You don't have to be a whiz to hire great people or find a great job. This site is about recruiting made simple. Find who you are looking for with tips from a whiz!
I have a theory that the majority of Black Friday shoppers actually lose money by hitting the stores early to get the “best” deals. I’d love to see a study reviewing lists of items shoppers go out with the intent to purchase with a comparison of the total cost of only those items before Black Friday, as well as the total cost of ALL items purchased during Black Friday shopping. I know, I sound Grinchy. I think all that beautiful marketing and crowd effect makes people forget if they even really want that thingamajig on the shelf.
This absolutely relates to job searches, by the way. During my first conversation with a candidate, I ask them what has prompted them to consider a new job and they always say something like growth opportunity, more stability, more interesting role, etc. I also ask them how much money they’re making now and what their expectations are regarding compensation if they get to the offer stage with my client. It’s amazing to me how many people will get an offer that meets their original compensation expectation (which is always more than they’re making currently) and offers some non-monetary incentive that they said they were seeking, but their primary reason for not accepting immediately is that they were hoping for MORE money.
I think this is Black Friday Search Syndrome. Sucked in by the glittering numbers and utilization gets completely ignored.
And I’ll be honest, we use it on the other side as recruiters too. I remind candidates that they’re not the only one who wants this job; there are other candidates pending. (Crowd Effect.) And if they didn’t get a big pay increase, I’ll try to show them how it might be recovered in other benefits. (Marketing Hand Trick.) Mostly, though, I try to remind them about what they wanted originally and how it matches up with the offer in-hand. If it doesn’t, we don’t usually get to the offer stage anyhow. (The Truth.)
Don’t wait until you get to an offer to tell me the only thing you care about is the money. Don’t get up at 3AM to buy crap you don’t need and didn’t want until you got there, then tell me you saved money. Both are silly.
Grinch out.
If real estate has “location, location, location” then recruitment should certainly coin “timing, timing, timing” for our industry!
Once, I had a candidate in final stages with a client on a Friday. I was buzzing about my weekend happy as a bee. Monday morning, I learn the hiring manager went to lunch over the weekend and bumped into someone that used to work for them at a different company, but they hadn’t seen each other in 10 years. They got to talking about their current companies and decided the nearly-filled job was worth discussing with this person (who had also recently decided to consider new roles). After the hiring manager carefully considered some other recent staff transitions, he tweaked the parameters of the open job a little bit. Within 24 hours, they’d declined my candidate who was no longer completely qualified, and moved forward with an offer to the other person. HOW RANDOM IS THAT? A simple, chance meeting at lunch ON A WEEKEND changed the outcome of an entire search. TIMING, MUCH!?!?
I have often told outstanding candidates that sometimes they are the PERFECT candidate for a job, but timing gets in the way. If they are resume #104 and the recruiter closes the pool after reviewing 100, that company has never even seen their resume! And sadly for all, that company might hire a less qualified person as a result. The candidate shouldn’t feel disheartened that maybe they weren’t good enough for some reason, sometimes it really is just timing.
When was the job posted? How many internal candidates did they have before posting it to external candidates? Is this search extremely confidential or is it widely known that the job is available? How many candidates are currently in process and are they all at the same stage or varying stages of the interview process? What time of year is it? Holidays and vacations mean delays and these create missed opportunities in availability and interest from both a company and a candidate.
If I could offer any word of encouragement to a job-seeker, it would be to consider timing. Do what you can to eliminate delays. Be EXTREMELY quick to act on freshly posted positions – I mean apply that same day. If you hear a rumor about a job, learn who to contact in HR and contact them immediately! If you are getting declined for jobs or just never hearing back at all, remind yourself that timing was likely a huge factor in the decision. Beating yourself up over the jobs you didn’t get won’t leave you looking awesome for the next one.
Do you have any stories as a recruiter about how timing has impacted your searches? Or have you noticed as a job-seeker when timing was the reason for you getting (or not getting) a job?
I heard that if you have a goal, you should never say that you’re going to start it sometime in the future. Don’t say, “I’ll start that tomorrow morning” or “I’ll do that after ____” because it creates a sense of non-urgency in your subconscious. If you can put it off for awhile, why bother doing it at all? If you want to achieve something, fully commit by taking the first step RIGHT NOW.
Nearly every HR and recruiting conference has a session about “The Future of Recruiting.” What about the present? What about the change factors we need to make TODAY to get there? It’s the individuals and companies who are making changes TODAY who will shape the future and reap its rewards.
HR Departments – Start utilizing your recruiting partners as real partners, instead of competition. Pick up the phone and tell your recruiter what they can do to help you and readily provide info that will help them be successful. You’re paying them to help you, right? Then, cross those recruiting tasks you just delegated off of your to-do list and get to those strategic projects you never have time to tackle. When open positions at your company are being filled with quality people (thanks to a well-informed recruiting partner) and you’re achieving other major HR goals within your organization, everyone wins – especially your employees and your bottom-line! Make that call right now.
Recruiters – When you get that call from HR, start thinking like a busy hiring manager and busy HR department. You’ve been hired to alleviate pressure, not intensify it. Tell your hiring managers that they’ll see fewer, but better qualified candidates. Know. Your. Client. Research their industry, understand the challenges in their market, know what potential candidates will say about them and how to overcome that. Commit to using your expertise to reduce the workload of your client’s managers. High-quality, pre-screened candidates are harder to find. Accept it and then conquer it, starting right now.
Candidates/Jobseekers – Quit your whining. Yeah, the economy has been miserable for awhile. Get over it. There are jobs out there – do you want one? If a recruiter calls you about a job and says they think you’d be qualified, don’t make them wish they hadn’t called. Don’t tell me about how much you hate the job search process, how your last boss was a jerk and the company was useless. I’m not your friend, I’m representing your potential boss. Use good manners, dress professionally, speak clearly and make sure your follow-up is timely and thoughtful. Make it your goal that everyone who talks to you will be happy that they had the opportunity. Remember that you are representing yourself AND your recruiter when you speak to an employer. Don’t embarrass me. Think of the most professional, successful person you know and mimic their best qualities. The way they dress, how they act and how they communicate is probably what made them successful. Start doing these things now.
What could you do now to move yourself and your company forward? What habits have you been TRYING to break instead of just breaking them? We could change the world starting today. Why wait for the future?
P.S. A tip of the hat to G.K. Chesterton who wrote, “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.” (I actually thought I was being creative with my title, but then realized it sounded a little too familiar, thus requiring further research.) The American Chesterton Society suggests that he meant some things are so important, that you should do them yourself, even if it means doing it poorly. So again I say, don’t wait until the day you can do something important perfectly, just start doing it today! You’ll get better.
After attending RecruitFest a couple weeks ago, one session has been echoing in my mind. It was about increasing your influence and becoming a leader, but it also offered great advice about finding your path and being happy. You’ve probably read articles that say, “Think about what you would you do if money didn’t matter…” Well, it DOES matter for most people, so that’s maybe not a helpful approach to finding a happier, more fulfilling career. Instead, I’d like to recap some suggestions from successful folks who have proven what works.
Here’s the video of the session called “Peddling Influence and Leading Thoughts” from RecruitFest. HRMDirect’s Chief Strategy officer Sarah White, Former SHRM COO China Gorman, and Career XRoads founder Gerry Crispin each offer their ideas on how to become an influencer – and really, how to turn your career toward the future you want and reap significant rewards from your day.
First point? Sarah White said, “I knew that in order to get to where I wanted to be, I had to find a job and everything else that would let me be comfortable and let me be me.” This one is dead on for me! I work from home and joke with my boss that she’s forever ruined me from working in an office. What parts of your job are a perfect match for you? What parts miss the target entirely? What jobs have more of the things you love and less of the things you hate? Can you get involved in projects at your current company that would get your career headed in the direction of one of those jobs?
Next, China Gorman suggests, “Create a track record of success. Create a track record of results, so that when people think of you, they think [he/she] delivers what’s promised, delivers MORE than what’s promised, delivers more than what’s promised quicker and under budget. Create a track record that people can rely on. When they think of you, they think honest, they think trustworthy. They think I can rely on this person in a pinch. This is a go-to person. Create that kind of reputation.” This kind of reputation will earn you the chance to be involved in projects to build you up for the job you want.
So…you’ve figured out where you want to be, you’re building your reputation, and you’re asking to get involved in new things to get you there. What else? Gerry Crispin talks about focus and active listening as an important component of his own success. “We are really present in the moment, looking at that individual, engaged with that individual in conversation, really getting what they have to say…or not. We may be thinking about the next person we’re going to meet or talk to. I do think there is a differentiator there in terms of people who eventually build influence. They’re perceived as having the ability to be present.” Once you figure out where you want to go, make sure you’re paying attention to conversations along the way.
These are things you can start doing this very moment to get to where you want to be. You don’t need to go to a fancy training or hire a career coach. These experts suggest that what you need is already in your hands, heart and head. Go for it!
If you’re in HR or a recruiter, you’ve had offers declined. What I find absolutely enchanting about such a miserable outcome is the underlying qualities that sneak out during this downhill process. AND, what if the candidate who declined is really the best candidate for the job?!?
Sometimes the most impressive candidates can suddenly get nasty during offer negotiation. They can become arrogant and demanding in their communications, suddenly ask for $20K more than they’d originally requested, or require outrageous benefits. They can drag out their decision for weeks, leaving the company wondering why they’d made the offer in the first place. Hiring managers can be difficult too. It’s can often become an ugly game of expecting the other person to step a little past the middle, a little bit of an unequal compromise to keep the upper hand.
In those instances, it’s easy to say goodbye to a candidate and never look back. But what if a candidate handles the offer and negotiation tactfully, but in the end rejects the final offer? Many reasons for declining a job offer have nothing to do with the company or a candidate’s interest in working there. Things like:
Any of these could result in a declined offer by a highly qualified candidate, just due to bad timing or temporary budget restrictions. As the search continues and you re-evaluate the pool of top candidates, do you ever go back and reconsider that earlier candidate if their original reason for declining is no longer an issue? How do candidates feel about receiving a second offer from a company?
It’s sometimes a matter of pride on both sides of the table. If there was a strong enough match between the job opportunity and that ideal candidate to make the original offer, doesn’t that initial match still exist a little while later? I had an HR manager tell me he’d ask his hiring manager, “Other than your pride, why are we not reconsidering this person?” That’s ballsy HR gold. The kind of relationship every HR Manager and Recruiter should aspire to have with hiring managers they support in their organization. Even if it’s not about pride, being able to clarify that is priceless.
Would you go back and make a second offer to a candidate, after your first offer had been declined? Why or why not? As a candidate, what would you think?
Hi! I'm Jessica. I believe that recruiting (when done correctly) is about creativity, minimizing limitations and applying new methods to make the whole hiring & job search process a little more efficient for everyone. In this blog, I will focus on recruiting and how HR, jobseekers and recruiters can make the hiring process a little smoother – and maybe a little more fun!
