After spending a couple of weeks vigorously looking for employment on line and sending out some 25 resumes, I recieved a phone call form Natasha Bernard of Executive Management Solutions saying that her senior vice president had reviewed my resume and would like to have a meeting with me. I had sent my resume to another recruitment firm, but could not remember sending one to this firm. I then recieved an e-mail from Natasha asking me to fill out a questionnaire about my general career management behaviours and objectives. I began to smell a rat.
Natasha then called me to set up an appointment with Mr. Hodgins. When I arrived he was out of the office and the receptionist seemed to know nothing about him. It turns out, Natasha is in Montreal and the office where Mr. Hodgins works is a bank of offices used by some 70 companies.
After leaving I got an apollogetic call from Mr. Hodgins and we set up another appointment for the following day.
He ushered me into his office when I commented on the lack of professonalism with regard to the management of his schedule to which he didn't comment.
Mr. Hodgins spent some thirty minutes explaining his service which would include one on one coaching with an "advisor" who would guide me in marketing myself including revamping my resume, building interviewing skills, selling my profitability to the prospective company and guiding me through the delicate climate of negotiating a higher salary than offered.
He then presented a two page questionnaire for me to complete while he excused himself to go talk to his "colleagues" on the feasability and potential of a "contract" with me. He returned to "mark" my questionnaire and said that the advisors were very optimistic given the market trends and my qualifications and that it being Christmas, the quicker I acted, the better it would be. He couldn't give me much more information but said that they would like to invite me back for another session the following day. I have toilet paper that's thicker than the card he presented to me with my follow up appointment time on it.
He kept me waiting 15 minutes for the following appointment and had my questionnaire in front of him with lots of yellow highlighter on it. He explained that he and his "colleagues" had gone over my resume at some length the night before and had seen a lot of promise. He felt I could increase my income beyond what my goal was within a very short period of time. He spent a good half hour of his time drawing a pyramid diagram of how he was going to narrow down what he anticipated would be several job interviews and offers. When I asked what the cost would be he passed over a "contract" that my 7 year old could have produced on Word in 5 minutes. And the comparison of the paper stock and my toilet paper still applies. For a retainer of $3250.00 (plus 6% GST) and a signing fee of $1000.00 payable on acceptance of a new job provided it was at a certain salary, he would guide me through the process with no guarantee offered of how many contacts or prospective employers I could anticipate. "How could I guarantee you a job if you don't accept any of the offers? "
I said I'd have to think about it wherein he said he would need his contract back if I decided against it, and if I didn't make a decision in a day, my resume would be in the shredder, because he was dealing with such volumes, he couldn't possibly keep all potential clients on file.
I went and walked around the block, came back and gave him his contract back and told him that unless he could supply me with a list of satisfied customers or some information about his company I was not interested. He told me I should have done my homework before I came to his interview.
He talks a good story, but it didn't really sink in until I returned home and "googled" him and found a very similar experience with the same man on this web site. I thought I would share my experience to give some credibility to the other gentleman's experience.
I don't know if Mr. Hodgins would ever have delivered, but I highly doubt it.
Job seekers beware. If it's too good to be true, it probably is.
Joe
Richmond, British Columbia
Canada
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