StlRecruiting

The Numbers Still Matter (Just Make Sure It's The Right Numbers)

I'm a big fan of social media.  When pitching a program to a client, I discuss the benefits of blogging, but focus in on the money you can make blogging in excess of what you're currently making. In my view, if you're not hiring more people or making more placements with your blog, then you have no business spending working hours on your blog.

Of course, this is also true for meetings, paperwork, hour and a half long interviews with bad candidates, RFP's, reading ESPN at work, checking your e-mail, and talking about quality initiatives with your boss.  The truth is that if you're not making money, most of what you do is a waste anyway.

So when I'm training, and someone asks me how long they should spend blogging a week - I tell them 3-5 hours.  That's a big chunk of time, and the only people it makes sense for are those who already tightly manage their time.  One of the first lessons I had in recruiting was the idea that planning was the most important consideration in my success. I had to plan my day, and then execute it.  I had to know how many phone calls, interviews, submittals, sendouts, meetings and starts I needed to make quota.  And over time, I saw that when you didn't hit your numbers, you didn't make your placements.

Surefire Way To Interview Salespeople

For those of you looking for new sales help in the New Year, let me offer you a tune-up for the way you hire salespeople.

Some of you have long, involved processes that include psych tests (better hope they're certified), questions about whether they were involved in sports in high school (yes, this question is still around), and the highly dubious, "Show me your W-2's" method that is supposed to show whether past performance is predictive of future success.

Forget all of that.  And forget your "gut instinct," too.  Salespeople are good at selling themselves, so anyone who has ever held a sales position and had any success should be able to convince you they know what they're doing.  Most account managers can worm their way into a position by repeating this mantra, "I love the phone.  All business starts with the phone, and if I just continue to make my calls, I'll be successful."

Of course, once they are hired, there always seems to be something that keeps them off the phone (I'm no exception, and have been guilty of it in the past, but you might consider adding this to your employment process in the hire of your next salesperson.

Ask them to write down a schedule of a normal day, their first week, the first 30 days, and the first 90 days. 

Hiring Sourcers

I'm fascinated with the world of sourcing.  As an account manager for six years with various staffing firms, my experience with sourcing prior to 2005 was the filing cabinet in the back of the office with 10,000 manila folders and a phone sticky from spilling coffee with too much milk and sugar on it. Ah, good memories.

After getting involved with the online employment crowd, I noticed this particular discipline starting to get a lot of attention, and names started popping up again and again.  Shally Steckerl, Glenn Gutmacher, Maureen Sharib, Jim Stroud, and Dave Mendoza.  Who were these sourcers, and how exactly did they make money?  Were the technologically proficient versions of a reference librarian?  The human variant of the manufacturer's guides I'd used to such good effect in a previous sales jobs?  Or were they something new?  Were they some kind of protean recruiter evolving along a different path than the rest of us?  They researched, and we sold?

The jury's still out.  Most recruiters, whether they be corporate or third party, still consider sourcing as an essential part of a recruiter's job.  The idea of outsourcing is laughable, unless you count the "junior recruiters" who are hired to download resumes from Monster because the volume is too high.  But the tide is turning.  I promised that I would go through the Electronic Recruiting 101 booklet and let you see some of the nuggets of gold hidden.  Written by Shally, the book of course has a section on hiring Sourcers (p.94)

Hiring Sourcers Do's and Don't

• Sourcers vs recruiters:
• Sourcers aren't junior recruiters
• Not all sourcers are created equally
• One-to-many ratio
• Where to go?

Shally covers each of these points in detail (though in telling you where to go, he pitches ERE and only ERE), and and then to make it really spicy, he shares how to compensate them.

The answer is highly.  Compensate them highly, but only if they're worth it, and if you can track their results to money saved.

by the way - I'll be on a panel with Shally next week.  We're speaking at an exclusive Executives only Briefing at the NAPS conference in San Antonio.  There's still room, the event is free, and we'd love to see you there.  Remember that you have to RSVP separately for this event by contacting Margaret Graziano <mgraziano@keenhire.com>

Videos From OnRec And LegoLand

Jim Stroud has video of big names doing God Knows What at OnRec.  Cheezman, Gerry Crispin, Jim and Kevin Wheeler (who will be returning to St. Louis in December) and Mark (missed the last name) are headed, somewhere.  When asked about having this many Staffing guys in a single car, Jim Stroud replied, "This is how we roll."

I looked for my own video, and couldn't decide if I wanted to show you Family Guy Numa Numa, Superman in Grand Theft Auto, or this one. 

I went with Legoland, in honor of K-Fed. 

Electronic Recruiting 101: ERE And Shally Steckerl

I've been remiss. Scott Baxt of ERE mailed me out a copy of the 2007 Electronic Recruiting 101, the latest and greatest recruiting training tool written by Shally Steckerl and put out by the Fordyce Letter.

That was about six weeks ago - maybe longer.

The thing is - I actually read it - and was floored by it - but have neglected to do a full write-up, in order to be able to really, truly do the manual justice.

Well - if wishes were fishes...Here is the link to buy this superb manual.  I will be writing up not one, but several reviews on the book - and if you are a recruiter, or a trainer, or a branch manager, may I highly recommend you pony up the cash and buy this book for your office.

It's like a Krell Mind Machine for Recruiters.  And yes, Shally's a sourcer, but he writes about much more, including interviews, job postings, and blogs, and computer tricks.  Please buy it, and tell them you came from StlRecruiting.com, and apologize for not buying it earlier as I was slow in posting this.

More reviews on all of my sites later. 

8 Ways To Get Noticed As A Candidate

1) Start A Blog titled:  Reasonsfor[employer]tohire[yourname]com

2) Sign up for LinkedIn and contact employees at the company, asking for help getting to a hiring manager.

3) Fill out a profile on Jobster.

4) Get interviewed by a recruiting or staffing blog.  Attach your resume to the post. 

5) Search for local blogs in your area on the industry you want to work for.  Contact the blogger and ask for referrals.

6) Leave intelligent comments at industry blogs, and leave your resume url as the hyperlink to your name in the comment section.

7) Go to ZoomInfo and Jigsaw and edit your personal information to make sure it's accurate.

8) Update your LinkedIn Profile.  Start putting it into your e-mail signature.

Preparing For A Staffing Interview: Cold-Calling List

So you have an interview coming up with the branch manager of a staffing firm, and you want to be their salesperson.  You are a good cold-caller, you hav a firm grasp of your industry (tech, accounting, healthcare, office), and you can point to a record of beating sales quotas, even in the tough times.

Actually, if you have all of those things, you're a shoe-in, so you can skip this advice, but if you are lacking in some areas of your resume, or if you've had some slow years and are looking to break a slump, here's a surefire way to impress your hopefully future boss.

Go to the Library.

Companies have big databases with thousands of contacts for hiring managers that you will be able to call when you are hired, but those databases are often inaccurate, old, never truly complete.  Promotions, new jobs, and new hires change the make-up of a company, and you're often left dialing old phone numbers and talking to people that don't have any business for you and wonder why you're calling.

Using RSS To Improve Candidate Retention

RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication, and the best explanation for it use is something like, Web surfing made as easy as checking your e-mail.

RSS Readers like FeedDemon (PC), NetNewsVine (Mac) and Bloglines (Web) allow you to select the sites that you normally read, and instead of typing in their url or using your book marks, you open your reader and read new material just like you would open your e-mail and read it in the morning.

So let's give RSS a new definition.  Recruiters Succeeding at Staffing.  The technical ideas behind RSS are unimportant, because a lot of programs (like blogs) create an RSS feed, which means all you have to worry about is content.  So what kind of content would be useful to candidates that you have already interviewed?

Job Postings, Skills Training, Company Newsletter Information, Referral programs, and content on how to perform better in your job (business analysts, java programmers, salespeople).

If you are in  St Louis, and looking to use the power of RSS to connect to a local technical community, you've come to the right place.  E-mail me at the contact e-mail listed on the top right of this blog.

(and if you're out of state, send me a note anyway.  I can probably still help)

The Responsibilites Of A Recruiter

When you first start recruiting, the world is your oyster.  You get the opportunity to help people find jobs, a noble way to earn your bread and one that promises a good living if you work hard.

Making phone calls, meeting with candidates, and finding new ways to uncover resumes is all part of the fun.  Most people enjoy taking your calls, and in terms of respectability, most people really do like recruiters.  Ask any parent, and the job of recruiter is a very respectable one. You may not be a doctor, but you help people and you make money. 

But very soon, the recruiter runs into the hard facts about employment.  The control of the process is all in your mind.  The real task of recruiting is not finding candidates or finding job orders, but rather making a connection between an employer and a job-seeker.  And at the end of the day, working with people is infinitely harder than working with widgets.

Third Party Recruiters Are Parasites?

Technically, I believe the e-mailer used the word, blood-sucking parasites.  This attitude exists in many job-seekers, but it's often replaced with "you're a saint, you're a lifesaver, you're a godsend" when you find the same person a job at a higher salary when they were about to dip into savings.

Of course, sometimes those people take the job and sullenly refuse to have anything to do with you as soon they get the offer.  But hey, we make money off both types, right?

There's no sense to saying that recruiters are parasites, or cyberpimps or anything else derogatory.  We provide a service that two parties can't provide for themselves.  Trying to pretend we don't add value to the equation only showcases the ignorance of the person making the accusations.

You might as well say that doctors are parasites because they only work with sick people. If you weren't sick, they wouldn't have a job!  And realtors.  If you didn't need to buy or sell a house, they wouldn't work!  And cops!  If there were no crime, there would be no need for cops!  And I pay their salaries.

What you really see in these outbursts is a person who has lost control over their lives, and who can't stand the fact that they don't have the skills, knowledge, or contacts to take care of themselves. 

Are there bad recruiters who add little value to the process?  Sure.  But even recruiters who do little provide a service to the companies that pay them.  If you're angry, be angry at the companies that decided that contract workers were expendable.  Here's a book review on the subject that every staffing person should read.

Non-Competes Should Go The Way Of New Coke

A couple of months ago, the non-competition section of my former employee agreement came to an end.  12 months after I decided to voluntarily leave my staffing firm, they can no longer sue me for the act of starting my staffing company or going to work for another company. 

My non-solicit is still in place, as that agreement lasts for 24 months after employment.  The difference between the two is important.  My non-compete says I can't work in my industry after leaving my company.  My non-solicit says I can't go after clients I cultivated on the company dime.

So what do I think of non-competes? 

This is what I said about them two years ago.

"---- ------- -- ------ ------- ---- -- --- -- a ------ ---- --------- ------ --- -one- - --------- ----------"

Today, I feel compelled to tell you what I really think - to fill in the ellipses, as it were.

Non-competes are a legal tool that companies use to stifle competition from employees they weren't prepared to keep around.  They are by their very nature, unfair, and any employee that agrees to sign a non-compete without full compensation for the duration of the restricted time is enabling poor performance on the part of their new employer.

A non-compete is often a condition of employment - which is to say that most large companies (and many small ones), won't even bother to speak to an employee about the conditions they impose without compensation.  Regardless of whether you stay ten minutes or ten years, the day you sign your non-compete, you are agreeing not to work in the industry of your employer.

In essence, your employer is turning you into indentured servitude, forcing you to sign away your righs to earn a living in your home location not only for the length of your employment but for as long as they can get away with it (1-5 years depending on the state you live in).  Who would do something like that? 

Companies that know they can't hold on to quality employees.

Look - no one is arguing about the need for non-solicits.  In business, the clients of your current company should be sacrosanct for a period of time - simply because those really are assets and you can cause real harm taking a company's clients with you.  They did pay you to bring in or work with those clients, and going to work for another company and calling your old clients is unethical.

So what do we do about it?  First, let's address the problems with non-competes.

Recruiters As Spies and Informants?

There's a fascinating article today in the print version of the Wall Street Journal about a new company who taps the information and expertise of middle managers to help make investment decisions for large hedge funds.

Big Investors Turn To Network of Informants (subscription required).

A networking wizard has done for professional investors something akin to what Match.com has done for the nation's singles. He hooks up middle managers from hundreds of companies with professional investors desperate for an investing edge.

The gist of the article is the success of 34 year-old  Mark Gerson in building a network of informants for investment representatives to call to get "real" information about companies the investors are looking to put money into.

There are of course some serious ethical questions at play, namely whether the information provided by this network of informers is a breach of company confidentiality laws, but there is that grey area between illegal, frowned upon, ethically wrong, and traceable.

With pay rates of $100/hr and more, can middle managers at companies like Bed, Bath & Beyond, Applebee's, or Penske Auto Parts walk away from casual chats with information hounds?

More important for our audience, what is the role, and indeed the responsibility of recruiters if approached about information gathered during a recruiting call?  Recruiters are excellent sources of information because a) they have access to time sensitive projects throughout the enterprise, b) they have access to a wide variety of contacts, and c) they are trained to pull information from people.

That sure sounds like helpful traits for someone searching for competitive intelligence.  So is there a clear ethical line on the information we gather from clients, prospects, targets and candidates?

1) The Client:  Passing on information about a client (defined as someone you are under contract with) is pretty clearly taboo, seeing as it is specifically covered by the contracts we sign (recruiting companies are required to safeguard confidential information).  A recruiter passing on information about any client is often someone who doesn't stay in business too long.  Gossips are notorious in our business, but sharing gossip is a quick way to destroy a client's trust that you will keep their secrets close to the vest.

2) Targets: Targets are companies that are identified as possessing people with the skills we need for clients, with a low probability of signing on as clients.  Whether bad blood or another vendor in place, a target is considered fair game for competitive recruiting, so why wouldn't information gleaned from a target company be available for trade? 

This is a personal ethical choice, but the most likely for recruiters and sourcers who move into the intelligence arena.  Is it wrong, or is it just business?

One Thing Wrong With Recruiting Today

Hiring Manager:  And that sums up what you're looking for.   
Staffing Account Manager: I think we can find what you're looking for.  Let me ask you, what salary range are you looking at and do you already have an approved budget for this position?
HM:  We're looking for someone in the $60-70,000 range, preferrably the 60 - that's what we start people out at in this department, and they'll need about five years of experience.
SAM:  $60,000-$70,000 is a bit low for this position - especially if it's as important as you say.  Do you have any flexibility?
HM:  My best developer is making $70,000 right now and he has 12 years of experience.  If I bring someone else in higher, my whole team will be at my door hollering for a raise. 
SAM: What about someone with good potential but maybe not the degree of experience you just detailed.  Entry level programmers are making $50,000, and that's just with an IS Degree.
HM:  I don't need entry level - I have to have someone with real experience who is going to stick around and finish this project.  Send me what you have.

**Back at the Staffing Office an hour later**
Staffing Account Manager:  And that's what we need - in the $60-70,000 range.
Recruiter:  Does this one have to walk on water or would the trick with the fishes and loaves do it? 
SAM:  Let's just send him what we have.

That little scenario is fictitious, but it plays out at staffing firms across the country every day.  Salaries and job skill lists are written for positions and sent out to third party firms with the hope that a firm will turn up the diamond in the rough who has perfect skills and doesn't know their own worth.  Recruiters out of desperation send what they have, and hiring managers, desperate themselves, often hire whatever they can get.

It's a bit like a woman asking you if she looks fat in her pants.  If you're a contingency recruiter (dating), you'll be booted out the door.  If you're in house (married), you can't be honest without taking the blame for the nice dinners and never going with her to the gym.

Honesty.  Is that what we really want in business and life, or do we just want everything to magically work out?

All Hail the Sourcing Kings

Shally Steckerl and Dave Mendoza have gone out and done it.  They've joined the ranks of entrepreneurs who hit the mean streets looking to exist only on their wits and their sales skills.

Welcome to the big game, boys!

Shally and Dave are both bloggers, but more important, they are both sourcers, that quasi-magical skill of list creation where the phone and internet-searching skills combine to map out the community of users for recruiters to call.

Sourcing has long been considered a part of the recruiters job decription, but Shally and Dave turn this into an art, and are now available to consult.  If you are a corporation having problems finding quality candidates, or a third party firm looking for a competitive advantage over other agencies, try contacting Shally or Dave at www.jobmachine.net.

Shally blogs at CyberSleuthing and Dave blogs at Six Degrees from Dave.

ERE Media Report: Recruitment Process Outsourcing

I had the pleasure of having lunch with David Manaster of ERE a few weeks ago, and from that, he had Scott Baxt of ERE contacted me and sent me their report on:

Recruitment Process Outsourcing;  An Assessment of Outsourcing Prevalence and Effectiveness: September 2006.

I've had a chance to review the document, but need to set up the story before I can give it an honest take.

RPO, Recruitment Process Outsourcing, is an umbrella name for a lot of human resource functions.  In addition to third party firm contingent recruiting (which some people consider outsourcing and some do not), the term describes sourcing, background checks, Applicant Tracking Systems, reference checks, credit checks, vendor management systems and on-site contract recruiters.

Where I came from (Staffing Firm), RPO was a code word for either a VMS or a Managed Vendor system.  The report set me straight on the term, which should be helpful to staffing executives fearful of losing part of the contingent pie.

The report is the compilation of the research efforts of Elizabeth Saperstein, the Research Director of ERE media and her team of experts, including several folks at the Newman Group.  Using a survey based on ERE subscribers, the results and recommendations of the report lays out a snapshot of the ERE subscriber base and their approach to RPO.  The method seems mosty sound, in that only half of the 334 responses were deemed valid, and while selection bias plays a dual role (voluntary submission of results and the subscriber base itself), the report serves an educational role rather than a stastical one, and ERE does an excellent job not overreaching conclusions or trying to sell a service in place of the report's results (Research Methodology and Scope are layed out in the beginning).

That said, let's get to the meat. 

How Line Recruiters can Use Blogs: Part I

A BlogSwap Post at Recruiting.com discussed the use of Metrics, and that rolled into a large discussion in the commenta about the use of blogs by recruiters.

I promised Heather I would do this, so here is the beginning of a series of posts on how local and line recruiters can use blogs to hire more people.  The question of whether a recruiter should blog boils down to a few simple facts.

1) Will it help hire more people than other activities?
2) Will it help hire better people than other activities?

Everything else is marshmallow fluff.  My contention is that the only way for us to determine if blogging is an effective recruiting tool is for recruiters to use blogs and report on the results.  For the purposes of these examples, we're going to make the assumption that the authors of these example blogs are competent bloggers who update regularly, write well, and join online communities.  That's a big assumption, but here are two specific ways a recruiter can use blogs to improve the number and the quality of the people the hire.

Blog Example # 1:  Hyperion Recruiter.
Search Google for "hyperion essbase st louis"

The results should bring up a series of posts I made when I was looking for Hyperion Essbase programmers.  To this day, Hyperion Essbase searches from MSN and Google routinely lead people to my site who submit their resume for placement.

Blog Example #2:  Desktop Java Recruiter.
Do a search of "Swing interview questions" on Google. 

While looking for a swing developer, I posted a list of Swing Interview Questions.  That one post is my  highest traffic builder, bringing 10 people a day from around the world looking for a list of swing interview questions. 

Analysis:
What kind of people use search engines to find jobs?  Primarily the people most difficult to find - travelling consultants who are constantly on the lookout for new long-term positions.  These consultants, ERP experts (SAP, Peoplesoft Financials, Oracle Express, Siebel), financial experts in Hyperion, EDI experts in Streamserve and other programs, usability architects, and hundreds of other specialites outside of the technical world are looking for new positions.

They are also looking for advice on how to do their job better.  A recruiter who hosted a blog on the technical aspects of hard-to-find technologies for their firm is going to better locate hard-to-find people with a blog that pulls candidates than phone calls that push them.

Good recruiters for years have haunted forums, lurking for top talent.  Doesn't it make sense to bring that talent directly to your website?

Up Next:  Call Center Blues?  Try a Blog.

Recruiting Metrics? Pah.

Gretchen comes out with the big question of Metrics in blogging, and I think it's time to lay my own cards on the table. 

We've discussed blogging metrics before, and the question has been one of soft measures versus hard measures.  Does  traffic, "buzz,"  press mentions, and anecdotal stories count as good metrics, or should we be focused on employees hired, time-to-hire, and cost-to-hire?

First, let me just say that recruiting metrics are not reliable.  They're fun to talk about, they give executives a sense of security, and they allow recruiters to pitch the illusion that our job can be measured.

I'm not disagreeing with the principle of recruiting metrics.  The numbers do mean something.  I simpy refuse to believe that steps taken to improve measures like cost-per-hire are causal, rather than coincidental.  Improving cost-to-hire is not an exact science, and anyone pretending it is deluding themselves. 

BlogSwap Post and a Surprise

My latest BlogSwap Post is up at Steven Kempton's AsiaPacificHeadhunter.  It's a fun-filled adventure of sight and sound, coupled with instructions on what to do when an executive you call on for business wants you to find them a job.

And because I haven't posted it anywhere yet, I'll give you a sneak peek at tomorrow's Recruiting.com Post.

I found another third party recruiting blog. 

Some Recruiting Links and a Catfight

$100K for signing up for a job board - CM Russell, Secrets of the Job Hunt
The problem of mixing up your work-at-home with your personal life.  - Career Journal, Jeff Opdyke
Getting a Raise from the Boss - Career Journal - Jaclyn Badal

RocketBoom Cat Fight:
An interview with Amanda Congdon yields this tasty quote.

What do you think of your new replacement? Have you watched the video?

It looks like she'll be a great new face. Best wishes to both Andrew and Joanne.

It looks like she'll be a great new face?  I wonder what the rest of that thought might be.

Interesting Search

Gautam has a post about social media and employment brands.

And today, one of my referrer log searches was "Teksystem Lies."

I guess someone had a bad experience, and is looking to vent.  Expect to see more of that.   

Are Recruiters using blogs to hire people?

Are recruiters successfully using blogs to find candidates?

My answer is always yes, but the hard numbers don't always spring to the lips.  We know that T-Mobile uses blogs, that Jobster is successful, that Microsoft has had great success, and that companies are interested in learning more.

Companies are spending money to advertise on blogs, start-ups use them regularly, and there's even a small division of a larger company that is focused on building talent communities to drive quality contractors to their clients.  But does it work?

Shel Israel (one of the authors of Naked Conversations) is asking the question, after he heard that recruiters at Microsoft have been successful.

The long answer is yes, recruiting blogging works.   Search engine results, industry knowledge, and networked early adopters are all benefits of blogging early.  Other benefits include knowledge of new tools like LinkedIn, ZoomInfo, Jobster, and Hirevue.  But for most places, the benefits of blogging haven't reached the corporate recruiter.  They're just too busy to do more than sort resumes and arrange interviews.

So the short answer is no, we're hearing more reports of success.  (interruption) I just got a call from Jason saying that he is posting an example of someone who got hired from a post on Recruiting.com, but what everyone is looking for is hard figures.  What companies beside Microsoft have implemented a recruiting blogging strategy and been successful.

Johanna Rothman has another article saying the same thing. (from Boston Works)

He's the King of All Recruiting Media

Ladies and Gentleman, the Canadian Headhunter, now posting over at Recruiting Animal.

He's got a good post on networking from Christian. 

Unfortunately, he's masking his domain so permalinks are hidden.  I'm sending you an e-mail, Mike.

Zoom Info Newsletter

Press Mentions:

Jason Davis has an article in Zoom Info's newsletter about the use and growth of online communities.  I have a quote in the article.

My second article in Hireability's newsletter is in the final editing stage - I approach the definition of passive and active recruiting with actual methods to find the so-called passive candidates.

We're all going to the Kennedy Expo - May 10th and 11th, to be on a panel discussing the use of recruiting blogs for corporate recruiters.

Now if I could just win that Tony for my tap-dancing choreography in A Streetcar Names Desire: The Musical

Let's Play Find A Staffing Agency

Determing what staffing agency to use in your job search is not an easy one. 

That's a bland way to open a post, but one that is important to your career management, because staffing agencies rarely want to be found.

What I mean by that is recruiters don't just need more candidates - they need more candidates that fit the profiles of their clients.  What this means for the individual candidate is a harsh truth about employment in general - you don't find a recruiter - the recruiter finds you.

A recruiter is 90% focused on the hot searches for each day, and 10% interested in buiding long-term networks of potential candidates.  Building that community of candidates is a supplemental activity that smart recruiters know helps them in future searches.  The tighter a niche the recruiter works in, the more activity is put into building their pipeline.  With a wider niche, the value of pre-screening a candidate pool drops.

Which is why it's rare to find a staffing agency spending money advertising to the general public.  There is little value in driving general traffic to a staffing agency.  Most people are going to be disappointed that they aren't a match for current openings, so why invite the hassle?

So how do you go about finding a firm?  We could name the technical staffing agencies in St Louis as a a start.  There are hundreds that are out there, but here is a list of the ones I know.

Words from Weddle's

A lot of good information comes in the form of newsletters.  I'm a big fan, partly because I write one myself, and partly because it's a painfree way of getting information.

If you're a recruiter, you have a lot of choices.
Recruiting.com
Hireability
ERExchange.com

Dozens more that I subscribe to and Weddle's. 

Today's Weddle Article's talks about the purpose of the job interview.  One would think that the purpose of a job interview is for a company to hire an employee.   Weddle's disagrees, and so do I.

"he purpose of an interview�its reason for being conducted�is not to select a candidate. It is to minimize or eliminate the risk involved in bringing a new employee into an organization. The hiring decision exposes an employer to change�it introduces a worker who is unfamiliar to his coworkers into an environment that is unfamiliar to the worker. If an interview is effective, it will reduce the possibility that such change will be disruptive or harmful to the organization."

This meshes with conversations we've had on Recruiting.com that a job requisition is not a job order  - it's a tool for managing risk.  Personally, I tell candidates that the difference between human resources and a third party recruiter is the recruiter has a vested interest in getting the right person the job.  They get paid only when they are successful. For too many human resource departments, there is no incentive to get the job done right.

Let me explain what I mean by that.

A Human Resources recruiter doesn't have the final say over a hire.  They can only fill the pipeline - the manager has to clear it with interviews and decisions on whether or not to hire.  When a position is opened, a list of skills is written and the recruiter goes to work.

Recruiter Compensation Plans

I used to work on marketing campaigns for car dealers.  Car dealers are the best marketers out there, and you learn a lot about selling and pitching your brand to the public from these guys.  From radio and direct mail to on-the-spot sales tactics, car salesman are the tops, even if they rank low on the the public trust.

I know better salesman than car salespeople though - and it's the dealers themselves.  They work their magic and their margins with a variety of compensation plans so complex that the best accountants would have problems deciphering them.

The comp plan becomes a pitch for luring top salespeople to a dealership.  If you're making 2% on the Revenue of each car sold, maybe you'll move for 10% of the Total  Profit on the car.  If you really want to move up, you'll go to a dealership offering 40% on the Actual Profit.

If you're savvy enough about car dealers, you'll know all three of those comp plans can yield the exact same amount of money.  Dealer holdback, reconditioning, special fees, and draw can all affect a salesperson's comp - but when they're talking with friends, all you hear is 40%...

Inside the Minds of Recruiters

Just surfing through a thread on recruiting.com called I will not Apologize

Inside is an excellent description of the daily practices of recruiters concerning, bill rates, perm fees, interview styles, headhunting, sourcing, client interaction, and candidate contact and representation.

If you want to know what your recruiter is thinking when you call - here's your peek into their psyche.

Referral Fees

A tight labor market has once again made referral fees a hot topic.  In year past, rewards for employees for passing on the names of their friends and coworkers reached a normal high of $2,000 (there are some rare exceptions), which never quite made sense to me.  Three questions about corporate referral fees for their employees/

1) If a company was willing to pay a fee of $20,000 to a third party staffing firm, why wouldn't they pay more to their employees for finding the same person?  The money could even come out of the staffing budget (the source of the funds may be the problem, now that I think about it).

2) When the friend is placed, are they angry at their friend for taking $2,000 out of their potential salary the way that many candidates think recruiting companies affect salary?

3)  Are there potential discriminatory complaints that can be made from a company that hires people that are referred to them?  Would this be a potential legal issue that has to be vetted by employment counsel?

If anyone has these answers, I'd should like to know.  Maybe I'll ask George.

You Need Me on that Wall

David Perry asks the question of what you do if the company you've interviewed tries to hire you without paying a fee to your headhunter.  Interesting comments ranging from the honest to the indignant - but one stood out where the commenter said, well, read for yourself:

"IMHO headhunters and recruiters hurt wages. How do they get paid? By employers. Where does that money come from? Wages. It seems to me that many recruiters are unskilled professionals (not engineers, scientists, accountants, etc.) acting as salespeople and trafficking in human labor, almost like a 17th century slave trader. Their very profession hurts wages and workers. Employers should utilize technology like Monster and Dice and avoid headhunters and staffing agencies and go straight to the labor pool."   

This could be the point where I try to be funny by pointing out that I refuse to put food on the table for the children of my candidates and then be questioned in the manner I do it, but seeing how it worked out for Colonel Jessup, maybe I ought to try a different tack.

Headhunters benefit candidate salaries. 
That's right.  Headhunters not only generate higher salaries for the people we place in our client companies, we create conditions that force companies to honestly evaluate their salary structure, benefits and perks.  Somewhere between 20 million and 40 millon Americans change jobs every year.  The effect in the staffing industy is known as "churn," perhaps better defined as voluntary turnover.   The level of "churn" is roughly analagous to the urgency companies feel when replacing their employees.  If talent drain is serioous, they up salaries, add perks,and increase benefits.  If the are in a placid pool, they hold back on raises, promotions, and find ways to cut costs.   

Headhunters directly affect churn.  We also go after the most talented and valuable employees in an organization for our clients.  Losing your top talent really hurts - which means the strategies companies use to prevent voluntary turnover affect retention strategy. 

I guess the biggest problem that candidates have is they feel the money that is paid to headhunters is money that would go to their  wages.  This simply is not true.  Corporations don't function on a zero-sum budget mentality.  Money paid to headhunters doesn't come from the salary pool any more than fees from Monster.com, radio advertising, or the cost of the employment section of the website does.

Staffing fees are a one-time expense - Salaries are an ongoing obligation.  I can see why candidates might assume that they could make work if only we didn't exist - but the truth is candidates would make less.  When I encounter one of these types in the interview room, I explain this to them if I have time and if they seem open to learning.  If they're just nasty and fearful, there's really nothing I can say that will make them feel better - and I sure don't want to represent them to my client.

Recruiters exist because there is a structural need for them in the economy. They will disappear when that need disappears.

Client Promotions

Fourth quarter business is usually at a premium. Rushing to get anything done at the end of the year is usually cause for higher prices, but I do remember an interesting promotion from year's past.

The promotion usually runs that if you someone with a client before the end of the year, they get 15% off your placement fee. Normally promotions like this tend to crimp profits because new business is never brought in - just business that would have been yours but you threw out a promotion that cost you money.

After all, an old client might jump at the chance, but hopefull a new client isn't motivated soley by money. Anyone ever run a successful staffing promotion and seen an increase because of it?

Rating Recruiters

One of my new things is to ask clients what I can do for them.  It's a good way to let them know that they can ask for help without me getting anything in return.

So I asked the other day, and one of my clients mentioned that it would have been nice if I had asked last week, as he needed a electrician.

I wasn't able to help him - but he already had the answer.  Angie's List .

Angie's list is a referral service for home contractors.  It works in the same way as Amazon's rating service does - but for home contractors.   They do work for you - you rate them - and the next person gets to see how honest they are.

What a great idea.  I wonder if we'll reach a point where blogs are universal rating systems.  Think about it - if you need to use a recruiter, what rating system would you have?  Do you trust corporations to use their own rating systems or send it to all of their clients?

Most recruiters are considered good if they get you a job, and bad if they fail.  What if they were rated on interview prep, frequency of contact, fairness in salary, truthfulness, and quality of client.

What if corporate job sites were rated the same way - and corporate recruiters were rated by helpfulness, knowledge, contact, management of the process, and negotiating skills?

There's a market out there for this - just as sure as there is one for Angie's list.  The question is how would you rate?

Questions, Questions, Questions

Good news - I'm writing up questions for managers to answer on how they hire - and some of them have agreed to give me some answers.

Inside the Mind of the Hiring Manager is coming!

sudoku wuz here!

Salary Surveys available

The 2006 Salary surveys are here in the office if anyone is curious.   Maybe I'll write that comparison if there are any significant differences.

Interested clients drop me  an e-mail and I'll get one to you. 

This Week Updates at Recruiting.com

If you're not signing up to Receive This Week at Recruiting.com, you're missing out.  This Week is an e-mail newsletter brought to you by the folks at Recruiting.com, and it is not available on the main site.  Over 300 people have signed up so far, and we're about to start a contest with a cash prize.

The opening paragraph this week;

The theme of the week is the power of the outside world to affect your recruiting strategies. From gas prices to unions to the ever present threat of pirates attacking cruise ships, no plan ever survives contact with the enemy. The key to good recruiting advice is learning that dealing with people is more about controlling your actions than worrying about what happens that is outside of your control.

There are Four categories - matched up with links an pop culture references. 

This Week - The best columns from the week.
Recruiter's Corner - Specific advice for recruiters
Soapbox - Editorials
The Lighter Side - jokes, funny web sites, timewasters

You get enough bad e-mail newsletters - this one is short, well-designed, and worth the time.  If you enjoy reading this site or the Recruiting.com home site, consider signing up. 

Click here to sign up for This Week at Recruiting.com

What to Work On.

I was just writing a rebuke of a column, and it popped up an idea I pitch when selling to my clients.

When choosing a staffing firm to work on your open requisitions, a hiring manager needs to determine who is selling the service, and who is doing the work.

Large staffing companies hire slick salespeople in perfect suits to fly around the country selling multi-million dollar deals with large companies.  These salespeople are payed by revenue.

Account managers and Recruiters,the worker bees in the trenches, are payed on Gross Profit.

Account Managers and Recruiters who are successful have options on what they will work on. They focus on profitability, speed of placement, and relationship with the manager to determine what they will work on.  They work as a team, pushing each other to do a better, faster job at making quality placements. They build a long-term relationship in the marketplace because they can always go to where the money is.

Account Managers and Recruiters who are not successful work on what they are told to work on, regardless of how this affects their bottom line.  They  never get past the bare minimums to do their jobs, and  as a result their quality of hire suffers.

So the next time the slick suit promises you low margins, fast response, and tells you they make their money on revenue - ask them how they pay the worker bees responsible for doing the work.

What would Durbin Do III?

How much time do you spend using job boards vs. looking for referrals?

I don't really like th job boards.  They are a necessary evil because most databases are filled with too much corrupt information, and scrubbing them is more painful and expensive than starting over or using what you have.

Job boards (the big ones) are a tool - just like niche boards, your database, your referral network, lists of candidates and Google Search.  They all have their applications, and they all have limited success in finding candidates.  The mistake is overreliance on one tool.

Starting with the negative - let's admit that a recruiter can use Monster and make placements.  It happens more than we give credit for it, simply because people know Monster is a great way to get recruiters to call.  At the same time, specialized searches and finding what I called "discriminate candidates," is a job best left for lists, your database and your referral network.

Monday Morninig Linkfest

Monday Morning Linkfest is up at Recruiting.com

Pick your favorite post of the week and go link it there.

Send a trackback.

What would Durbin Do II?

Answer to Another Question:

What is your philosophy for penetrating accounts once you're put on vendor lists?

Hmmm.  Timely Question for St Louis, as is seems every company with more than 10 contractors as some kind of vendor list.  For those who don't know, vendor lists are the approved staffing firms that a company wishes to utilize.  Combining your business into fewer companies gives them more work, which allows you to set lower prices, and also consolidate invoice payments.

Most large companies have invoice costs of $70-$150 per invoice.  It's easier to  write  a monthly big check instead of hundreds of smaller ones.  I first learned of the why of this in 1999, from Lawrence Aldridge, who was at Disney.  He had an interview titled Focus on the Value, that I've really tried to utilize as my staffing model in the last five years.  Lawrence agreed to sit down with me at Starbuck's one day and discuss his staffing needs.  Not in terms of who he needed, but in terms of how he planned to use his supply chain management experience to alter the way that Disney managed it's staff augmentation needs.

Why do I bring it up?  One - it's a great article, and it deserves to be disseminated.  Two - it is the heart of how to further penetrate into companies where you are already on the vendor list.  When you have a license to hunt, there has to be something you can offer managers to consider using you.  just because someone in Purchasing or HR signs you approval papers doesn't mean you should get the opportunities for business.  To me, this is one of the major problems with not allowing manager contact.  Recruiters have a lot of information at their fingertips, and wise managers recognize that there is more to a good recruiter than how many resumes they can shuffle their way.

What would Durbin Do?

A recruiter recently sent me a e-mail, asking for advice based on my blogging.

"...I've been searching for a blogger close to my space, of someone who is more experienced than myself...who can truly articulate recruiting ideas, advancements and perhaps even inspire.  Your blog is all of those things and I'd like to pick your brain."

While the praise is a bit overwrought, it's always pleasant when someone compliments your work.  What surprised me was the next sentence.

"I've asked these same questions to a few others whom supposedly are leaders in our space.  I was unfortunately disappointed by their lack of depth and humility.  I'd love to get your answers to the following...and hopefully start a meaningful dialogue with you."

I'm not sure what our guy said, and I'm certainly not willing to point fingers, but I do wonder if sometimes the "leaders" in our space aren't doing this first, to get attention for themselves, and, well, you can figure out the rest.  I'm a blogger by nature, and a recruiter by trade - so maybe I, and my e-mailer have different expectations of what to expect from industry lights - but I can say this - if you are blogging, you're not giving a lecture to a room of eager young recruiting trainees at a conference.

So let's cut some of the attitude.  That said, let's get to the questions. 

1. What is you strategy/philosophy for opening new accounts?  what are the most effective methods you use?
2. What is your philosophy for penetrating accounts once you're put on vendor lists? 
3. How much time do you spend using job boards vs. looking for referrals?
4. How many positions do you normally work on during a week?  how many interviews a week?  placements a month?

Weighty questions.  Questions I need to be careful about answering.  Questions that have many answers.  My take, which is just my opinion, below.

Guest Post: Counteroffers

Counteroffers are offers a candidate gets from their current employer when they have announced that they are leaving an organization.  Counters usually imply increased salary, a title, additional benefits or some promise of future growth within the organization. 

“What a great thing?” you might say.  “I can get what I really want without making a move.  They are going to:  a) finally appreciate me; b) reward me for the great work I do; c) panic if I leave since no one knows my job and they figured out they can’t do without me; or, d) placate me for a little while then fire me at the first available opportunity.  Pick one.

The danger of accepting a count offer is real, although it may not seem so at first.  To begin, you have already experienced a number of career “dissatisfiers” within your organization or you would not be looking.  You may feel overworked, under-paid, you are not getting the training promised, or you see your colleagues promoted ahead of you.  These are real career concerns.  For one reason or another, your organization is not seeing your potential or has chosen not to see your contributions.  This could be for any number of reasons but, the fact remains, your career path within this organization has stalled.

Recruiting Blogosphere

Ever wonder what's going on in the recruiting world?  We're growing and connecting, people!

Jobster Invitation

Just got another e-mail from people asking for a jobster invitation.

Trying to convince my company to act on this - because if people are asking me, then the curiousity level is high for random searches.

I sent it, of course - and if you want to know how it works or know people who want to work forfor Jobster or Samsung, send me a note.

Send it to the diogenescorner@hotmail.com account.

Outsourcing a Bust

I've been saying this since I first encountered it in 2002.  People are finally catching on.

At least the India Daily is saying it's not so great.

And the Herman Group says.

Customer complaints are now joined by employee complaints in the host countries. Increasing challenges are pushing employers to slow the flow of jobs overseas and to begin bringing jobs back for efficiency and stakeholder satisfaction. Even stockholders are questioning whether the alleged cost savings justified.

What should be interesting to managers and executives who read this is how far ahead of the curve recruiters are in the game of competitive intelligence.  To be clear - outsourcing is not all bad - but I could tell you offline who is doing it right and who is doing it dead wrong in St Louis.

But why would I?  No executive has asked me - so unless you get me drunk at a Christmas party...

Candidate Behavior

The market is tightening further, and this means dealing with counteroffers and multiple offers.

Business has been good - but there have been quite a few drop-offs this quarter, so I thought I'd repost a summary of what to do and not to do when resigning.

This is a decent link - and I've pointed to others at Ask The Headhunter before.  I even had a post on Recruiting.com about it.

The answer is simple.  Don't take an offer you don't plan on keeping for at least a year.  Don't interview for a job you have no serious thought of taking, and please, please don't assume that interviewing at a company for one position will magically get you another, higher paying position at that comp