Recruitment practice

[louy]

My friend works for a local small firm. She is not disliking the job, but would like a change. So she has been sending out CVs / Resume to prospective employers.

She has not been with the current employer long, and she has not told him that she is keeper her options open.

She has just found out that one of the companies she applied for, phoned her current employer and told him that see was looking for a new job and applying for positions elsewhere.

Is this common in Sngapore. I was actually quite angry when I heard and thought that this would be considered unprofessional and unethical where I came from.

The boss is now being mean to her and not treating her well.

I am worried about job hunting now in case this happens to me as well.

[sundaymorningstaple]

It's only unethical if she had notified those that she sent the CVs to should NOT contact her current employer. Otherwise, it's normal for any prospective employer's HR department to do background checks before shortlisting a potential employee.

She should have noted in her cover letter quite succinctly that her current employer should not be contacted.

Having said that, most Agencies and HR departments in Singapore are not all that professional. Take my word for it. I've seen it a lot in both industries (I've worked in both).

[ilovesushi]

they shouldn't be doing checks like that unless they have offered you the job, and then they ask your permission to run the reference checks. i think it is really unprofessional for them to just call up your current employer risking your current job when they are not offering you a job.

[Nath21]

I think its both the employer and the candidate being stupid, the employer should confirm with the candidate first before contacting the employer for a reference but the candidate should also clearly state when they send out the cv's.

Wait until you use a bad recruitment agency and you start to see all the tricks of the trade. For instance some agents in a bad market may see it hard to get a person a job but its easier to fill a position so they contact the employer behind your back, offering false jobs to get you on the books, not having a job but seeing another agency having a job so they create a fake job similar to the real one, get canididates and then contact the real employer directly. Recruitment agents are the new finance brokers.

Most jobs ads are fake, either in that they are just building the agencies book in a deficient skill set or are a copycat ad trying to steal a job of another agency. Now you multiple the fake building books ads by the fake im trying to steal your client ads and all you get is no real jobs. That why the saying goes 70% of all real jobs are not advertised.