UPDATED and ADDED 27 October 2010: Recruiters mentioned in the comments have been added to the list - readers, do your own due diligence, but having multiple, unsolicited, unpaid, positive recommendations from fellow expats is about as good as you can get.

A reader writes in:

Dear Chris,

First, an obligatory thank you for your blog. I've enjoyed reading it
for about a year or so.

I'd like to teach in Korea (I got a 36 on your "Should You Teach in
Korea" quiz!), but like so many others, I've heard a few horror stories
that make me nervous. I found your post on hagwon blacklists, and I know
you said you can't suggest any specific hagwons because there are so
many, but can you suggest any recruiters? I saw your post on what to
look for in a recruiter as well, but I was just wondering if you could
make my search a little easier.

Thank you for your time!

Sincerely,
[C.C]

C.C.,

A 36 puts you in the right bracket, definitely :) I've written about recruiters, reliable hagwons, and how recruiters are a necessary evil, which might lead the uninformed to think they're a slimy bunch of people. Having worked with several (and heard about many others), I'm relieved to tell you that they're not all bad. Some can be a bit shady, while others just have a hard time staying on top of things or seeing things from the teachers' perspective. That they're paid by the schools is a conflict of interest; the result is a process that causes more headaches than it should.

There are a number of ideals for a good recruiter.

A good recruiter should:

• have a phone number, a website, and a street address. Contacting them should be the least of your worries.
• have success stories / references from teachers they've helped on their website
• advertise their jobs, or give enough information to tell you they actually have jobs available. Simply telling you to 'register' with their website tells you nothing about what jobs they may have for you.
• screen applicants and be honest about your job prospects from the start
  
• listen to and work with your preferences within reason.
• be open about the recruiting process, and the steps both you and the recruiter need to take.
• be friendly, but professional. There is definitely a balance here.
• sound organized when you talk to them. It's unfair to expect them to memorize your entire file, but it is fair to know what stage of the recruiting process you're at.
  

• ask you for money during the recruitment process. They make their money when you're placed at a school, just like a realtor makes their money when they sell a property. The school pays their recruiting fees, not you.
  
• ask you for your original diploma or other documents until / unless a firm job offer has been made.
• delay the process without good reason. "I'm waiting to hear back from the school" is acceptable within reason; "my staff hasn't finished filing their nails yet" is definitely not acceptable. If you get the former and it's been more than a few business days, move on.
  

© Chris Backe - 2010

This post was originally published on my blog,Chris in South Korea. If you are reading this on another website and there is no linkback or credit given, you are reading an UNAUTHORIZED FEED.

Do you have a question about Korea? I'm happy to answer, but do me a favor and search the blog archives first - there's a good chance your question has already been answered. If it hasn't, e-mail me at chrisinsouthkorea AT gmail DOT com.

Do you have a preference in the Apple vs. Google war? Still hating Microsoft? Thomas Hazlett and Russ Roberts reveal how remarkably similar is the strategy both Apple and Google follow, to make the illusion of Apple vs. Google so compelling.

All great market innovations challenge entrepreneurs to do two things: (a) get other firms
to help create specialized products, and (b) maintain sufficient control to guide the
process while extracting a generous portion of its returns. These tasks carry obvious
tensions. Builders of complex ecosystems handle them differently.

The iPhone/iPod/iPad/iTunes product space embeds numerous Apple-set restrictions.
Buyers purchase devices on the proviso that they lock-in for applications purchased down
the road. So long as the innovator incentivizes its developers to bring exciting new stuff
to market, while producing slick, iconic handheld devices that insert themselves into the
dreams of teen-age girls and boys, vast riches ensue.

Google’s structure features more semi-independent partnership layers. But calling it
“free” or “open” is less an economic description than a stroke of marketing genius.
Google’s enterprise is to capture new game to feed to its vaunted search engine. That
product enjoys overwhelming dominance – perhaps 75 per cent market share — due to its
competitive superiority. No other firm can rival its popularity. Moreover, the firm’s
innovation cluster brilliantly scales – its lead over rivals becomes more formidable as the
web expands.

Because the market position of Google Search is so secure, distributing “free” access to
Android is simply another form of Apple-like tie-in. Once the customer web searches,
Google reasonably expects to profit. And no “open platform” governs. Google prices
access to its engine – with its proprietary databases, secret algorithms, and private global
transport network – to maximize firm profit.

The Apple and Google models are two sides of the same coin. Both leverage innovations
in the smart phone market for revenues in ancillary services. Apple has in many respects
the more ambitious mobile plan, integrating heavily into hardware design and
manufacturing, and has been an industry disruptor forcing Google to mostly play catchup.
It makes its economic demands explicit, requiring iPhone users to patronize the App
Store and iTunes. Google need not be so fussy; with what the U.S. Department of Justice
would likely characterize as “dominance in the search market,” it simply leaves
customers to their own devices.

Since January 1, 2007, when the iPhone was announced (Android launched later in
2007), Apple shares have risen about 200 per cent while Google shares have slightly
declined. Lots else is happening, but mobile strategies are clear pivots for both firms.
Because the bottom line is the bottom line, not market share, the game so far belongs to
Apple. Google just plays.

But it is playing to win, and on terms not so different than Apple’s. Resistance to
openness is not futile — it’s ubiquitous. What looks “open” or “free” is a misdirection
hand gesture, diverting attention from where proprietary products are inserted into the
chain, with returns surgically extracted. All the rest is “revolutionary” hype.

Hazlett discusses many under-appreciated facts of the Apple-Microsoft rivalry, another convenient illusion, and, for those considering net neutrality, Roberts offers the reality of the “network of networks” that has evolved qualitatively from the DARPA

Mistakes we make are generally looking at market outcomes and seeing them as somehow either mistakenly the result of some policy intervention–as in the case of thinking the Internet is a government project that came from DARPA, which is really a common view that I think is quite misguided. Why? The DARPA network had a lot of inputs that became useful in modern networks, but the network of networks today is all these products–computers, chips, software, wireless, applications. Not master crafted on some blueprint by the Department of Defense, nor designed to withstand nuclear attack, by the way. Vision incorrect. The idea that networks are open end to end, control only at the edges of the network: that’s in some sense an optical illusion. There is control that takes place at the core, but to the extent the illusion is correct there is an incentive for a lot of standardization within the core of the network in pushing innovation out toward specialized innovations. What does that mean for regulation–we should enforce rules like network neutrality that maintained that the only kind of innovation that can take place in terms of structure has to be on the edge–and that again is a misreading. Consumer products–the edge–content and applications, Mass market customers have access to directly. Google is highly integrated with core networks in terms of how it transports its applications around the world; world more productive for that. Many other edge applications integrating into faster transit to make their products better for end users. Akamai specializes in speeding up delivery, allowing all these application providers to avoid the traffic or congestion of the Internet. You want competition to not only deliver new products but new structures. Sometimes experimentation is going to be vertically oriented. That is not a sacrilege–just a religious belief, not one founded in economics.

All in all, a fascinating exchange that made me think again about why I prefer Google over Apple. But, I still don’t like iPhones.

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