Hiring Manager! Use your recruiter wisely.

If you are like most hiring managers, you view your recruiter as a source of resumes and interviews. If you want to maximize your recruiter’s effectiveness, you need to help her manage her talent pipeline, and take advantage of her market insights and knowledge of candidates.

The most important thing you can do to help your recruiter bring you great talent is to make clear decisions, communicate them, and take action. Unwillingness to say no to good, but not great, a candidate is the primary mistake that hiring managers make. If you put candidates on hold, you block your pipeline and your recruiter becomes frustrated that you aren’t pulling the trigger on anyone. Or else, he becomes complacent, figuring that you will hire someone, while he moves on to more urgent projects.

As a hiring manager you are very bus, and sometimes focus on your own projects, sometimes to the detriment of your recruiting efforts. In order to help manage the process during a prolonged hiring initiative, you should consider appointing a person specifically to this task. I devoted an article to the discussion of this new position, “The Candidate Advocate.”

Once you have your pipeline under control, you are free to gather the knowledge and insights that your recruiter has to offer.


Next Entry: How a candidate should use a recruiter


Contact Jason Sanders

Headhunters Hate You!

In the course of your business life, you will undoubtedly piss a few people off. Recruiters, by nature, look for the best in people. We make our living by perceiving you in a positive light and representing you to our clients. Like any salespeople with integrity, we want to have confidence in our product. We want to believe in you!

Still, there are people who we don’t just ignore, but who actively avoid. “Hate” may be too strong a word, but you will definitely cause some eye rolling on the other end of the line, if you exhibit the following behaviors:

1. You expect too much. Please don’t call me and expect me to find you a job. As a retained executive search professional, clients call on me to find individuals with very specific backgrounds. Candidates that do not fit our positions may still be valued contacts, but we work for clients, not for candidates.


2. You talk too much. You need to check yourself any time you interview for a new position. Recruiters may have more tolerance than hiring managers, but don’t be abusive. Ask your audience if you are giving them what they need. I would say to pause your conversation every couple of minutes would be a good rule of thumb. You might ask, “Is this helpful? Do you need more or less detail?”


3. You oversell. We want to know that you are excellent, but we also want to believe what you say. Present your credentials to us, but keep in mind we speak with people like you everyday. You need to differentiate yourself, but you can’t fool us into believing you are something that you are not.


4. You don’t listen. Enough said.


5. You say one thing and do another. Don’t make promises you cannot keep and set expectations appropriately.


6. You treat us like “friends of convenience.” You get in touch when you need a job, but don’t help us network. Networking is our life’s blood. Take our call!
   

Contact Jason Sanders

Headhunters Ignore You!

More often than not, I take a proactive role in approaching my networking contacts. I view this as my job as a recruiter and expect a certain ratio of return calls to placed calls. I also expect a certain number of unsolicited calls, and many unsolicited resumes.

We are organized enough to be able to respond to unsolicited resumes, but many firms do not care to answer most inbound inquiries.

If you cannot get the ear of a recruiter, it may be for a number of reasons. Here are some to think about:

1. You call without a direct reference. Knowing someone who knows the recruiter is extremely effective. We make our living based on referrals from others, and most of us will reciprocate.


2. You do not define yourself well. We don’t have time to waste, but we are always happy to have more “inventory.” A foggy presentation, however, won’t do you or us any good.


3. You do not know what you want. If you have a very specific message, you have a greater chance of getting our attention.


4. Your resume looks just like everyone else’s. If you are creative, or have the right help, you have an easy way to differentiate yourself from the start.


5. You do not look like an outstanding candidate. We make our living by knowing the best people in your field. Why are you one of them?


6. You have caught us at the wrong moment. Persistence pays off.


7. Finally, your expertise does not match with our specialty. If you approach a recruiter, you need to know what they focus on.

Apart from our retained search services, we provide counseling to executives actively engaged in a job search. Feel free to get in touch for more information.

Contact Jason Sanders

Hiring Friends

The best way to begin to ensure cultural fit is for someone at the hiring company to know the candidate. This provides an instant reference and provides a high comfort level. Most hires are made through this kind of internal referral.

There are pitfalls though.

The comfort level created can prevent companies and candidates from going through the necessary due diligence. The candidate may not meet as many interviewers, interviewers may have a positive bias toward the candidates, and references may not be checked. This can lead to the dual problems of losing a new hire, and damaging existing relationships.


Have you ever experienced the hire of a professional colleague that didn’t work out?

Contact Jason Sanders