It’s true, us recruiters are naturally inquisitive (read:nosey) folk. That said, there are valid reasons why we ask the questions we ask. See below for the recruiter's glossary:

‘What is your current salary and what are your expectations for your next role’

Money matters. We need to know this information to be able to guide you and manage expectations. It’s also important to be able to differentiate between base salary and package. For example, people working in certain sectors have generous pension benefits, and therefore moving out of the sector might require an increase to their base salary in order to offset this. We regularly provide our clients with salary benchmarking and we can also advise you on market rate and whether you are currently over or underpaid.

‘What other processes are you in?’

We expect candidates who are looking for a new job to be every active in the market. It doesn’t faze us a jot if you are in multiple processes and this won’t count against you. What is important is for us to communicate to our client if you are likely to be snapped up. Not only does this reflect positively on you, but it encourages them to speed up the process or provide extra reassurance if you are in the running for other things.

‘Who do you report to in your current role and what is the structure of your team’

This gives us a thorough understanding of your responsibilities and competencies. This extends to how much support you have in the role and whether you have line management responsibility – a key criteria for some of the roles we recruit for. We are not simply farming for names and will never contact referees without your consent!

‘Please explain any gaps in your CV / why was this role cut short?’

A question that can feel awkward to ask or answer, but we wouldn’t be doing our job if we didn’t. There are many reasons why a job might have been cut short or why you took a break between different positions. We need to know these reasons in order to fairly represent you to our client, who will be asking us the same questions! We want you to be happy in the role we find for you, so if you have had a negative work experience prior, we will use this information to ensure that there isn’t a repeat.