The Unsolicited Job "Offer"

When I was much younger, I'd get excited about receiving messages from recruiters on LinkedIn. I thought to myself that I was actually in demand. The ignorance of youth, am I right? Truthfully, I'm not popular enough or patient enough to get anything out of LinkedIn; so to me, it's mostly a joke and I treat it as such.

I accepted the job offer for my current position end of May 2018 and I updated my LinkedIn accordingly the same day so I wouldn't get recruiters sending me messages any more. Little did I know, that meant absolutely nothing to recruiters. I kept receiving unsolicited messages regularly from recruiters until mid August 2018 when I disabled InMails. Yes. I had to completely disable a feature on LinkedIn, because despite my happily starting a new job, apparently I was still wanted for "a great full-time opportunity with a profitable and long-standing successful company." That's right everyone, I got a job offer at—wait, what company is this that supposedly wants me? I was never told!

Did disabling InMails solve my problem? If you think so, you are horribly mistaken. Instead of InMails, I was now receiving connection requests from recruiters sending me their messages via friend requests. Why would anyone think that's a good idea?

Don't get me wrong, being a recruiter must be a tough job and I respect it. Every job is a respectable job. But please put effort into your job and don't just use the same generic and templated messages for everyone. One InMail I received included this gem:

We work using Paired Programming and Extreme Programming methods to build Next-Gen Tech from AI, Machine Learning to drones and we offer some amazing perks. No other company is doing what we are!

Every company is building "next generation technology" nowadays. If this were true, there would be a lot more real R&D going on for the betterment of society. Remember blockchain and the all hype it got? I'm sure that was "next-gen" too. Also, what is "extreme programming?"

Why am I giving recruiters such a hard time? Why am I hating on their methods? Because it's only fair to do so, in my opinion. As an employer, how would you feel if you got a resume that consisted of just the following:

• Rock star programming
• Worked on next-gen tech at a profitable and long-standing successful company
• No other developer does what I do!

Would you call this individual in for an interview? I wouldn't. Not even if I was absolutely desperate, because it shows a lack of effort on the applicant's part. So when recruiters do essentially the same thing, it shows a lack of effort.

How do I solve this problem? Well, in my "about" section I have a little message hidden away. If you're truly interested in someone as a person, you should do them the courtesy of at least skimming their about section.

The way I see InMails is that it's all just a game. The way InMails work is that if the recipient responds to them within 90 days, the recruiter gets credit back for the InMail they sent you^[1]. As long as they receive some sort of response, even a rejection, they'll get their credit back; isn't that great? When I was receiving InMails the same week as I updated my new position, I simply stopped responding entirely to the InMails. If you're not going to do your due diligence of seeing that I had just started a new job, then you don't deserve your InMail back.

Fast-forward a year, I've reenabled InMail. I keep getting these ridiculous messages and connection requests. Wait. If I don't like LinkedIn, why do I still have one and advertise the link with my other social media links? Because it's blasphemy for someone in my age group not have one.