Responding to Misaligned Recruiting Messages

After taking some calming breaths, I responded with the following email message:

If you encounter a similar situation, feel free to borrow or customize this email message.

Although I don’t always hear back from recruiters, in this case, I received a reply stating that the recruiter would share my feedback with the hiring manager. If you run into a similar scenario, remember that taking the time to respond to inappropriate recruiting messages and job descriptions could help other UX professionals to land positions that align with their skillset, at a company with an evolving understanding of User Experience. Thanks to you!

Seeking a Unicorn

Sadly, the myth of the unicorn persists in many companies that believe a developer or engineer should also handle UX or UI design responsibilities. Recently, I received a job description from a recruiter for a Web Application Developer position because the recruiter felt that my background and experience aligned well with the job requirements. (They didn’t!) As Figure 2 shows, not only did the job description describe inappropriate qualifications but also further devalued the disciplines of UX and UI design by suggesting that any technical professional should be able to perform those functions.

As you can imagine, this job description touched a nerve, so it was tempting to write a combative response. However, as I described in my UXmatters column, “Writing for Action,” such messages seldom achieve the results we want. So I instead responded with the following message:

Again, you are welcome to borrow this message if you find yourself in a similar situation.

If you want to be even more helpful, suggest some actions that the recruiter might take. Arming recruiters and hiring managers with the right information could pay dividends to other designers—and even developers—down the road. Here’s what I added:

I received a reply from the recruiter stating that she would go back to the hiring manager and discuss this feedback. Did they end up making a change? I don’t know. But I consider their response a measure of some success because, while they might not have made changes to this job description, they’ve received feedback that could inform the next job description they post for a similar position. Plus, most recruiters do not work with only a single company. Many are freelancers or work for staffing agencies, so taking the time to educate them could pay future dividends to the numerous other clients with whom they engage—and, by extension, to our peers within the UX community.

Confusion About User Experience Versus Customer Experience

Customer Experience (CX) roles are becoming more prevalent as companies move to Software as a Service (SaaS) models that better facilitate and streamline annual recurring revenue (ARR). However, there’s a great deal of confusion between the fields of Customer Experience and User Experience. A recruiter recently sent me a job description for a CX position, shown in Figure 3, indicating responsibilities and skills that had little to do with the field of User Experience.

In his CareerFoundry article “UX vs. CX: What is the Difference?” author Cameron Browne describes the following key difference between User Experience and Customer Experience: “User experience designers focus mainly on a user’s interaction with a single product, while customer experience designers are focusing on the consumer’s experience with the organization as a whole. Keep in mind that the user UX designers are studying is not always the consumer or purchaser.”

While I’d argue Browne’s point about UX designers’ focusing mainly on a single product—a UX designer could design many products or services as part of a larger system—he’s correct in pointing out that the CX journey is broader and that the user isn’t always the same person as the customer or purchaser, which is common in enterprise software. Customer Experience is multifaceted and could encompass brand perception, customer loyalty, market analysis, and many other facets that diverge from the field of User Experience. Professionals with marketing, finance, and sales backgrounds typically have different skillsets from UX professionals. While it’s certainly feasible for a professional to move between User Experience and Customer Experience—and it’s appropriate that people in each of these fields should work closely together—it is helpful to educate recruiters on the differences between these two fields so they can attract and retain the most appropriate candidates.

If you receive a similar message or job description that’s more suitable for a CX professional—especially if there’s no obvious corollary to User Experience—I suggest that you cite Browne’s description and recommend that the recruiter connect with professionals who have backgrounds and skills that are appropriate for the position.

Is it possible that the right position might have found you, even if a message was slightly mistargeted? Of course. People make career jumps all the time. However, it’s still helpful to provide such feedback to recruiters because it grows their knowledge, which can benefit other recruits in either of these fields down the road.

Conclusion

You’ll always receive some recruiter email messages and job descriptions that don’t align with your level of experience, your specific discipline in the field of User Experience, or your career goals. Of course, there are sometimes egregious misalignments between job descriptions and the qualifications of the professionals to whom recruiters send them. If you encounter scenarios that are similar to those I’ve described in this column, I encourage you to take a step back and look upon them as opportunities to educate recruiters, as opposed to fodder for your recycle bin.

As UX professionals, we must often carry the additional burden of having to educate people on what we do. The field of User Experience is still immature in many companies so you should expect this. Over time, this situation will improve. However, it behooves us to accelerate this education process and foster UX maturity in organizations whenever possible. In the future, our UX peers are more likely to hear about job opportunities that actually align with their skills, experience, and qualifications. Recruiters hold an important place in the advancement of UX maturity across the industry. We help our entire profession when we help recruiters increase their knowledge of User Experience.