The Life Span of a Crappy Recruiter!

I have to give credit where credit is due, and Aerotek is the one that originally discovered how long it takes to figure out you suck as a recruiter! It’s right around 9-14 months. The TA world is littered with people who have worked at Aerotek for 9-14 months! If you’ve spent 13 minutes in Talent Acquisition on either the corporate or agency side, you’ve seen a ton of these resumes.

Just having recruiting experience, especially IT or Technical, can guarantee you a recruiting career for at least ten years or more, even if you are completely awful at recruiting! As a President of a recruiting firm, and someone who has run corporate TA shops for years, I see these candidates come across my desk on a weekly basis:

A crappy Recruiter looks like this:

1. First Recruiting job right out of college, working for a big agency recruiting sweatshop and this position lasts 9-12 months. They left because “they didn’t agree with the management style” of said agency. The truth is they weren’t meeting their goals, but we give them a pass because these sweatshops churn and burn through people.

2. The next gig is usually another agency or small corporate recruitment gig. This one usually lasts under 9 months. It’s more of the same, they couldn’t do it the first time, what makes you think they’ll do it for you!?

3. Now, if they’re smart, they jumped from the second gig before getting fired to a very large corporate gig where they have so many recruiters they truly have no idea what they actually do, this will buy you at least 24 months before you’re discovered as a recruiting fraud. In these big organizations you don’t even recruit, just post and pray, anyway, so you should be able to survive.

4. Big organizations finally figured out you’re worthless, but you now know the game, so you leveraged this big corporate name on your resume into your next gig, this time as a senior recruiter, with another big firm who wants you to sell out your last firm and all their recruiting secret. The big secret is, you have no idea, and the last big org gig you had, well, they had no idea.  Once you run out of fake secrets to share, you’ll be kicked to the curb, so start looking for a recruiting manager gig in about 18 months.

5. You jump at the first recruitment manager gig you’re offered. A mid-sized firm, who loves your big company experience and can’t wait for you to save them from themselves. They have super high expectations on what you’re going to do for them, this is not good for you, remember, you suck at recruiting! You’re gone in 9 months.

6. Welcome back to the agency world! You will now bounce around these companies for a while, selling the fact you have ‘contacts’ at big companies of which agency owners want to get into. You’re now 8-10 years into your Recruiting career, and you’re an awful, crappy recruiter.

If you’re truly lucky as a crappy recruiter you’ll fall into some recruiting gig with a college or university or some other sort of fake, non-profit. Those are like wastelands for crappy recruiters. Absolutely no expectations that you’ll do anything of value, just show up, collect a check and follow a process. It’s never your fault, and hey, they don’t want you to move to fast anyway!

Beware TA leaders. There’s a reason a recruiter has had 4 – 6+ jobs in ten years, and it’s not because they’re good at recruiting! The best recruiters don’t move around because they’re so valuable the organizations they work for won’t let them leave! If you’re crappy, people are hoping you leave and take your crappy recruiting skills to your competition!

Are you “True” to your game?

There is a phrase that is often used in a number of contexts, the phrase is:

“Stay true to the game” 

I’ve always almost seen it used when talking about sports, and almost always in basketball. But I’ve seen it used across pop culture for decades.

“The game” is that thing you do. Maybe it’s sales. Maybe it’s accounting. Maybe it’s basketball. My ‘game’ is recruiting. Third-party, corporate, RPO, the vendors that support recruiting, we are all in the same game.

“Stay true” well that’s a little more difficult to define for each of us. What does it mean to ‘stay true’ to recruiting?

If you pull out recruiting and think about what does it mean to ‘be true’ to anything. Think about that one thing you’re most passionate about. How are you ‘true’ to that passion? How do you think about it? How do you ensure it’s number one in your life? What do you give to that passion to demonstrate it’s your truth?

I think this helps to start paint the picture of what being true to recruiting is all about.

My game is recruiting. If I’m true to my game there are things I need to do. Here are some of things I do to stay true to my game:

– Consume anything about recruiting I can get my hands on.

– Network with people in recruiting at all levels that are better than me.

– Take calls and notes from others in the field who want my knowledge and share constantly.

– Constantly think and act in a way that will raise my game.

– Understand that being true to recruiting is a choice. My choice.

If I’m going to be true to my game I need to constantly search for ways to raise my game and raise the game overall as a profession.

I’m a busy guy (aren’t we all!). I run a staffing company (HRU Technical Resources). I write every day and share freely with the community. I wrote a book (The Talent Fix). I volunteered and I’m on the board of the Association of Talent Acquisition Professionals (ATAP) as the President-Elect, and I run the Michigan’s Recruiter’s Conference each year.

At the same time, I constantly push my team to leverage the latest and greatest recruiting technology on the planet, and push them to be life-long learners of sourcing and recruiting. I’m sure that isn’t the easiest environment to work in. But, I’m staying true to the game.

It’s Monday. You have a choice to make today. Do you stay true to your game, or not?

Do you even know what your “game” is? If you do, congratulations, you are already on a great path! A powerful path! Knowing what game is yours is more than half the battle. Once you find it, the work to stay true isn’t work, it almost becomes an obsession of sorts! In a good way!

So, my challenge to you this Monday is simple. In the comments below, tell me what your game is. Then, tell me what you’ll do this week to stay true to your game! Go.

Things I Learned at Greenhouse OPEN #ghOPEN

Hey gang!

I’m on the road this week at the Greenhouse OPEN. What’s Greenhouse? It’s one of the top ATSs on the planet – but you already know that if you read my blog!

The Greenhouse OPEN is basically their user conference, where Greenhouse users and those considering using Greenhouse come together as Talent Acquisition Pros and Leaders to experience great recruiting related content from a corporate TA point of view.

I love attending conferences with great TA content, and Greenhouse has done a really great job growing this conference to 1,000 participants. You know it’s good TA content when it doesn’t matter if you use Greenhouse or not, to get a ton out of the sessions.

Also, being that Greenhouse is designed for corporate TA, and not having third-party recruiters in the room, you really get a ton of great sharing and conversation taking place between attendees.

Here’s some cool stuff I learned:

Some organizations are using very specific, un-produced video, to source candidates! How? Instead of sending a candidate a blind email or text, the recruiter takes their iPhone and records a quick video to the specific person they want and sends them the link to watch. “Hey Tim, I found you and want to talk to you about…Here’s why you would be great…Etc.” The response rate from the organization using this is super high, as you can imagine.

Organizations are worried about Recruiter Experience! You know what, you do not want your hiring process to suck for candidates. We all get that 100%! But, what about your recruiters? Does it suck to work as a recruiter in your environment? If it does, that might be worse for your organization in attracting talent, then if your CX sucks. We tend not to even give this concept of Recruiter Experience any thought at all, but we should!

Across all industries, text response rates from candidates are running 70%-ish, in all kinds of roles from hourly to salaried, tech to healthcare. Texting candidates keep coming up as either something organizations can’t live without, or something they are not using, and don’t want to use. I find this really strange, as it seems like it’s a form of communication that everyone is using. Being able to have etiquette and rules of engagement are important.

Not all employee referrals are created equal. Great employees are more likely to refer great referrals. Bad employees are more likely to refer bad employees. You don’t want bad referrals, so it’s best to have a program that allows you to segment and know who is providing you with your best referrals. Manually, this is difficult, but with technology like Greenhouse and Teamable, you can start to get a real sense of who should be referring more in your environment.

I’m going to keep advocating that you find ways to spend more time with other TA pros and leaders. We learn from each other when we are in safe, and encouraging environments to share. Does that have to be at a conference in New York? Nope. It’s great if you get the chance, but you can also start or find local outlets for groups of peers to get together.

I love that Greenhouse and others are showing the industry the way, and I thank them for bringing so many great and giving TA pros together. Such a powerful way to learn and develop as a professional!

The Latest Dating Trend has Always been a Leadership Trend!

Have you heard of the dating concept called, “Stashing”?

Here’s the Urban Dictionary definition of stashing (editor’s note: you know you’re about to read a great HR post when it starts with a definition from Urban Dictionary!):

“Stashing is when you’re in a relationship with someone and you refuse to introduce them to your friends and family; mostly because you view the person as temporary, replaceable, and/or you’re an assh@le.”

There are other reasons you might ‘stash’ someone. Maybe you know your friends and family would approve of this person, so you stash them because you still like them, but you don’t want to upset your friends and family. Maybe you’re worried your friends might try and move in on this person themselves, so you stash them.

But, usually, stashing has more to do with there is something about the person that embarrasses you, most likely because you’re a shallow, horrible person, so you stash this person you’re in a relationship with. On the leadership side, stashing actually takes the exact opposite effect.

Leadership Stashing

Leadership stashing is when a leader purposely makes sure one of their direct reports doesn’t have a high profile, so that other managers within the same organization won’t know you have a rock star on your team and then try to steal them to their team.

This happens all the time, especially within large organizations!

Here’s how it works. I’m a leader of a group, my name is Tim. A year ago I hired Marcus right out of college. Your basic new hire grad. Green as grass, just like every other new graduate. I quickly came to understand that Marcus had ‘it’. He was a natural. I know Marcus will easily be better than me in the near future if he’s not already better than me.

As a leader, I’ve got a decision to make. Keep Marcus stashed on my team and reap the professional benefits, or position Marcus for promotion, in which I’ll probably lose him off my team. With Marcus on my team, I exceeded all my measures last year, and Timmy got a big bonus. So did Marcus.

When asked in leadership meeting what I’m doing with my ‘team’ to exceed all my measures, I let everyone know some of the ‘new’ leadership accountability strategies I’m using, and how it really comes back to setting great measures and then holding your team accountable to meeting those measures. Marcus, specifically, doesn’t come up.

Am I a bad leader?

Yes, and this is happening in every organization on the planet.

We love to frame this around, “well, Marcus just needs some more seasoning, and I’m the right person to give it to him”. “Marcus is young, and not quite ready.” “Under my leadership, Marcus is thriving, but under some of these other yahoos, who knows what might happen.”

The right thing to do is obvious and simple. My group is doing well, I let the organization know, it’s a team effort, but you all have to know, I hired a rock star, and we need to get Marcus on a fast track to leadership. That’s the right thing, but it’s not as easy as it sounds when you’ve been struggling to climb your own ladder.

What we know is leaders stash talent.

It’s our job as HR pros and leaders to find that stashed talent and elevate that talent within the organization. If we don’t, that talent will most likely leave because being stashed sucks in life and in your career.

 

Do you know what you really want in your career?

About ten years ago I came home one day and said to my wife, “I can’t do this anymore”. It doesn’t matter what I was doing, I just couldn’t do that anymore. I knew it. Something had to change.

Steve Jobs is famously quoted as saying, “people don’t know what they want until you show them”, I think Henry Ford said something similar about one hundred years before Jobs. Both were talking about consumers, but in reality, it fits people in almost every aspect of life.

I find it really rings true for people in their careers. We think we know what we want. “I want to be a vice president by the time I’m 35”, I told my wife when I was 25 years old. I thought I knew what I wanted in my career. In reality, I was just title chasing.

I became a vice president and I found out I felt no difference in my career, and I definitely didn’t feel satisfied. So, a title was not what I truly wanted. What I discovered was I wanted to be in control. Success or failure, I wanted that on my shoulders. It didn’t matter what I was actually doing in my career, I needed control.

As a leader, I find probably only about ten percent of those who you support will truly have an idea about what they want out of a career. The other ninety percent, are just like me, they think they know, but they really don’t until they’ve reached whatever goal they’ve set for themselves, then they’ll find out if they actually had any clue, or they were just guessing.

If we start with most employees have no idea what they want in their career, or at best they have an idea, but it’ll be wrong, it’s now up to leaders to help shape this path. It might be the only real thing we can do for those we supervise as leaders are to help guide them on their career path.

Employees don’t know what they want in a career until you show them. 

If you believe this is your job as a leader to show those you work with what their career can be, this really helps to crystallize what you do each day.

What I know from my experience is the best people I ever worked for had a vision and path they wanted for their career. That path was usually developed and born from a mentor or boss that took the time to care about this person enough to show them what their career could be.

I can point to four different leaders and mentors in my life who helped shape my path, and by the way, all said I was an idiot for my obsession with a title. I was too young to listen, and thankfully they were too smart to give up on me.

It’s your job as a leader to show your people what they want. Don’t ever assume that your people already know what they want, most don’t. They won’t admit this because admitting it makes you sound like a moron, but it shouldn’t stop you as a leader from showing them the possibilities.

What I find is the more you show them the path, the more they’ll gravitate towards it and raise their performance to meet it.

GenZ Doesn’t Want Your Stupid Millennial Office Happy Hour!

Guess what 2018 will be the year GenZ’s get us to stop talking about Millennials and this just in, all those ‘after hour’ work happy hours you think your employees love so much, well, GenZ hates them and they’ll hate you for expecting them to go to them!

Hello, Employee Experience! Turns out all of us don’t like the same things, and GenZ is much more cautious and career-focused than their much older Millennial peers. A recent article in Wired had this to say:

The college student survey allows a more precise look at in-person social interaction, as it asks students how many hours a week they spend on those activities. College students in 2016 (These are GenZ, not Millennials)  (vs. the late 1980s) spent four fewer hours a week socializing with their friends and three fewer hours a week partying—so seven hours a week less on in-person social interaction. That means iGen’ers (or GenZ) were seeing their friends in person an hour less a day than GenX’ers and early Millennials did. An hour a day less spent with friends is an hour a day less spent building social skills, negotiating relationships, and navigating emotions. Some parents might see it as an hour a day saved for more productive activities, but the time has not been replaced with homework; it’s been replaced with screen time.

Basically, GenZs don’t want your forced socialization. They would rather be at home gaming, watching Netflix or hanging out in much smaller more intimate settings. So, your weekly office happy hour is like torture to GenZers.

Another factor playing into this is alcohol is more unpopular with GenZ than any generation before them. So, if you are having a group office interaction, your youngest employees would more likely prefer it be a non-alcohol affair, especially if it’s a work event.

GenZ has grown up with Snap and IG and they know better than anyone what happens when you get in drunk in front of people – it lives on forever and is embarrassing!  Combine this with being more career-focused as a generation and GenZers would just prefer to have other types of fun than drinking.

It’s not that they’re completely different than their older peers, but from a career standpoint, they’re probably more like they’re GenX parents in terms of thinking work is about work and not a party. They go to work to focus on their career, not socialize.

So, what should you do for GenZ when replacing the office happy hour? Here are few ideas:

Weekly Netflix Series “Meet”-Up – Everyone in their own comfortable place all watching the same show at the same time and interacting on Twitter or Snap or IG or whatever messaging app fits your culture. But without actually physically meeting up!

Encourage smaller one-on-one employee interactions – It doesn’t mean these younger employees won’t create many relationships across your company. They would just prefer one or two people at a time versus larger social interactions.

Plan fun events that are dry, or that aren’t centered around alcohol. GenZers are not prude, and they are fine with people making the decision to drink, but they won’t want to choose to hang out at a work event where the sole purpose is getting drunk.

Ahh! Something and someone new to talk about! Isn’t this refreshing!?

5 Things Leaders Need to Know About Developing Employees

I think we try and deliver a message to organizations that all employees need and want to be developed.  This is a lie.  Many of our employees do want and need development. Some don’t need it, they’re better than you.  Some don’t want it, just give me my check.  Too many of our leaders truly believe they can develop and make their employees better than they already are.  This is a lot tougher than it sounds, and something most leaders actually fail at moving the needle on.

Here are some things I like to share with my leaders in developing their employees:

1. “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time” -Maya Angelou.  I see too many leaders trying to change adult employees.  Adult behaviors are basically locked. If they show you they don’t want to work.  They don’t want to work.  Part of developing a strong relationship is spending time with people who are not a waste of time.

2. People only change behavior they want to change, and even then, sometimes they’re not capable of it.  See above.  When I was young in my career, I was very ‘passionate’. That’s what I liked calling it – passionate.  I think the leaders I worked with called it, “career derailer”.  It took a lot for me to understand what I thought was a strength, was really a major weakness.  Some people never will gain this insight.  They’ll continue to believe they’re just passionate when in reality they’re just really an asshole.

3. Don’t invest more in a person than they are willing to invest in themselves.  I want you to be great. I want you to be the best employee we have ever had work here.  You need to be a part of that.  I’m willing to invest an immense amount of time and resources to help you reach your goals, but you have to meet me halfway, at least. Don’t think this means a class costs $2,000, so you should be willing to pay half. It doesn’t. Financial investment is easier for organizations to put in than for employees, but if you pay for the class and it’s on a Saturday and the employee turns their nose up to it, they’re not willing to ‘invest’ their share.

4. It’s usually never the situation that’s pissing you off, it’s the mindset behind the situation that’s pissing you off.  Rarely do I get upset over a certain situation. Frequently, I get upset over how someone has decided to handle that situation.  Getting your employees to understand your level of importance in a situation is key to getting you both on the same page towards a solution. Failure to do this goes down a really disastrous path.

5, Endeavor to look at disappointment with broader strokes. It’s all going to work out in the end.  It’s hard for leaders to act disappointed.  We are supposed to be strong and not show our disappointment.  This often makes our employees feel like we aren’t human.  The best leaders I’ve ever had showed disappoint, but with this great level of resolve that I admired. This sucks. We are all going to make it through this and be better. Disappointment might be the strongest developmental opportunity you’ll ever get as a leader, with your people.

LinkedIn and Microsoft launch “Resume Assistant” and it’s a big deal!

Big announcement today coming out Microsoft/LinkedIn. The two companies are figuring out more and more how to integrate LinkedIn into the Microsoft office ecosystem and their new Resume Assistant is the first major feature announcement.

What’s Resume Assistant?

Microsoft’s Resume Assistant is a Word product integration that brings the power of LinkedIn directly into Word when you’re crafting or updating your resume.

How does Resume Assistant work?

It’s pretty easy. You upload or open an existing resume, made an old resume you have, and Word will automatically recognize that document is a resume and open up the LinkedIn integration. The integration pops up as a right-side window in Word so that your resume is on one side of Word and the LinkedIn Resume Assitant is on the other.

From here, Resume Assistant will do a lot of things but mostly use artificial intelligence to help you craft a better resume that will more likely be selected for jobs by recruiters. Resume Assistant does this through analyzing LinkedIn data of those profiles, work experiences, titles, etc. that are getting hired and moving into new roles via profile changes.

Don’t know how to phrase your work experience? The Resume Assistant will pull in specific examples, similar to you, of people who got hired and show you phrases, skills, and words that will help you get hired. RA will also easily allow you to go directly to other profiles on LinkedIn from Word to see how others have structured their profile.

Why is this a big deal? 

So, Microsoft and LinkedIn shared a bunch of data that led to this product creation:

  • LinkedIn data shows ‘job hopping’ has doubled in the past twenty years
  • LinkedIn is seeing 40% growth in job applies through LI
  • On average 100 candidates are applying for each position on LinkedIn
  • 80% of resume updates in the U.S. happen in Microsoft Word

Okay, and, so?!

Connect the dots! One part of the Resume Assistant is to also show each Word user updating their resume the jobs that most match the resume being created. So, 80% of job seekers will have LinkedIn’s 11 million jobs showing up in Word, right next to their resume while they’re updating and thinking about looking for a new job!!!

I would not want to be a job board today and be reading this. In fact, for how much Google has been swinging its weight around recently, this is also a pretty big punch back from LinkedIn and Microsoft to let them know they are not giving job search away!

Game changer!

Think about how many people use Microsoft Word. 100% of those people will now have a direct link to LinkedIn and the LI jobs when they are doing anything with their resume – Resume Assistant opens automatically when a resume is detected. It’s really a genius move by LI and MS.

If this is the first integration that the two sides have figured out, I can’t wait to see future integrations as well, and from the sound of things, both sides are moving quickly to make these a realities.

One note of importance. Resume Assistant will launch today for Microsoft 365 Insiders, at the beginning of 2018 for all Microsoft 365 users, and soon after for all other Word platforms.

At 4% Unemployment, 2nd Chance Hires are Looking Very Attractive!

I’m a big fan of 2nd chance candidates. Candidates who were fired, terminated, let go, etc. for many various reasons, most of which come down to wrong job fit, the wrong personality fit with their boss, wrong skill fit, etc.

I don’t have actual numbers, and I wouldn’t believe any study who told me a number because here’s what really happens. An employee gets fired for ‘performance’ because the manager thought the person could do the job, even though the person had never done the job, and both continued to get frustrated. HR puts that down as termination for performance, not poor job fit, or lack of skills, or something else.

Is this person a bad employee? No. Did this person not try hard? No. Did the organization look to move this person into a role they were better suited for? No. It’s just easier to cut bait and move on to another hiring mistake.

The problem most employers are facing right now is at 4.1% national unemployment, almost any candidate that you find out of work is going to have a ‘hickey’. Maybe they require too much money, maybe they don’t have the education you require, maybe they won’t move, etc., etc., etc. We all know the deal. It’s tough sledding finding talent right now, it’s even tougher if you’re looking for someone out of work to fill your job!

That’s why 2nd Chance Candidates can be some of the best hires you’ll ever make, but you need to pick the right ones. Here’s what I look for in 2nd Chance Candidates:

1. A chip on their shoulder. I don’t want them to talk bad about their last employer, but I want to know they feel like they were unfairly evaluated and have something to prove!

2. Job history before the last job. Say what you want, but when taking a flyer on a 2nd chance candidate I find those will more solid work history tend to be the right ones to pick.

3. Willingness to do anything. When you get fired some weird shit happens to you. You get angry. You get sad. You get frustrated. Eventually, you get to a point where you go “I don’t care what it takes, I’m getting back into the game!” Those are my 2nd chancers.

4. The story seems to make sense. I don’t hire a 2nd chancer where the story doesn’t add up. So, you were the employee of the year, last year, then out of nowhere, with no reason, you got fired? Yeah, no thanks.

5. They want to work. You’ve been out of a job for 7 months, and I offer you a job, I only want to hear one thing. “I can start tomorrow!” If you tell me I can start in two weeks, or next Friday, or anything besides “I’ll start working right now if you let me” I’ve got a concern!

People get fired for awful things, but they also get fired over petty things. Being in HR, I’ve been apart of both kinds of firing, and I’m not proud of that fact. It’s super hard to support a hiring manager who wants to fire an employee because basically, the employee cares more than the hiring manager about the work, but I’ve seen it happen!

It’s our job in TA and HR to find out if we’re going to give someone a second chance. It’s not an easy decision. It seems like there’s always a red flag, and it seems that way because there is! The person was let go! It’s now our job to determine was that person being let go going to be a positive for our company, or a negative. I like to think, many of second chancers can be a positive!

But, don’t get me started on 3rd and 4th chancers!

Do you LOVE someone you work with?

Almost two decades ago Gallup research came up with the Q12 of employee engagement. Basically, twelve questions you could give your employees to measure their level of engagement. Soon after, a multi-billion dollar industry was born and everyone in leadership and HR started to worry about how we could get and keep our employees engaged.

I thought most of it was crap and still do. Engagement for me is like watching a puppy chase it’s tail. They will never catch it, and if they do, it’s pretty unsatisfying after a while! Employee engagement is the same thing. I’m not saying you want disengaged employees, but where does it end, or does it ever end?

Once you go down this path of ‘training’ your employees you will do stuff to keep them engaged, they will continue to need stuff just to stay at that same level of engagement. Offer a kid a cookie and he’ll do what you say. Give a kid a million cookies and he loses interest in cookies.

The one piece of the Q12 I like is the question:

“I have a best friend at work.”

It’s pretty simple and straightforward. If you have a best friend at work, you’re more likely to want to stay at that job. I mean, heck, you’re best friend is there! What’s better than going to work each day with your best friend!? Not much!

Now, take that concept one step further. Instead of a best friend, do you ‘love’ someone at work? Imagine how you would support a coworker that you love!? It would be off the charts!

That’s what I love about the photo above from the World Series with Justin Verlander and Jose Altuve. For those who don’t know, Justin Verlander is a pitcher who came to Houston from Detroit this year at the trade deadline. So, Justin was very new to the team, but much needed if they want to win the world series.

There’s a long history of superstars coming together on a team and it not working out because egos get involved.

Jose Altuve is the best and most popular player in Houston. He’s a superstar. Justin Verlander is one of the top pitchers in baseball, in history. He’s a superstar. Want to know how one ultra-high-performing player welcomes another ultra-high-performing player and makes sure ‘culture’ and ‘ego’ will not be an issue?

Just look at the photo!

In an interview, Jose Altuve was asked about Justin Verlander and he said, “I literally love Justin Verlander”. Verlander was told what Jose said and had these shirts made up. These are two dudes who get it!