I hear what you are saying about salary, but as a hiring manager it is one of my earliest questions because it is one of the few hard and fast go-no-go questions for both me and the candidate. If salary expectations don’t match and I have no room to move higher, the candidate and I don’t have anything left to discuss. Time for both to move on.

However, as a candidate I *hated* giving my salary figure “too early”.
Now I wouldn’t care considering other hiring managers probably work like I do and just want to have it to know if there is traction with this candidate or not.

As a candidate you have to know what you are worth. In my experiences the places worth working at will recognize this and agree with this figure and you won’t have to freak out over salary negotiations and the fear you could have gotten more.

I hadn’t even indicated the companies and jobs I wanted to pursue, never mind actually interviewed for them yet.

What makes it even worse is that some companies have outsourced their hiring entirely to this guy, and I’m not alone — colleagues have shared similar experiences.

I suspect the employer has no idea they’re shooting themselves in the foot like this, and I’m sure the “non-”recruiter is convinced he’s an expert negotiator. Pathetic.

For what it’s worth, with the job I did land, I applied directly and salary discussion was pretty much the final step in the process.