Looking for a job? Here’s how to spot hiring scams

Read original article

When experienced exec assistant Kit Cali moved from Boston to Philadelphia to be with her partner, she immediately began searching for jobs on LinkedIn.

She had few personal and professional connections to tap into in Philly, so she hit the ground running and applied to every remote and hybrid EA position she could find.

Cali told Sidekick that she aimed for “low-hanging fruit” first—listings that didn’t require a cover letter because applying would be quick.

You might imagine that the worst case scenario would be radio silence, but much to her delight at first, she saw response after response hit her inbox. Unfortunately, Cali said those responses “immediately were ringing some alarm bells,” offering super high pay or having critical grammatical errors or operational contradictions in their communications.

“[For instance] the English wouldn’t be idiomatic, or [the job posting] would be for an executive assistant position but say, ‘There’s an evening shift,’” she said. “Executive assistants don’t have day and night shifts.”

There were other warning signs, too. In one case, the person emailing her didn’t have an email address that matched the name of the company. In some instances, even the name of the supposed recruiter seemed like “not a real name someone would have,” Cali said. Profile images often looked like stock photos, and the suspicious companies wouldn’t have any employees listed on LinkedIn.