You don't really negotiate with a recruiter, in that sense. When they are asking you your salary information, it's not negotiation, it's fishing for information -- they want to know whether continuing the conversation is a waste of time or not.
Recruiters can be useful because they should know the upper salary bound for the position that they are trying to fill. Just ask them directly how high the client can go, and they'll probably volunteer this information. Act underwhelmed and ask for a little more (or end the conversation there if it's seems like a waste of time). The recruiter will go back to whatever HR manager and either get a "yes there's some flexibility" or "no it's set in stone".
Most recruiters are the "putting warm bodies in front of desks" kind. This kind of recruiter doesn't really give a crap about you or the client, they just want to make the deal, but a high salary for you works out well for them also. Filling positions this way can be a sign that the client is desperate.
There is another kind of recruiter that doesn't work this way. They're rare and they only do talent search for hard-to-fill executive and consulting positions. They are more about building networks and relationships.
What really threw up the red flag for me was that he didn't want to only know what I earned at my current position, but the 3-4 previous positions before that, including my reasons for leaving each job.
I can understand he wants to find A-type winners that are on a rising arc instead of slumming for a job, but that took a lot of balls to ask.
Wow, it sounds like they were probably just filling out the job application for you. It was clearly a "warm bodies in front of desks" kind of recruiter. I've experienced this sort of thing before where a defense contractor wins some bid and needs to hire like 2000 engineers now and just enlists a team of recruiters to make it happen.
High-frequency trading firm. I didn't think that needed bank-level clearance either, but maybe the hiring firm stayed on the cautious side of background checks.
This is completely untrue. The recruiter will be trying to push their client's rate up, while simultaneously keeping your rate as low as possible. They might say something like "our commission is x% of the final rate", but you'll typically have no way of checking that.
Recruiters can be useful because they should know the upper salary bound for the position that they are trying to fill. Just ask them directly how high the client can go, and they'll probably volunteer this information. Act underwhelmed and ask for a little more (or end the conversation there if it's seems like a waste of time). The recruiter will go back to whatever HR manager and either get a "yes there's some flexibility" or "no it's set in stone".
Most recruiters are the "putting warm bodies in front of desks" kind. This kind of recruiter doesn't really give a crap about you or the client, they just want to make the deal, but a high salary for you works out well for them also. Filling positions this way can be a sign that the client is desperate.
There is another kind of recruiter that doesn't work this way. They're rare and they only do talent search for hard-to-fill executive and consulting positions. They are more about building networks and relationships.