Category Archives: IT Staffing

The Only Way To Hire A Recruiter

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I’m always on the lookout for a silver bullet to make great recruiter hires! But, I haven’t found one, yet!

I’ve met and been around thousands of recruiters in my career, and most have a few similar traits that make them successful at recruiting, think:

  • Self Motivated
  • Ability to drag information out of an individual
  • No phone fear
  • Quick minded
  • Connector of people
  • Etc.

The reality is, though, no one has really found the secret sauce to hiring great ‘potential’ recruiters.   I say potential because it’s rare I that I hire experienced recruiters.  It’s not that I have a problem with experienced recruiters…wait, I probably do have a problem with experienced recruiters.  Here’s my deal, if you’re a really good recruiter, I shouldn’t be able to afford you. If I can afford you, you’re not a good recruiter.  I like to grow my own.  No recruiting experience, come on in and we’ll show you the ropes.  By the time you end up being really good, I’ll be paying you really well and everyone is happy.

That still leaves me with a better way to find those who, potentially, could be really good at recruiting. There isn’t any ‘recruiter starter’ program at the local community college, and while Enterprise Rent A Car kids have been a good breeding ground, that isn’t perfect either.  Sure, Allegis/Aerotek has used the Fraternity and Sorority route for years, and that has done well for them, but I want something that is more of a sure thing.

And, I think I might have it.

For my next Recruiter hire, I’m going to have the candidates actually recruit someone for their interview process.  Game show style!  Bring in three people we like from a personality standpoint, give them a requisition on a need we have with all the details, and send them home.  First one to come back with a valid candidate that we would want to hire, get’s the job!

I know, I know – you can thank me later – I solved it!

Think about it for a minute.  If the candidate truly wants to recruit they should be able to fumble there way through one requisition to find some candidates that are relatively close.  The reality is, I want to see how they go about it, I want to talk to them once they find the person and ask them a million questions about how they did it, what they would do different, etc. I want to know that they actually want to do this.  My guess is 2/3 of the candidates won’t complete the task and I’m completely fine with that, because I don’t them, and they probably don’t want me!

What do you think?  Would you take on the task?

The Great Recession Fall out on Talent Acquisition

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I have a feeling I’m about to preach to the choir.  I can’t tell you how many conversations I’ve had with a hiring manager lately, that just don’t get it! (I hear you saying “What do you mean “lately” – does a hiring manager “ever” get it!)   The Recession has made our job very hard, especially if you are currently trying to hire anyone with technical skills (engineers, designers, IT professionals, Scientist, etc.).   During the Recession we had candidates coming out of our ears!  Today, it seems like, almost overnight, technical jobs across the country have turned on like a fire hose!  Everywhere companies are trying to find technical talent, in all industries, all at the same time.   Remember that baby boomer Tsunami of retirement we were suppose to see?  This feels like the first waves are hitting the shore in terms of technical hiring!

I’ve spoken to engineering schools that 100% graduation hires, plus companies now paying for engineering seniors, senior year of tuition!   I’ve spoken to companies that have had to double their payroll projections, mid-budget year, just to have enough money to hire the same amount of projected hires at the beginning of the year.  In HR and Recruiting we get this, the market moves, sometimes very quickly, and organizations have to be prepared to adjust and move with it, or risk causing some very bad outcomes to our operations.  But, do our hiring managers get this?

I’m hear to say, not enough have gotten the message!

Over the past few months, it we are now having daily “conversations” with hiring managers who are still wanting to see the same 20 candidates they saw during the height of the recession, and turning down candidates for minor things like “he seemed a little shy”, “she was from Tech and I like State grads”, or “he’s had 2 jobs in the past 10 years!”   I’ve had hiring managers have interviews, come back and say they like both candidates really well, but would like to see some more! When I don’t any more!   It all sounds familiar doesn’t it!  The Recession did this to them!  It made the greedy, it made them ultra picky, and it made them believe there is a never ending pool of great candidates who only want to come work at your company.   Ugh! I hate the Recession!

So what?

In HR/Recruiting this is where we become marketers.  We have to start selling, and what we are selling is an idea.  An idea that the world is different, they sky is falling and there’s only one person left to hire.  “That person, is the stupid candidate I just put in front of your face!!!” (wouldn’t that be great if we could say that!?)  Look, I understand you and your hiring managers “only want to hire the best talent”; by the way so does everyone else.  But times are changing, if you want to hire the best, you better be paying the best, or at least offering the best value proposition as compared to your competitors.  Lines of candidates aren’t out there just waiting for calls any longer.

It’s really just simple addition, more technical job openings than candidates + baby boomers now beginning to feel like they can retire = our job just got a lot tougher!

Do your hiring managers get this equation?

Becoming A Victim Of Can’t

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I spoke in Huntsville, Al this week to a group of around 175 HR and Talent Pros for North Alabama SHRM.  It was a fun group. They had a ton of energy and were willing to put up with me and my fast talking northern ways! My wife told me to be more respectful, than usual, on my way down to Alabama.  She said southern women expected more manners than I was use to!

For those who don’t much about Huntsville it is a big military town, which means most people either work on the base, or work for a contractor supporting one of the many military contracts coming out of the base.  There are literally hundreds of companies in Huntsville that are considered military ‘contractors’.  That’s really just a big fancy term for companies that won a military contract, which is just a scope of work they need to do or deliver to the military.

If you haven’t worked a military contract before, they come with as much red tape and rules as you can expect from the U.S. government.  That becomes a very big problem for HR Pros who love to follow rules!  One thing that was apparent very early into the day was that some Huntsville HR and Talent Pros became very comfortable with saying the following statement:

“We can’t do that, we are a military contractor!”

You can probably guess what my answer was to that!  “Yes, you can! You just have to find a way to do it!”  What they didn’t expect was that my company was also a military contractor, I was going to accept any victim statements.  Yes, you are a military contractor.  Isn’t it great!  Now, let’s find out how we can use Facebook to recruit and find you some really good talent!

But, Tim, OFCCP! OFCCP won’t allow us to social recruit!  Really.  It really says within OFCCP regulations that you can’t recruit on Facebook!?  Well, no, but…you just don’t understand.  Yeah, I understand more than you really know.  I understand it’s going to be hard, but it can be done.  I also understand that it’s really easy to fall the victim and use OFCCP as a crutch to why we can do our job.

I actually spoke to two pros who were going through OFCCP audits.  Scary stuff for any HR or Talent Pro.  But I didn’t even let them use it as a crutch.  I asked them if they would get through it. Yes, was the answer.  Did you get fined? No.  So, now you just have to figure how to make it the sourcing you need to do, work within your OFCCP process.  Not easy. But doable and needed.

The most dangerous thing we’ll ever face in our career is becoming a victim of can’t.   I’m a firm believer you can try to do anything.  We might not succeed, but it shouldn’t stop you from trying.  Things like OFCCP are there to catch bad companies, doing bad things.  I’ve never spoken to a good company, with good people, trying to do the right things, that ever had an issue with OFCCP! Ever!

Go do the right things for your organization, and in the end trust that why you might get audited, you are doing what is right.  That’s ultimately all you really can do.

More Resumes vs. Enough Resumes

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I work in a world of resumes, where resumes equal solid quality candidates.  I recently met with a client who needed ‘more resumes’, they didn’t have enough quality candidates.  Seems like a simple equation, I just go back to the office and crank up the Resumatic 2000 and BAM, you’ve got ‘more’ resumes.  But those in recruiting know, it’s never that simple.

I started digging into what was really going on, because the fact is, you only need 1 resume to fill a position.

My line of questions in order:

Are you not getting any resumes? Well, you see we have a very involved process.  It’s hard for resumes to get through this process.

Oh, so you have a ‘too many’ resume problem, so you set up many filters to get just those that fit your need best?  Not exactly.  We have one process for all positions. Some positions we have too many resumes, some positions we don’t have any resumes coming through.

Why don’t you change your process for those positions you’re not getting resumes?  We can’t. It’s illegal. EEOC.

It’s not illegal to change your process based on need and position.  It’s illegal to discriminate against candidates. (that wasn’t really a question, but I couldn’t help myself from saying it!)  Well, our “EEOC Lady” (exact quote) won’t allow us to change the process.

What does the hiring manager think?  He loves the process!  He created it.

How many positions do you have open? 70.

He likes having 70 positions open? Doesn’t that cause a business issue?  He just wants us to get more resumes, but keep the process the same.

You see there really isn’t an issue with getting more resumes.  The problem is, is when you already have enough resumes but you put barriers in place that cause those resumes not to be enough.  You have enough resumes, more resumes isn’t going to solve your problem.  Your process is the problem.  Your filters are the problem.  Me giving you more resumes isn’t going to help you, it’s just going to cause a bigger problem.

But that’s what they did.  Just go get more staffing vendors to work with.  If ten can’t get us ‘enough’ resumes, get twenty.  Twenty isn’t working, let’s try 75.  Still not good?  Why not one thousand!?  It won’t matter, you still have a you problem.  You are unwilling to change.  More isn’t going to help.  You have enough.  You need to fix you.  You don’t have a resume problem, you have a ‘You Problem’.  That is actually harder to fix!

 

Putting On the ‘You Show’

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That’s what an interview is, right?  It’s a complete 60 minute show about you.  The entire thing rotates around your storyline.  Will you fit with this position? Will you fit with our culture? Are you the skilled enough?  Are you the ‘right’ personality for the hiring manager.

It’s a complete 60 minute tell all that you really control.  You can make it a sitcom, a drama, a horror show, crime show or a boring biography.  It’s really your choice!

But in the one time any of truly has for a ‘You Show’ we allow employers to make it a ‘Them Show’.  We allow them to run the show.  Can you imagine going to a Broadway musical and you tell them what songs you want to hear!  It doesn’t work that way.

“But you have to follow the employers interview structure!”

To a point.  If you’re asked a question, you have answer it.  Wait a minute. No you don’t!  Do you know how many hundreds of thousands of questions I’ve asked in interviews over my career, where the candidate didn’t even come close to answering what I had asked!

Here the secret to getting and not getting a job all at the same time.  Be the director of your You Show.  Some employers will not like your show and will not make you a offer.  That is okay, that is not an offer you would want anyway.  In the long run you wouldn’t be happy.  Some employers will love your You Show and want to extend your You Show to many more seasons.  That’s the job you want.

That doesn’t mean you go into an interview with sweatpants and your “Just Legalize It!” t-shirt, because that is who you ‘truly’ are.  You go into the interview the best version of yourself, not the worse version of yourself.  Think date night, I really love this girl you.  Trying to impress, but also not trying to be someone you are not.

The You Show, now playing at an interview near you.

The #1 way to tell someone they Suck!

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Every Monday morning we have a recruiter meeting at HRU.  The purpose of the meeting is for our recruiting department to share with each other what they are working on, what they’ve accomplished the prior week, and give in updates that the full group might need to know.  Something came up this morning that I wanted to share.  Like most recruiting departments/companies/etc. we have our “Repeat Offenders”  – these are the people who just won’t give up.  At one point, a recruiter probably called them, and maybe even interviewed them, possibly even hired them – but now, they won’t leave you alone – they call, they email, they LinkedIn, send Facebook Friend requests, etc. Basically, they become a stalker!

This morning, one of the recruiters says “Mr. Jones (I’ve changed the name to protect the guilty) won’t stop bugging me, he emails his resume to me ‘every’ day!”  We all know Mr. Jones, because Mr. Jones use to work for us at a client, and it didn’t turn out so well.  Now, Mr. Jones wants us to find him his next assignment.  The problem with Mr. Jones isn’t skill related, it’s personality related – he’s annoying.  He was annoying to the client and to his work group peers, he is annoying to us, and I’m pretty sure he was annoying to his ex-wife – thus the “ex”!

So, the BIG question. How do you get Mr. Jones to stop bugging you?  This happens to every single recruiter I know eventually.

Here are the steps I use:

1. Tell Them!

That’s it – no more steps.  Here’s our problem as recruiters – we never want to burn a bridge.  “Well, Tim, you don’t know where he might go, who might hire him, I don’t want to ruin my reputation”  We have to think about our “Candidate Experience”! Bullshit.  You’re being conflict avoidant, and if you look at your last performance review, I bet under “opportunities” is probably says something about avoiding conflict or not confronting issues head on.  I had a very good HR mentor once tell me – “it’s best to deliver them that gift, then to allow them to walk around not knowing”.  Once you start being straightforward you’ll be amazed at how many people will say, “No one has ever told me that!”  That’s the problem – no one ever tells them the truth, thus they keep doing the wrong thing, instead of trying to fix what is wrong.

How do you get an annoying candidate to stop bugging you?  You tell them exactly, very specifically, very calmly, with no ill intent – “I want to give you a gift.  You might not see it as a gift right now, but I hope in time you’ll understand it to be a very valuable gift.  I (don’t use “we” or “us” or “the company – you’re avoiding again by using those) – I think you have a very bad personality flaw that comes across annoying to me, and from the feedback I have received, to those you work with.  If this does not change, I won’t be finding you any job in the future, and you’ll probably struggle to find one on your own as well.”  OUCH! That hurt right?  But, read it again, was there anything mean or untrue in the statement? If this person actually listens to the statement and acts on it, will they be better for it?  You can change the reason for whatever issue the person might have – maybe it’s hygiene, maybe it’s a crazy laugh, who knows – but the basic message stays the same.  You need to change, or I never want to speak to you again.

It’s hard for recruiters to understand this, because 99% have been taught to be nice, thoughtful people – not to be rude.  This sounds a bit rude.  In reality, I think it’s rude to string a person along and not care enough about them to actually tell them what is wrong and to help them.  Stop telling candidates your blow off lines and start telling candidates the truth.  At the very least, you’ll have more time on your hands to talk to the candidates you really want to speak to!

It’s Criminal Not To Recruit Your Competition’s Talent!

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If I get 100 Talent Acquisition Pros in a room (no this isn’t going to be a dead lawyer joke) and ask them if it is ‘ethical’ to recruit each others employees, about half will say ‘No’. In fact, there are even a number who will say, “we have an agreement to not recruit from each other”! I’ve heard this, out in the open, with no restraint. It’s normal practice in the corporate world. It’s very common to hear inside Talent Acquisition departments say they don’t ‘actively’ recruit from each other because they’ve been told not to by their executives. That type of conversation will soon be a thing of the past, although, I doubt highly the activity will be!

From SHRM on the highly publicized lawsuit of many of Silicon Valley’s largest tech companies who ‘conspired’ to not recruit employees from each other:

“From 2005 to 2009, the leaders of Northern California’s largest and most powerful companies agreed to reduce competition for workers by entering into an interconnected web of secret, bilateral agreements not to solicit—‘cold call’—each other’s workforces,” the plaintiffs allege.

“By shielding their employees from waves of recruiting, defendants not only avoided individual raises, they also avoided having to make across-the-board pre-emptive increases to compensation,” the plaintiffs claim.

Agreements among the companies to refrain from the common recruiting practice of cold-calling each other’s employees deprived workers of information regarding pay packages that they could have used to find higher-paying work or to negotiate for higher salaries with their existing employers, according to the lawsuit.”

That’s right Talent Acquisition Pros it’s actually illegal to say you won’t actively recruit from your competition because you’ve agreed between each other not do it.   I get it, I get why you do this.  Having a hot job market and constantly taking talent and losing to each other seems like a never ending treadmill of work, but that’s the life of a Recruiter.  You know there are ways to stop this from happening.  Pay better.  Engage better.  Develop talent better. Have a vision that is real and share it.  It’s the age old business conundrum, do you want to pay on the front side or the back side.  Reactionary companies end up paying on the back side – more money in wages to attract talent because they turnover people who leave for better companies, more wages, etc.  It eventually catches up.

Other companies pay up front and keep their talent by paying at market or above, then constantly evaluating the market and changing pay whenever it’s needed without having employees ask, or have to leave to get paid fairly.  They develop talent from within and spend the money to do it right, giving themselves an internal pipeline.  They make sure to only allow people into leadership positions who are engaging and visionary.  It’s a lot of work, and costs money, but in the end it’s still cheaper and you have a better company.

I would actually love to see legislation that makes it illegal if you’re a corporate recruiter and you don’t make cold calls to recruit!  You saying you’re a ‘Recruiter’ but you don’t actually recruit!   That’s the real criminal activity going on!

7 Words Mathematically Proven To Get You More Hires!

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Wired recently worked with OkCupid and Match.com to find out which words were used on the most popular dating profiles on their sites.  Millions of data points were done for this data analysis and they came up with the most popular 1000 words.  What they came up with were the exact words to use in your profile descriptions to get the most clicks.  I’m going to take this one step further and say if these words attract singles to another single, I’m quite certain they would attract a job seeker to a job.  My theory being singles are also job seekers.  Okay, I hear you, just because some words might attract one person to another person doesn’t mean those same words will attract a person to a job – but it might.

It is my belief that we can totally re-write Job Descriptions in a way that is a lot less HR’ish, and much more real, which will make more people want to work in the jobs you have.  My good friend, Kris Dunn, is a master at this over at Kinetix (click through to see some of KD’s work). Here is another one I put together when I was hiring a Recruiter for my staff.   The positive is, it lets us in HR get our ‘creative on’.

Let ‘s give it a shot. I’ll give you 7 categories of words that were mathematically proven to get more dates hires:

1. Active Words: Yoga, Surfing, Surf, hiking, athlete, etc. These words were popular because people want to be associated with things that are good for them. Do you highlight active things you do at your organization in your job descriptions?

2. Pop Culture Words: 30 Rock, The Great Gatsby, Homeland, Arrested Development, The Matrix, The Big Bang Theory, The Hunger Games, etc.  People want to work with an organization that has a personality.  Pop culture references in your JD give you a personality.

3. Music Words: (FYI – some of these could also be considered Pop Culture) – Radiohead, Nirvana, live music, guitar, instruments, etc .Does your organization have a musical preference? Why not?  Maybe you’re a little country, maybe you’re a little rock and roll, either way, it’s alright to let candidates know!

4. Calm Words: Ocean, meditation, beach, trust, respect, enjoy, planning, dedication, openness, etc. Words that project a feeling of safety and security. In today’s employment marketplace, don’t discount the value of your jobs based on how calm and secure the work is.  Anxiety is at an all-time high.  Having the ability to say “we’ve never laid off in our history!” could pay you huge dividends.

5. Food Words: Chocolate, cooking, foodie, pizza, sushi, breakfast, etc. Food is a gathering and sharing point in most cultures.  If you do food related things in your work environment it brings all of your people together. Everyone eats. Not everyone will do Yoga or want to watch movies.  Chili cook-offs, company happy hours, Donut Fridays, etc.

6. Descriptive Words: Creative, motivated, confident, driven, passion, awareness, etc. Most HR pros see JDs as a means to an end.  They’re a legal necessity.  We should be looking at them as mini-commercials for our jobs.  I would love to see a company go full video JD – nothing written, just watch our Job Description. 60 seconds of someone telling you what this job is.

7. Spontaneous Words: Tattoos, F*ck, wasted, kissing, puppies, sucking, lucky, etc.  Words that most people would never expect to see in a JD.  This word has absolutely no usefulness in a JD – that’s exactly why we put it in there.  It might not attract an older conservative candidate, but it might be just what a newer generation is looking for.

I’ve never met a senior executive that had a problem with any job description I wanted to write – not matter how bland or how crazy.  That being the case, why do we continue to write JDs that put people to sleep?

 

 

 

How Technology Saved Recruiting

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This is a rebuttal post to an article on Forbes.com by Liz Ryan titled “How Technology Killed Recruiting“.  For those of you who don’t Liz she is a media personality who use to work in HR back in 1997 for Fortune 500 companies, which might speak to her viewpoints about recruiting and technology.  Liz writes a ton of HR and Recruiting type articles for publications that wouldn’t give me the time of day (Forbes, Huffington Post, Harvard Business Review, etc.), so clearly she is respected.  That is why I decided to react to her article.  She has a huge stage and gets thousands of clicks, so I was perplexed at this attack on corporate recruiting that really has no true basis in 2014.

Liz feels that Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) have killed recruiting.  She feels all corporate recruiters do is set a never-ending string of hoops for applicants to jump through, until they are eventually lost in the black hole of a corporate recruiting abyss.  I do think this thought process has merit, 10-15 years ago.  When ATS software first came onto the market they were clearly selling to the corporate HR marketplace.  I can clearly remember sitting in process meetings with ATS vendors and having them show us (corporate HR) how they could make our life easier.  Need more screening of applicants? No problem we can put them through the ropes and only the best will get through!  Then they show you a process flow chart with 67 steps and the rest was history – Liz’s story above.

Today, ATS vendors look at the process completely different (Note: I don’t sell ATS software now, or ever! But I have purchased and implemented 5 systems in my career.).  Now, corporate HR needs the ATS to provide talent fast.  It’s about fewer clicks – how does an applicant let you know they have interest in “1” step, not 67.  Once the talent is ‘sourced’, corporate recruiting can then take them through as many filters as needed to ensure a great hire is made.  This is fairly common practice in the last 10 years of ATS implementations.  Can you still find companies that don’t get this? Yes.  But it’s not the norm in corporate recruiting with today’s ATS. Dare I say ATS vendors asked to set up a 67 step process would probably back out of the deal and refer that customer to their competition, because that will not be a customer you will ever make happy!

Here is why Liz and those who support her argument still carry around this notion of an ATS being a ‘black hole’ for your resume (BTW – I’m wondering when the last time Liz even applied for a job online?).  Candidates make excuses when they are not chosen.  “I applied! And I was perfect for ‘that’ job! But I never heard back.”  I know this because I’ve been the leader of corporate recruiting departments in the last 10 years.  I’ve heard this exact line coming from the cousin of our CEO.  I then had to show our CEO, in fact, three carefully crafted communications that his cousin received from our ATS system as the hiring processes proceeded over two weeks.

Technology hasn’t killed recruiting.  Technology has decreased the time it takes HR to recruit great talent. Technology has increased our retention rates and decreased new hire turnover by giving us better data on which to base our hiring decisions.  Technology has allowed recruiting to be brand ambassadors to our organizations. Technology has allowed most corporate recruiting departments to do ten times more, with the exact same staff it had 10 years ago.  Technology has allowed our employees to be an integral part of our recruiting function by automating employee referral programs. Technology has increased applicant response times by showing us exactly who in our organizations is holding up the process.  Technology has allowed us to fish in candidate pools that, previously, were never possible. Technology moved recruitment out of HR and into one of the most valuable functions an organization can have.

If people are your most important resource.  Your organizations ability to recruit talent, becomes critical to your organizations success. Technology help do that for recruiting. But I don’t write for Forbes, so what do I know.