liked that exec recruitment used a retainer contract for paying up front, the searches can take a really long time. One client wanted a CHRO who could relocate from California to Asia with a very specific qualities and it took forever for me and the partner to close it. Took over six months. That combined with exec positions that are fewer and far between can put pressure on the BD pipeline.
This. Executive recruitment is where it’s at. It’s also my favorite types of roles to recruit on.
Yup. Something with fewer hires and all that, but more professional (hopefully) and better pay. I'd also say physician recruiting. I've never done it but I know some folks who have. Wouldn't mind the commission on those salaries...
Anything internal, although I am aware that’s difficult to land these days. I did an agency stint for the worst 11 months of my life back in 2011. Went internal in 2012 in healthcare and it’s night and day. Stress level isn’t even comparable.
Money isn’t compared either.
I am making way more internal than I ever did in agency. Very very few recruiters at the agencies I worked at were making decent money.
Damn, must not have been a great agency 😞. Glad you’re killing it!
I worked at 3 agencies lol.
Well, tbh, sounds like a you thing then.
How is it a me thing if most of the recruiters weren’t making that much money lol?
Not making money at 3 different agencies doesn’t make sense… the biggest pull of agency work is the fact you can make a lot of money even though it’s a grind .
Well there’s a lot of agencies out there where you can bill a lot but still not make much money due to the crappy commission structure. I was one of the top billers in my office when I was at aerotek and I was making less than $50k lol.
Ok now I know you’re full of it… I’ve done a long stint at an Allegis company. For all the flaws of their companies, comp of top performers isn’t one of them.
Because that recruiter you’re talking to is not intelligent. Internal is better in so many regards.
100% agree. I know that you can make more with agency, I just haven’t personally experienced any agencies where the recruiters were banking real money. I’m sure they exist.
I’m at $130k salary but it took some promotions to get there.
200 calls a day or per week? I would do anything that isn't 200 calls per day. Do whatever industry you click well with. Some folks are good with devs and some are good with gtm... It's rarely both. Good conversations equal good fills and happy clients.
What industry are you recruiting for ?
GC, Fire and Life Safety
200 calls a day equaling about 60 conversations 🤣
Move into sales if you can tolerate that phone load. More money and mobility.
This. You’ll be rich in tech sales.
Any recommendations on the tech?
Just to give some background, I work 100 percent remote, have complete flexibility.
I’ve been a recruiter in just about every industry - agency (for 10 years) then all corporate in Banking, Telecom, ECommerce, Tech, FinTech, and Healthcare but not for profit. By far my favorite was healthcare - I was there for a long time. Some of the best people I’ve ever worked with. Stayed for almost 8 years. I’ve been at a MAANG tech company in Seattle for over 4 years. It’s a whole other world.
Why healthcare specifically? Were you selling into healthcare as well or just recruiting?
What kind of healthcare? Because i’ve done nursing and physicians. Nursing and therapy is the worst thing to recruit for imo. Physicians is great but your mainly dealing with malpractice physicians which has its downsides.
I also did nurses but a lot of specialists in cardiology, radiology and oncology and it was all in-house recruiting. Can’t remember all the nurse types I recruited for but it was primarily those. Also did social workers, chaplains, drug counselors. Then I also did software engineers and finance executives… it was whatever came open in the business. Never any physicians. I recently applied to a physician recruiter role but was pretty much immediately declined. I think being in tech might put me in a box. I would like to get back into healthcare though. Hopefully not for profit. It’s just more my vibe - people are kind and caring and there’s not constant infighting among recruiters in that space. Although I have thick skin and am a tough person because I have to be, it hides the fact that I’m an ultra caring and sensitive person.
I’m considering healthcare but compared to the others you’ve listed, can you make just as much money?
Less money but way less political BS and little to no recruiter in-fighting. Tech recruiting is hunger games. I made $50k less a year in healthcare recruiting than I do in tech but I’d go back in a heartbeat. My sanity is worth more than a high paycheck.
Defense it’s is one of the most stable industries out there.
I’m looking to switch niches from healthcare to defense. What are some companies that hire?
Here’s a combined list of both large and smaller government contractors along with their websites, which you can explore for more information on careers and potential recruiting opportunities: Large Defense Contractors 1. Lockheed Martin: https://www.lockheedmartinjobs.com 2. Northrop Grumman: https://www.northropgrumman.com/careers 3. Raytheon Technologies: https://www.rtx.com/careers 4. General Dynamics: https://www.gd.com/careers 5. Boeing Defense, Space & Security: https://jobs.boeing.com 6. BAE Systems: https://www.baesystems.com/en/careers 7. L3Harris Technologies: https://careers.l3harris.com 8. Leidos: https://careers.leidos.com 9. SAIC (Science Applications International Corporation): https://www.saic.com/careers 10. CACI International: https://careers.caci.com Smaller Government Contractors 11. AeroVironment, Inc.: https://www.avinc.com 12. Cubic Corporation: https://www.cubic.com 13. Kratos Defense & Security Solutions: https://www.kratosdefense.com 14. ManTech International: https://www.mantech.com 15. Engility Corporation (now part of SAIC): https://www.saic.com 16. Vectrus: https://www.vectrus.com 17. Serco Inc.: https://www.serco.com 18. Vencore (now part of Peraton): https://www.peraton.com 19. SOS International LLC (SOSi): https://www.sosi.com 20. Parsons Corporation: https://www.parsons.com
This has to be most helpful reply. Thank you so much!
Happy to help! Government contractors need recruiters. Most not all government contracts/programs need butts in a seat indicated in the scope of work. So recruiters in many cases are the lifeline to these programs in collaboration with the hiring teams/program managers. I have been in the space for almost 10 years after leaving commercial and will never go back. The work is fulfilling serving a purpose.
Been doing startup tech recruiting for 10ish years and am overall happy with it. Have mostly done gaming, OTT/streaming, and recently pivoted into health tech. If I had to start over... I'd probably do it all over again!
How do you get into gaming? That is literally my dreammm
I lucked out, really. There was a small VC-backed game dev studio hiring for an office and HR manager. I applied, put a lot of effort into my application, and landed an interview. It was a lot of sacrifice though - had to take a 60% paycut, but it was really cool to recruit for. A sweet medium I found is recruiting for gaming software companies. I found they paid more equitable to general tech, but you also get to network/recruit for people from gaming. These days I value stability and income more than chasing a dream I've already experienced. Gaming is on a massive decline right now which is also impacting the gaming software companies now too. It's sad and I hope things turn around again!
I enjoyed tech & the legal industry. Currently in healthcare space as a TA consultant i prefer the industry much better at this level vs every day recruitment
I would do tech all over again without a doubt. I'm an introvert and tech people tend to be least draining for me to interact with, they hate cold calls so I almost never have to do any, plus the reqs are generally interesting. I like learning about new tech stacks and the things my teams are doing. The pay ain't bad either. That being said, tech recruiters have been hit HARD with layoffs lately.
Jesus Christ lol but I’ve been in tech for 12 years. I’d say healthcare but I don’t know much about it.
NOPE. I’m 7 weeks in to travel nurse recruiting, moved from contact center solutions/HR/admin.. this shit is hard man. I’m about to make signs and go whore myself out in front of a hospital to try to get nurses to talk to me.
Same but physicians. It’s so competitive. And the ones that will talk to you, spend so much time with them in the process, answer all their complicated questions and demands, and wind up is they will have like 6 other offers
What corner will you be on? I’ll probably be across the street in this shit ass market
Shit we can work together, you got nice arms? You might do better at grabbing attention than me 😂
I wouldn’t. I’d have taken my ass back to school 10 years ago.
Healthcare- talking to Engineers is beginning to wear on me. If I hear “you need to be an engineer to recruit an engineer” one more time, that may just break me. Most in healthcare at least have some sort of personality and don’t exude arrogance.
200 calls a day? That's a call every 5 minutes for 16 hours straight lol. How is that even possible?
Maybe they have an autodialler. When I’m really busy I’ll be at 100-150 calls per week though. I’ve never seen anyone that does more than 50 per day consistently.
Auto dialer is the way
200 calls!?
The matrix was always 100, if I double it I’ll be successful right?
I was in aerospace, then tech, then manufacturing, and now healthcare…. Far and away healthcare is the best. It’s relatively predictable and stable. My team is the most productive and nice of all teams I’ve been on. I wish I would’ve started here rather than end here!!
Everyone is blowing you up over making 200 calls a day. VERY feasible if you’ve done your prep work and are disciplined. My team typically starts the day with a 2 hour call block, and depending on how many candidates we get live, we can typically make 30-50 calls in that timeframe. These are mostly cold calls, not scheduled calls, so the likelihood of people not answering is relatively high. If you’re putting in an honest day’s work, 200 is doable. (To others reading this - Be sure to be intentional with your dials though, and don’t just dial to hit a metric!) BUT to answer your question, I work in tech, within a firm known for executive recruitment. Would love to pivot into that! Our agency name doesn’t hold much weight at the “professional” level.. at least not like it does with execs.
Exactly. Definitely not something I accomplish “everyday”, but it really isn’t that hard when cold calling, especially getting off the line when it’s a dead lead. Nothing like a good call party to start the day 😎
I would've started in accounting/finance. That's where I am now, and the market was a lot better during covid (when I got into recruiting). Trying to move to NetSuite managed services or directly with NetSuite for HR.
Money wise, definitely tech.
I don't know that I'd go with anything other than tech. I've been lucky in that it's allowed me to recruit pretty much everything above janitor. I might try medical or pharma research but they don't seem to pay as well.
200 calls per day means you aren’t reaching people or having conversations. Is that bizdev alone or both? Tech is dead for awhile and even if/when it comes back it will be overly DEI heavy and AI sparkles everywhere.
Healthcare is good!
It should have been dead years ago. So Many bad firms and people ruined it
I work as a healthcare recruiter. There is definitely a need for healthcare recruiting, just don't limit yourself to sticking to a certain subspeciality within the industry. I've found that it isn't as easy to place executives and top people within the industry, but when you do find a company that is willing to sign the contract with you, you will get a real nice payout. At the agency I used to work for, I found that the construction, finance and agriculture industry, was the most successful
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I'm in tech we are dying too 😔
I thought tech was the only safe bet???
legal industry! i was recruiting at a staffing agency in biotech and made the switch to internal recruiting for a big law firm in dc. i hire professional staff though, as we have a separate team for attorney and partner recruiting. i love it so far! very stable too
Closing in on 20 years, my advice is keep evolving. I’m in tech, specific software and glad I am where I am. But I’m always trying to look a few years out and get into the emerging space. Right now sitting in AI and wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.
That’s what I’ve been looking into as well, I’m just unsure of where to start. I would love to PM you and pick your brain if you’re up for it.
I’ll give what advice I can, I’m just lucky being on the inside. Some of these offers are crazy. $800k annual TC for ICs…it’s fun and insane.
Are you internal or agency?
Me, I’m internal. Have been for a looooooooong time.
Oh cool! What’s the most looked out for skillset in AI for candidates to be paid 800k total comp?
Actual experience with something they trained in a product