Do Recruiters Blacklist Candidates in Ireland?

LollipopJimmy wrote: »

Oh well good. If you have reported them then they will be dealt with.

As for me, I have dealt with recruiters and have been in recruitment both internal and agency and I have never seen a recruiter or colleague share data with another agency. I don't see why any recruiter would do that, there would be nothing to gain.

Annascaul wrote: »

I haven't been able to get any employment in the Inside Sales roles in Dublin, not even had any resonance to my CV from the various job boards in Dublin. My CV gets resonance everywhere else, but not in Ireland, even though that kind of work is always looking for new candidates. No email, not even a phone call.....

Annascaul wrote: »

Maybe not the recruiters, but more the business doing the actual hiring.

It may also be only coincidence as well.

I am just surprised that I get more traction in the UK than in Ireland, for the same kind of roles / jobs and in the same industry, an industry I have worked for for many years.

I have a similar experience and probably not entirely alone with problem of blacklisting in Ireland.

I was once hired by a US American IT company. The job was inside sales or account management role with foreign language skills and sounded good, in line with my experience and halfway decently paid and some extra money for relocating to Ireland. I could offer a solid track record in inside sales and overachieving sales targets in a similar role for around 5 years in the UK.

However the salary for that position wasn't high enough for the Dublin housing / rental market, it was only good for some form of shared accommodation. This is a few years back, just before the pandemic hit. As I wasn't aware of the highly competitive rental market in Dublin back then, I was shocked, and had trouble finding a place to live in.

When I spoke to my manager about that issue, it only caused concern that he thought I wasn't serious about the job commitment. Within two weeks I was fired.

I've had trouble finding work in Ireland in other companies the IT inside sales field ever since, whilst others with a similar CV and experiences got jobs pretty straight.

Even though it's illegal to keep a "blacklist of candidates" I do believe it's done in Ireland, especially for those inside sales roles in IT.

It wasn't that kind of stir you're referring to. It was actually 8 weeks I was with them in employment and passed all the entry exams either top of my class or among the top. The first 4 weeks I stayed in a hotel, the company provided. Then I stayed in AirBnBs while I conducted my apartment search in Dublin. It was a very frustrating event, as I viewed with possibly 30 or more and seemed to have no chance of finding a place to live.

Only with some luck somebody could have secured a flat share with total strangers, however that was difficult enough and could only succeed via some facebook group if the search was successful at all. Two weeks after I spoke with my manager about that challenge, I was history.

Honestly it wasn't even my choice, nor did I plan this and apparently, I wasn't exactly the only one who had gone down that road, but still a small minority of the new hires. They just wanted to get rid of those new hires who struggled with the housing market or were sharing difficulty about that challenge among team members. Help or any kind of support wasn't available, not even HR, where I raised the matter as I objected to my dismissal, had any influence.

Nearly two months of salary, plus relocation bonus, and that tax free after leaving the country, I would presume as well that on an island the size of Ireland word gets around quickly. Whether that's just word of mouth, bad reputation or a blacklist doesn't matter to me, as the negative implications to me are one and the same....

In an ultra-competitive business with high turnover of staff like recruitment, it would be very difficult to keep secrets about secret files or blacklists, whether internal or external. Details would leak out very quickly.

When you went for these interviews under the false name, were you not worried that you'd meet someone who would know you when hanging around reception? What did you put on the fake CV for the period with the company in question?

Most to nearly every bigger American IT company operating in Ireland give the employee the wrong impression about certain things. One of them is HR and the whole function of HR.

Upon getting hired, they constantly spread the Ask HR word or HR is your partner etc..., they have internal whistleblower and grievance processes, anti discrimination policies, nice work-life balance talk, even the gay and lesbian rainbow flag is part of it, giving the employee the impression HR is about fairness, correctness and that fairness is part of life in that organization and the organization is all about diversity and inclusion and no wrongdoing of any sort.

However the reality is very different, sadly. HR always fails if there are workplace issues, which are created due to bad management, problems then start to fester and linger around, and if then one tries to involve HR it's often too late.

In reality HR is only there to hire, to fire, and to make sure the company is protected from any lawsuits or potential lawsuits disgruntled employees bring upon the organisation.

Another issue is that direct management in inside sales organisations can do with their employees nearly everything they like, make their sales targets easy to reach, or impossible to reach, play one employee against the other, etc... Any complaints to HR are futile here and only give HR an early warning. And if one gets then unfairly dismissed, one is put on something like a blacklist. It's not "a list" per se, but an entry in the personnel file stating something like "do not re-hire". The whole process of ending up on such a "list" this is not a trial or a tribunal where opposing facts are presented and a fair decision is then made, but instead a "we can do it because we are the big strong organization".

American IT companies in Ireland often outsource the hiring process to recruitment agencies, often having one single point of contact who deals with them. They do also tell them, whom they want and whom the definitely don't want.

The inside sales industry in US American IT companies operating in Ireland is not only highly competitive, but also there is very high turnover, often of international hires, Italians, French, Spanish, etc..... Employees coming and going, for different motives ranging anywhere from unfair management, unreachable sales targets, or even if reached commission unpaid, to high housing cost in Dublin, thus there is always a good bit of hiring going on and the process of hiring is often remarkable fast and very streamlined if they want to or have to achieve their hiring targets.

If one is so creative to go to these lengths to change their names on a CV, then one would fall easily though the cracks of the do not re-hire notice of the former's employee file. It won't get you an employment contract but it will only confirm that this "list" in form of a do not rehire note exists.

This should give you and anybody who denies blacklisting an idea, how blacklisting works:

(it's actually a functionality in most applicant tracking systems used by HR and recruiters)

US-based provider, that doesn't have to worry about pesky things like GDPR. If they blacklist you in Europe using this, you'd be entitled to know that you're on their blacklist. Also, blacklisting based on email address isn't really the most effective way of blacklisting.

Yes and no, Ireland is indeed a small world, but recruitment is a big business with VERY high turnover of staff. No doubt people will gossip, but the suggestion in this thread that you multiple organisations sharing data illegally contravening GDPR, exposing themselves to very large fines, isn't credible. There would be a queue of former recruiters lining up to pi$$ on their former employers and drop them in it. You can't keep secrets like that.

Interesting article.