Earlier this week I spoke with Derek Jenkins who is Sales Director at Monster.
We talked about the post on the forum (where one of their sales people pretended to be a satisfied customer) and the blog I wrote about another salespeson selling against agencies.
The bottom line in both cases is that the actions were unauthorised, totally against Monster policy, unacceptable (to Monster) and that the individuals involved are "being dealt with".
Derek said that, with regard to the forum, he agreed that there is "nothing more frustrating and cringeworthy than seeing people plainly and obviously trying to punt their services".
He assures me that Monster are more than aware how the staffing industry has contributed to building the business into what it is today – and to creating a stronger future. He said it is not the case that they would want to turn their back on staffing sector and would like to see more collaboration between staffing companies and themselves.
Going forward he says it is very much a one off (or two off to be more accurate) and they he has instructed the training department to put formal guidelines in place around what can and should be sent by email; ensuring that individuals are sending the right emails at the right time with the right messages!
I hadn’t actually seen the fake forum post before, that really is just unbelievable!
Interesting that the Word document attached to the offending email sent by Paul.********@monster.co.uk (that I recently received from several very disgruntled recruiters), was not actually written by Paul.********@monster.co.uk. I checked the document properties for the original author and it was not Paul, but a chap called Norman P.
That means that this is almost definitely not a rogue sales agent @ Monster but a targeted and authorised approach.
I wouldn’t want Paul to be publicly shamed for this when it is clearly Norman and probably senior management who are to blame.
3 scandalous breaches of Data Security in 2 years (unforgivable and Monster should be sued), many candidates refusing to use the site, no more agency business and many end clients losing faith… Go Monster!!!
p.s. A pal of mine was recently offered a 50% discount by Monster after he refused to renew his contract over this. He still didn’t take it up!
Ben Stermon
I think you may be reaching a little Ben. Just because the original document was put together by Norman, doesn’t mean it wasn’t changed after. I find the fact that YOU have publicly named Norman unprofessional and your claim of “no more agency business” couldn’t be further from the truth. I’ll take a stab and suggest 70% of their business is still coming through rec cons this year. Monster have acknowledged these issues, approached Louise about a solution and are making them happen. For me that’s a huge step forward. Now before you put your Sherlock Holmes hat back on and check LinkedIn, I worked at Monster for 3 years, so give the junior detective bit a skip. Monster have been through the mill a bit recently, and yes, the security breach is an extreme issue, but I just found your comments to be nothing but “Monster bashing”, and knowing their PR folk wont let any of them reply to your comments, I’d reply to your rant.
What an uproar!
Interesting to see that The Recruiter Magazine has commented about this rather negative PR in todays magazine. It states that an apology was was sent by Monster to The Employment Agents Movement (TEAM)… Great stuff Louise!