SittingXlegged

The Best Boss I Never Had

Simon Meth — Mon, 31 May 2010 18:09:04 -0400

If you're like me, you've had quite a few bosses over the years. Some were good, some were bad, some were great, and some you'd rather forget. So what makes a great boss? Now I'm completely aware that the challenges I've faced with my bosses over the years say at least as much about me as it does about them. That being said, let's take a look at the hypothetical best boss I never had.

The best boss I never had is extremely loyal to the team.
The best boss I never had takes complete responsibility for the performance of the team.
The best boss I never had is on top of all the details.
The best boss I never had is technologically sharp.
The best boss I never had does not gossip.
The best boss I never had treats every member of the team fairly.
The best boss I never had acknowledges their mistakes.
The best boss I never had has accurate metrics on the teams' performance.
The best boss I never had is more concerned with supporting the team than covering their *$#%.
The best boss I never had knows how to motivate the team.
The best boss I never had leads by example.
The best boss I never had makes a change when change is needed.
The best boss I never had rarely fights fires.
The best boss I never had understands that team members vary in their ability, interests, and motivation.
The best boss I never had doesn't try to be everyone's friend.
The best boss I never had has realistic performance expectations.
The best boss I never had acknowledges in public when team members have done excellent work.
The best boss I never had works with team members in private when they have done less than excellent work.
The best boss I never had does not shout, raise their voice, or blow a gasket. If they do they apologize immediately.
The best boss I never had develops each member of the team.
The best boss I never had is enthusiastic and congratulatory when team members leave for better opportunities.
The best boss I never had is generous, is responsible, and operates from integrity.

So, have you ever had a boss like that? Would you like to?

Top 10 Things that are Seldom Measured and Analyzed that Should Be

Simon Meth — Sun, 02 May 2010 22:31:18 -0400

Corporate recruitment departments are usually extremely busy places. The focus is mostly on filling currently open requisitions. Satisfying the internal customers' immediate needs is paramount. Large quantities of fascinating data can be collected during that process but seldom are. My experience is that even when that data is collected, it is rarely analyzed.

Following are some ideas about what to collect and analyze.

Source of hire data is really important. It's relatively easy to collect too. The most accurate data can usually be found on application documents. Make sure that the people who review those documents with the applicant, double check the accuracy of the data with the applicant. Many applicants will just put "Internet", "company Website", or "Monster". Ask them to clarify. Capture the best data you can and start reviewing it monthly for all your hires and non-hires. In time you will learn a lot.
How effective are your Internet job postings? The source must be automatically registered. If you're relying on candidates to select the source from a list, then your data is likely no better than random. Most candidates will pick the first site on the list. There is no reason for the candidate to care about selecting the real source. Automate this or don't bother collecting the data.
Are employee referrals your largest source of hires? They probably are, but are they your best source of quality hires?
Are you measuring quality of hire? Are you looking at the relationship between quality of hire and source of hire?
Are you looking at the effectiveness of your recruiters? Number of placements is the sledge-hammer metric. But is it all that relevant? Surely the type and range of positions being handled by a specific recruiter are important. For example, you may have a recruiter who places a high volume of similar, non-exempt people and another who places a smaller number of difficult to find exempt professionals. Does it make sense to compare their performance based on raw number of hires? Is one more valuable to the organization than the other?
Are you keeping metrics on each recruiter's performance over time?
Do you have a measure of all non-recruiting activity that you require your recruiters to do? Is it the same for each recruiter?
Do you keep records of the ratio of internal fills to fills by third party recruiters?
Do you keep records of third party recruiter fees paid per corporate recruiter?
Do you measure internal customer satisfaction with the performance of the recruitment function as a whole and of each recruiter?

It would take a serious effort to begin collecting all the data mentioned above and to regularly analyze that data. Most corporate staffing departments probably have an idea about some of these areas but I question if the data they collect is valid and analyzed in such a way that informed business decisions can be made.

Memo to a Corporate Recruiter

Simon Meth — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 20:31:17 -0400

From: Hiring Manager

To: Corporate Recruiter

Date: April 10, 2010

Subject: How to work with your hiring manager to hire great people!

Thank you for your memo that I read with great interest. I appreciate the work you do to help me hire great people when I need them. Your thoughts are taken in the spirit they were intended and I’ll do my best to work with you as suggested. Here are some thoughts of mine that will help our work together to be even more effective.

The single biggest challenge that I face is that there never seems to be enough time to focus on staffing. Most of my time is spent managing my existing team, dealing with my “real” work, meetings, fighting fires, and responding to the requests of my boss. It’s difficult for me to focus on staffing when I have many urgent things to take care of “right now”. Please understand that if I don’t respond to your requests quickly, it probably means that I’m working on something that is more pressing to me.
It works best for me if you send just a few truly on-target resumes for me to review. I don’t have the band-width to review 10’s of resumes for each position. Just pick the best ones and I’ll respond to those.
If you’re not sure what I’m looking for, please read the requisition and do some research before calling me. I’m happy to clarify anything you need but not if you haven’t done the groundwork.
I truly value your detailed phone interview notes. When I read those and consider the resume, I’m in a much better position to choose what action to take. Thanks for taking the time to find out more about the candidates.
We all can get bogged down with administrivia. It’s great when you work out the details and give clear instructions to your administrator and mine so that everyone can be on the same page. For example, if everyone is informed when we’re scheduling interviews we have the opportunity to catch errors and make changes before the candidate shows up on our doorstep.
I rely on you to give me a solid review of each candidate we interview, to know what they really want to do, their compensation history, their compensation requirements, where else they are interviewing, and everything else that will affect our ability to hire the people we want to hire.
Part of your job is to close candidates. I pay particular attention to your offer to hire ratio. I know that you aren’t in complete control of whether or not a candidate accepts our offer but you are the person who has the most control on our side of the equation. If we’re not hiring the people we want then I have to question your effectiveness.
It’s important to me that you work well with my team including my boss. Your job isn’t to bully people into taking the action you want them to take. Your job is to forge strong relationships with the internal team and to influence behavior so that we can hire the people we want.
Please always ask yourself what you can do to forward the action. Don’t sit on your hands because I didn’t get back to you on a stellar resume. Find another way to prompt me to act. Sometimes email is best but other times I’ll respond better to a phone call, instant message, or you showing up at my door at a convenient time.
I value the weekly status report you send me. It’s great to have a clear one-page summary of all my open requisitions, when they opened,
and the status of each candidate currently in-play. I like that everyone on the
team is copied. It’s a tool I use to hold my team to account.
Please know that our business situation is extremely fluid. Our urgent needs today may not be urgent or even needs at all tomorrow. Please try to anticipate our needs. The closer relationships you have with my team the more likely it is that you’ll know what is going on and what changes are expected. Don’t rely on me to provide all that information. Find as many sources as you can. I’m available to validate any information that you believe is critical.
Sometimes HR can be so process and policy driven that it drives me nuts. I know that there are certain requirements to do your job. Please do everything you can to insulate my team and me from any busy work. Can you please just take care of it for us?
If you see bottlenecks, problems, wasted efforts, or inefficiencies in our hiring process, please either just take care of them or have whatever conversations are necessary to clean them up. None of us has time to waste on unproductive activities. Just don’t “bitch” about them to others. That doesn’t help anyone.
As you know, my boss can be challenging at times. I’d certainly appreciate it if you didn’t complain to her about any of my shortcomings. Just come and talk to me if you have concerns and we’ll work it out. I guess that means that I’d better not complain to your boss about you.

I truly appreciate the support you give us.

Thanks,

Your Hiring Manager

Memo to a Hiring Manager

Simon Meth — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 13:32:01 -0400

From: Simon Meth

To: Hiring Manager

Date: April 4, 2010

Subject: How to work with your recruiter to hire great people!

We’ve been working together for some time now and I’ve noticed some things about how that is going that may be helpful to share with you. My intent in doing this is to foster increased communication between us so that we can hire the right people, exactly when you need them, with the minimum of fuss.

Please respond to every candidate I submit to you within 48 hours. 24 hours would be better. It doesn’t work to respond only to candidates that are of interest to you. Just a short note is all I need about why the candidate isn’t a fit. That way I can learn quickly what it is you are really looking for and only send you on-target resumes.
Don’t complain to your boss that you haven’t seen any good resumes when you have a stack of resumes you either haven’t reviewed or haven’t responded to. If you have a concern please call or email me to discuss it. We’re on the same team here and I intend that you be completely satisfied.
My goal is to only send you candidates who are a good fit. In fact, I only send candidates that I believe we could actually hire for the position and whom I want to phone interview. Conversely, I don’t send resumes of people I don’t want to talk to.
I realize that you may refine what it is that you’re looking for during the hiring process. That’s fine and exactly the way it should be. Please just let me know if you have new information for me that may be helpful in our search.
If you have an internal person in-mind for the position, please let me know that right away. Let’s not pretend that we’re looking for candidates when the requisition is already filled before it even opens.
Please be on-time for all scheduled phone interviews and in-person interviews.
Great candidates have a shelf life. If you want to hire the best and brightest candidates we must act quickly and decisively.
Think carefully about the makeup of your interview teams. Make sure that you will have all the information you need to make a hiring decision.
When you find a candidate who you like who can do the job we should hire them. Let’s not wait to see if we can find someone better. There is always someone better out there! Let’s hire the one we have and open another requisition if we want to continue the search.
Never talk with candidates about their compensation expectations. That’s my job.
Never attempt to negotiate with or close a candidate. That’s my job.
Never make promises or share anything off-the-record with candidates. Focus all your discussions on the candidate’s ability to do the job.
Be prepared for your new employee’s first day. Be ready to welcome them and have their workspace ready and stocked with supplies. Have some real work for them to do when they start.
If you ever have any information or concerns that may potentially impact filling your requisitions, please call me immediately. I’m here to serve you and I really want to work with you to find the right people quickly and efficiently.

Cheers!

Simon

Your Corporate Recruiter

The Dreaded Employee Referral

Simon Meth — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 20:19:58 -0500

Popular opinion is that employee referrals are the #1 source of hire in a corporate environment. I believe that to be true. But are employee referrals the #1 source of quality hires? I doubt it! Following are some thoughts from my own experience. Your mileage may vary.

Companies often pay a referral bonus to encourage employees to refer their friends and former colleagues to open positions. Bonuses range from a few hundred dollars to thousands of dollars. I wonder sometimes if referral bonus programs are incenting the intended behavior in employees. I'm often on the receiving end of numerous internal referrals that are so off the mark that it's laughable. How can one candidate be a fit for multiple engineering positions in multiple disciplines? Most likely they cannot be.

Now let's say you worked with someone at a previous company in shipping. He was a good guy, you used to hang out after work and maybe you caught a ball game on the weekend together. You're buds so you want to help him out so you submit his resume for a variety of positions to HR following the approved referral procedure. You do that because you want to be sure you'll get paid if your bud is hired. Eventually the corporate recruiter will get around to reviewing their stack of referrals. The referral's chance of being submitted to a manager for review is about 5 percent. That's right, 95 out of every 100 referrals will go right on the discard pile! That's about the same chance someone has if they apply online.

Another strategy is to shotgun your friend's resume direct to the hiring managers. I often get calls from employees asking me if I know who the hiring manager is for such and such a position. I never reveal this information but it doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure it out without my assistance. Managers are often weird when it comes to employee referrals. Rather than just being straight with the referrer they make all kinds of vague promises to review the resume, call the candidate, and potentially set up interviews. Mostly, once the referrer has left their office, they forward the resume to me with a request that I deal with it. But sometimes the referrer actually has some valuable, first-hand knowledge of their colleague's capabilities and they express that information to the manager. They are actually adding value by doing that. This occasionally results in a first rate referral.

Some referrers submit so many resumes that people see them coming with their stack of resumes and they duck behind the nearest bookshelf so someone else has to deal with it. A very few referrers actually take a professional approach to making their referral. They research the available positions, they study their friend's resume, and they make informed matches. In short they only refer people for positions that they realistically could fill. Perhaps they speak with the hiring manager or they write a letter of recommendation or they come to speak with me. The funny thing is that these folks are not motivated solely by the referral bonus. They genuinely want a qualified friend or colleague to come and work where they work. They want to help out a friend and provide a quality referral. This, unfortunately, is quite a rare occurrence.

But what about quality of hire? Do employee referrals make better, worse, or average employees? I've heard and read that they make better employees with the rationale being that people will only refer quality people. Sure. Do you really believe that? I don't. What I do believe is that, at best, employee referrals provide about average hires. Some will be great. Some will be not so great. On balance they will be average. I can hear the metrics police shouting, "What do you mean by quality of hire?" I mean do employee referrals get solid evaluations, do they stay with the company for many years, are they an employee relations problem, and do they become key players? Do their managers wish they could hire more like them or do they wish they would leave before they have to fire them?

The fact that you worked with someone is just not a compelling reason to hire them. Perhaps you served in the military with them and you know they are great under fire. That's nice and some of the best people come from our military but are they qualified to do the job? Are their skills and experience a match with the requisition? Do they fit the profile of people who exceed in the company? What you should be seeing here is that assessing a referral candidate is really no different than assessing any candidate. Don't hire her because Joe in accounting says that she's a great gal. Don't let the hiring manager slide one in as a favor to someone. Do your job and hire the most qualified candidate for the job.

How to Get an Internship this Summer

Simon Meth — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 17:21:46 -0500

I spoke recently at UCSD on a recruiter panel for engineers and last week I attended a career fair at SDSU. A few weeks ago I was at BYU. So I've spoken with students recently and many of them want internships this coming summer. Following are some ideas that may help:

Have a crisp, clean resume that shows what you're studying, when you plan to graduate, your GPA, previous internships you've had, and that lists extracurricular activities that are potentially relevant to an employer. Give the corporate recruiter everything they need to choose your resume over a huge pile of other resumes. Don't even think about getting fancy with your resume formatting. Make sure that the contact information is accurate and up-to-date. Only list an email address that you check at least daily.

Update your LinkedIn profile to show everything you've done that an employer might want to know. You do have a LinkedIn profile don't you? If not you're missing out on the single best method of connecting with people who work in the organizations you want to intern with. Link to your other online sites such as facebook and twitter. But first make sure there is nothing there that could dissuade a potential employer from hiring you.

By all means apply online for summer internships. Just don't expect that you'll get a call back. Use LinkedIn and all other means available including your parents, family friends, coaches, and anyone who wants to help you make connections. What you're looking for is an introduction to someone who may actually be motivated to assist you. Making those calls and sending those text messages, IMs and emails will separate you from the pack.

Go ahead and attend on-campus career fairs. But have a plan and do some research on the companies you visit. Find out what they do and what sort of people they are hiring for now. Nothing impresses a corporate recruiter more than a well prepared, well presented student with a plan. Think of the few minutes you'll spend at the booth as a mini job interview. Maximize your chance of success by being personable and knowledgeable.

Talk with your professors and ask them if they know any companies that are hiring. Believe it or not organizations do contact your school asking for the names of the top students. Your school wants you to intern and to be successful in finding high paying jobs after graduation. Those are great measures of the value of your program. Schools develop reputations for producing highly qualified graduates who are ready to contribute soon after graduation. Work with your school. They want to help you.

Don't be a butt head. I'm sorry but lots of the students I speak with fit in this category. Not everyone can have a 3.0+ GPA. Not everyone has interned before. Not everyone is studying what is currently hot. Not everyone is comfortable connecting with strangers and asking for something. You're in school learning new things every day. Use those same skills that you are developing in school and apply them to seeking out an internship. Nobody is going to hand you anything on a silver platter. This too is going to require some effort on your part.

Go for it!

Recruiting is Sales. Please Get Over It!

Simon Meth — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 22:31:01 -0500

I'll be in your area tomorrow. I could see you at 10 or 11. Which would you prefer?

If I could show you a way to increase your salary by 50%, would you be interested?

I was given your name by someone who highly recommended that we speak.

I've been working a confidential search for a direct competitor of yours.

We've all either used or been on the receiving end of these ancient and hackneyed lines. Back in the bad old days, when aluminum siding was new, pretty much every sales person used lines like these. Sales!

And then, eventually, things evolved and we moved into consultative selling. We tried to listen more and to find out what our customers really wanted. We consulted with them. Bottom line was we still wanted to sell something. Sales!

So what are we doing today? I don't know what you're doing but I know that I listen a whole lot more, that I'm always looking to add value, and that I totally respect the time of my customers. Sales!

Recruiting is different to selling hard goods like cars and washing machines or soft goods such as computer software and consulting services. When you're selling products or services the customer will either buy what you're selling or not. Recruiting is different because you always have to make two sales to make one. If the hiring manager wants to hire your candidate but they have a better offer somewhere else it's going to be no sale unless you can turn things around. Sales!

I used to think that I hated sales people. I know I don't care for people who only contact me when they want something. I know that I detest people who lie, cheat, or steel. I'm not interested in spending time with someone who demands my time and doesn't add significant value. I no longer hate sales people. I choose not to spend time with people who have an amateurish or unsophisticated approach to their craft.

So let's all up the ante, do a great job, focus on what our customers really want and do what we can to help them get it.

twitter practical guide to following and being followed

Simon Meth — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 21:08:38 -0500

unless you've been living under a rock you know what twitter is and probably have a twitter account. since I first blogged about twitter in May, 2008 (see I'm a Twit), I have experimented, tweeted, and followed and removed some people I was following. what have I learned?

twitter is not a popularity contest

one of the basic ideas that many subscribe to is, "I'll follow you and you'd better follow me too or I'll drop you." pundits tell you to follow lots of people so that they'll follow you back. this advice does work but is it practical? if your motive is to be followed by the most people possible then maybe. however, the underlying idea of twitter is for people to tweet about what they're doing and for people to read those tweets and maybe reply or retweet. if you have 10K+ people that you're following it's difficult for me to believe that you're reading my tweets. do I care if you read my tweets? the answer to that question is that it depends on what I want to get out of twitter. it's nice to tweet and have someone reply or retweet. i get much the same buzz as when someone comments on my blog. feedback is good. so maybe it makes sense to follow people who give you feedback?

follow people that interest you

it also makes sense to follow people who have something to say that interests you, that adds value to you, and is worth reading. they may or may not follow you back but that really doesn't matter if you get value from reading their tweets.

lurkers just lurk

some people have twitter accounts and either rarely or never tweet. they are the lurkers. i just drop them since they don't add any value to me. i've noticed that sometimes these folks are friends or colleagues of mine and I wonder if they may be offended if I drop them. most times I figure that they were experimenting with twitter and just decided it wasn't for them. drop!

follow away!

i let almost anyone follow me who wants to follow me. that includes lots of businesses and other people selling products and services. i never follow them back. i have no interest in their tweets. if I want to know about them I'll check out their Website. sometimes I learn about vendors that interest me because they follow me. for example, I tweeted about installing a car radio with a USB port for my iPod and @The_iPod_Store followed me. i'd never heard of them and now I'll check them out when next I want to buy something iPod related. this is actually a really interesting use for twitter: tweet about topics that interest you and interesting people and vendors will find you.

even twitter has spam

twitter spam isn't a big problem. i do get the occasional scantily dressed young woman following me. usually by the time I notice that they are following me, twitter has already suspended their account for "suspicious activity". if the account is still active I just block them.

say thank you

i also thank everyone who follows me with a Direct Message. that may not be possible for those who have 10K+ followers but those of us with smaller numbers of followers can do it. it's nice to be followed so why not acknowledge that?

Thoughts from 2009

Simon Meth — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 12:30:22 -0500

Women rule on twitter. Maren Hogan has 17,039 tweets. Shally Steckerl has only 1,227 tweets. Shally is much more visible in other forms of social media. There's something about twitter that suits Maren. She is open to sharing just about everything in her life and we just lap it up. Of course there is always someone who bucks the trend and Animal is that someone with 14,278 tweets. Also, The Global Language Monitor ranked twitter as the top word of 2009. How astounding is that?

Google wave is in beta and I can't give away invitations. There's no doubt that GW is extremely cool but what will we use it for? It's a real time combo of social media, IM, email and who knows what else? It's cool to watch someone type their blip for a few minutes and then you're left wondering where this is going to go?

The Global Financial Crisis (GFC) continues to dominate our thinking. Our governments have plowed billions of dollars back into the economy. Initially I was dead against that sort of government meddling. I still am. Pundits now expect a slow recovery. We'll just have to see about that.

The Tiger Woods fiasco brings home the lesson that things are rarely as they seem. Irreparable damage has been done to the TW brand. The impact on the golf industry has yet to be seen but I suspect that a near fatal blow has been dealt. Expect layoffs.

Anthropogenic Global Warming has more or less been debunked by the hacking of emails and data that show that the "scientists" have been fudging the data. Best quip of all was from John Stewart of The Daily Show, "Poor Al Gore. Global warming completely debunked via the very Internet you invented. OH. OH the irony."

Top 10 Ways to Identify and Eradicate a Pest

Simon Meth — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:20:17 -0400

Some candidates are pests. They just bug you. These are the folks who work hard to take up as much of your time as they can. Here's how to identify them and how to deal with them:

1) Pests apply to every job on your corporate job site. They reason that if applying to one job is good then applying to 200 is even better. They don't realize that this is a sure fire way to be identified as a pest. Where I work we disposition every job that a candidate applies to. That results in a long list of rejections which is like a neon sign to recruiters that says "Don't hire me!"

2) Pests track you down every way they can. They email you. They leave multiple voice mail messages. They send you messages on LinkedIn, twitter or facebook. They call other people in your company to let them know how great they are. Pests don't understand that taking a shotgun approach does not cause them to be viewed in the best light. They are viewed as spammers or junk mailers and nobody likes them.

3) Pests drop by your office and ask for just a few minutes of your time. They bug your front office people who may not know how to deal with them.

4) Pests tell you that they were referred by someone at your company. Oftentimes you eventually find out that the person that "referred" them doesn't even know them or perhaps doesn't recommend them.

5) Pests show up at every job fair. They tell you that they met one of your colleagues at a previous job fair who told them that they were a great fit for your company.

6) Pests write cover letters that have two columns: one that lists your requirements and another that shows where their skills match up. This would be OK if they didn't stretch the truth so much or make nebulous associations.

7) Pests think that listing everything they have ever done on their resume is a good idea.

8) Pests think that providing a long list of references with their resume is a good idea.

9) Pests think that name dropping will help their case.

10) Pests just won't take "no" for an answer

There is a really simple way to deal with pests and it does not involve the use of harsh chemicals. When you identify a pest there is just one thing to do and that is to pick up the phone and call them. Genuinely let them know that you appreciate their interest and give them an opportunity to talk. Make sure that you really listen to what they have to say and that they know that you are listening. After that have a really straight conversation with them. Review their resume with them and the positions they applied for and let them know that you don't see a fit. You should never give them details so just keep it general. I've done this countless times and mostly I receive a thank you for taking the time to reach out. An amazing thing usually happens. The pest ceases to be a pest!

Your Career Change and Transferable Skills

Simon Meth — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 13:42:25 -0400

Don't do it! Yes, that's right, don't do it! You may hate your current job or there may be a declining demand or zero demand for your skills in our current job market. But does that mean that you should throw the baby out with the bathwater? I think not. Now, there are lots of career counselors, resume writing experts, life coaches, and other well meaning folks who will help you figure out what skills you have that are transferable to new careers. But is that the best approach? Read on to find out how I think you should do it.

Here's the challenge. Let's say you rewrite your resume to highlight all the really neat stuff that you can do that is transferable to your chosen new career. You find a suitable position and apply online. What happens? If someone like me sees your resume you're not going to go anywhere. You see I look for people who have been doing recently what I want them to do in a similar environment. That simple little sentence is the basis or should be the basis of what corporate recruiters do.

Now I'm not saying that people don't or shouldn't make career changes. I'm not saying that at all. What I am saying is that going cold turkey on your current career is a mistake. It's a big mistake. Assuming that you already have a job, you should keep it. It may not be the greatest job but it is a job. Find ways to add value where you are, learn new things, and expand your resume. When was the last time you volunteered for more work rather than complaining about the work that you already have? If you're lucky, there will be work just lying around waiting for someone to pick it up and that work may actually expand what you know how to do.

Let's say you don't currently have a job. What are you absolutely best at? What have you got the most experience doing? Target those areas. Maybe you'll need to take a slightly lower level position than you had in past but that's quite OK. Get to work and start expanding your skills and making yourself more valuable.

Now that you're working, adding value, expanding your skill-set, and being a productive employee you can start thinking about that career change. My bet is that over 50% of people who follow this path will discover that they actually love their chosen career and will give up thoughts of making a change. But perhaps you're really good at what you do and just want to do something else? Go take some classes, volunteer in your spare time, network your butt off with people in that new area. Join societies, user groups and get out and meet some people. Create a really punchy elevator speech and share it with anyone who'll listen. Don't just talk about it, do something!

And another thing, is your job really that bad? Check out my favorite Dirty Jobs episode in which a Las Vegas pig farmer recycles waste from the casino buffets. Enjoy!

Ten Things I’ve learned about Corporate Recruitment

Simon Meth — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 11:15:55 -0400

After many years in corporate recruitment I've learned a few things. At least I think I have. Read the following ten things I've learned and see if they resonate with you. Please add some things you've learned as a comment.

Hiring managers often complain about not receiving enough good resumes from you but they often either don't review or don't respond to the resumes you send them.
Candidates apply to jobs that they have no business applying to. I'm a plumber so I'll apply for a brain surgery position because it's like plumbing.
You can't satisfy everyone all the time so satisfy as many people as you possibly can.
People love or at least appreciate feedback both positive and negative.
It's boring to look at hundreds of resumes and attention often wavers.
Being a good administrator is critical to being a good corporate recruiter.
It's much better to let a hiring manager know that you're searching for qualified candidates and not send any resumes than it is to hide from the hiring manager and send junk.
Closing top candidates starts with the first contact you ever have with them.
At most companies, great candidates are dying on the vine. First pick the low hanging fruit.
Referrals are the number one source of corporate hires and the quality of referral candidates is, at best, no better than other candidates and maybe even lower.

Does Your Resume Help You or Hurt You?

Simon Meth — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 21:16:57 -0400

I was talking with a career counseling client the other day. He's a smart guy with a PhD and loads of great high tech experience. And still there were some basic things about his resume that were hurting him. So I got to thinking about that and wondering about how widespread this phenomenon is. As a corporate recruiter, you could say that I look at resumes for a living. I've got loads of experience reading resumes and I see all sorts of funny things each day. At least they would be funny if they didn't cause me to reject the resumes and move on. I've written before here on the subject and I point my new career counseling clients there first with a recommendation to read the article, to make any changes they see fit, and to send me an updated copy of their resume. Here are some new ideas:

1) If you're originally from another country and you are now a citizen of the country where you are looking for work, let the reader know that. Nobody wants to deal with someone who needs a visa to work unless they are desperate for talent. If you have the right to work and are not a citizen, then say that.

2) Your objective should state clearly what it is you want to do. It is not a catch-all for everything you may want to do. If you don't know what you want to do then do some work on that before you write your resume. Corporate recruiters want to know what you want to do.

3) If you have technical skills, you must integrate them into the experience section for each job where you used them. It is not enough to provide a long list of skills elsewhere on your resume. Corporate recruiters want to know what you used when and what you did with it.

4) If you submit your resume to a corporate site it will almost always end up in an applicant tracking system (ATS). If the ATS butchers your resume the corporate recruiter will ignore it and move on. So keep your formatting clear and simple. Almost all ATSs will handle an MS Word doc well unless you add lots of lines, multi-columns, and graphics. If you don't have MS Word then save your resume in a widely used and transportable format. Pdf is fine for email but often not fine for ATSs. Simple is best!

5) Some candidates believe that if applying for one job at a specific corporate site is good that applying for every job is better. All this does is makes you look desperate and non-discriminating. I see this all the time and it's a waste of my time to disposition the same candidate 20 times. This is not the way to encourage a corporate recruiter to look favorably at you.

6) It's a great idea to include hyperlinks on your resume to companies you've worked for and to samples of your work. Hyperlinks give the reader an easy way to find out more about you if they are interested in learning more. Consider adding links to your blog, your Linkedin profile, your twitter profile, and your Google profile. What? You don't have all of those? You'd better go read another article of mine that covers that and some other ideas on finding a new job.

7) Some candidates are just pests. They apply online, they call all their friends who work at your company to make internal referrals, and they call everyone they can who may be able to get them in the door. Is this bad? Well it surely shows enthusiasm and persistence and that's a good thing for some jobs such as sales, corporate recruiting, and account management. But nobody likes a pest and too much of this will hurt you. My practice is to return every call and email and every now and then I'll find a pest that I'll eventually ignore.

8) When you do secure an interview, make absolutely sure that you complete all paperwork clearly and completely. See resume is not an answer to a request for details of your past job experience. Incomplete or missing information will be interpreted as a strong indication of the quality of your work.

9) When you do secure an interview, do some significant preparation. Research the company and find out what they do. If you know the names of the interviewers then research them. Don't know how to do that? Better get busy finding out!

10) Throughout the whole job search process you are being judged and evaluated. "I didn't see your email" or "I didn't get your voice mail" is just lame. If you get an email from a corporate recruiter then take great care in how you respond. Typos and grammatical errors in email correspondence are just as damaging as on your resume.

If you have thoughts, comments, or other ideas please let me know.

America...

Simon Meth — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 18:03:41 -0400

What Makes a Great Corporate Recruiter?

Simon Meth — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 20:25:31 -0400

Exactly what personality, competencies, and experiences make a great corporate recruiter? No one person could possibly exhibit all of the qualities on this list. Each of us will exhibit some of the qualities but not all of them. The opportunity is to notice the areas where you excel and those areas where you could develop yourself.

Before we dive into the list, a quick word on the major sources of this information: I posted questions on LinkedIn, RecruitingBlogs.com, and ere.net. Follow the links for the great and varied responses from many of our colleagues.

And now, the list:

Customer service mentality-however you care to look at it, it's undeniable that we're in the customer service business. We have two groups of customers: our hiring managers and our candidates. Ideally we'd all keep everyone happy all of the time. That may not be possible but having a strong customer service mentality will go a long way to achieving that.

Compelled to provide an outstanding candidate and hiring manager experience-this is really more about customer service mentality but it's good to look at it from the perspective of the experience that others have.

Excellent organizational skills-corporate recruiters are responsible for a lot. When you consider the hundreds of resumes we review each week, the countless emails we read, the interviews, the meetings, and inevitable interruptions, it's a wonder we're as productive as we are. The only way we can be this productive is to have excellent organizational skills. Otherwise things will continually drop through the cracks, will take too long, and our customers won't be happy.

Strong administrative skills-our work must be accurate, complete, detailed, and prompt. We must understand that everything flows from the paperwork we generate while we're hiring a candidate. We may be audited by the OFCCP, EEOC or some other organization. Will your files be the ones that cause your company to pay a huge fine? Are you creating messes for others to clean up?

Great at working with people-we're in the people business. We must love working with people and look forward to each and every interaction.

Exceptional at assessing people-we're not just processing stuff here. One of the things that exceptional recruiters have is the ability to truly assess a candidate's abilities and to know what a candidate will do when we extend an offer.

Good listening and interviewing skills-are we talking most of the time or listening? Truly great recruiters listen far more than they talk but when they talk they have something truly valuable to say because it's based on what they hear. This is equally important when working with candidates, hiring managers, and team mates.

Perceptive-being perceptive is a key part of assessing people. Have you ever had a candidate tell you one thing and do the complete opposite? The more perceptive you are the better you'll be at telling when someone is just blowing smoke.

Inquisitive-it's difficult to be a great sourcer if you aren't inquisitive. Digging through databases, running different searches, puzzling over possible places the ideal candidates may be hanging out are all things that light up an inquisitive person.

Works smart-there's a lot to do. Are you doing the most important work first or are you doing busy work and pretending that you're working hard?

Time management skills-do you have a plan to get done what needs to get done by when it needs to be done? If not you're just flapping in the wind.

Business oriented-we must satisfy the needs of the business. We're not a charity here and we exist, in part, to make a profit. Understand that unfilled, key positions are costing the company money.

More extraverted than introverted-we recruiters tend to be outgoing people. We have a thirst for human contact and we're natural networkers. It's difficult for us to stay holed up in our offices for days at a time.

Technically savvy-to be truly efficient we need to be expert users of all the available recruitment tools. Are your Boolean searches really searching for what you think they are searching for? How fast do you type? Clearly the faster you type the faster you can update your ATS and send emails and the more work you'll get done.

Ability to understand the requisition-Clearly we can't possibly be expert in everything we recruit for but we should be quickly able to grasp the essential parts of the requisition.

Ability to understand the skills and competencies required to do the job-skills and competencies are more than just words on a page.

Sourcing skills-as corporate recruiters we often have no bandwidth for sourcing as opposed to screening. When we have a critical, hard-to-fill requisition we need to find candidates. There's a lot more to this than running a few searches on your ATS.

Resume review skills-we could say that we look at resumes for a living. Great recruiters can review resumes quickly, identify strong candidates, and eliminate the unqualified candidates. Often it's what's missing from the resume that is most telling.

Closing and negotiation skills-it's a lot of work to move a candidate through the recruitment funnel. Strong closing skills maximize the percentage of candidates who accept our offers. Closing starts with the first conversation with the candidate and usually ends when they start work with us or decline our offer.

Be able to truthfully sell the company-closing isn't about making stuff up and convincing candidates to do things that they don't want to do. We all need to understand what's great about our company and where we have opportunities to improve so that we can sell the company in a fair and balanced way.

Persuasive-you'll use your powers of persuasion whenever you attempt to close a candidate on an opportunity or encourage a hiring manager to interview a candidate.

Hire for the future and for scalability-with every hire we make we are building teams of people. It's important to hire the right people that will make a positive difference for years to come. Today's candidates often turn into tomorrow's hiring managers. Are you hiring people who can continue to grow and develop their skills?

Relationship builder-our work is all about building relationships with our candidates and internal customers. Build strong bonds and great things will happen.

Flexibility-wait five minutes and something will change. We've all experienced doing a lot of work on a requisition only to have it be put on hold. As they say, "them's the breaks!" When something like that happens, do you let it ruin your whole day or week or do you get to work on the most important thing on your desk?

Tolerance of ambiguity-sometimes you won't have all the information that you believe you need and you won't be able to get it. You have a choice, stop work and wait or take some action and see what happens. Great recruiters will do the latter.

Understand the company culture-some candidates will thrive here and others will fail dismally. It's our job to understand what works and what doesn't.

Create business value-do your internal customers see you as an administrator or as a trusted business partner? You can't create value unless it's the latter.

Sense of urgency-Part of our job is to instill a sense of urgency in our hiring managers and our candidates.

Able to keep confidential information confidential-this is self evident

Integrity-in a corporate environment, any cutting of corners, untruths, or sloppy work will eventually be discovered.

Methodical-we have a lot to do and a lot of process to follow. A haphazard approach is not the best way to get the most quality work done.

Makes mutually beneficial hires-we're not just filling requisitions here! Every hire that we make should be the right thing for company and the new hire.

Knowledge of state and federal employment regulations-this is self evident.

Candidate control-is often associated with agency recruitment but it's equally important in a corporate environment. For example, do you know what other opportunities your candidate has, what their motivations are for relocating to the area, if they have support for the change in employment from their family? If you don't then you have little candidate control.

Have a thick skin-people say and do things that we often can't believe. It isn't personal and it isn't about you.
Ambassador-be an ambassador for your company in every interaction you have at work and away from work. You may be surprised what comes your way as a result.

Expert on competitors-the more you know about your competitors the better you'll be at working with candidates. Your closing percentage will increase and your sourcing abilities will improve with the more you know.

Understand that time kills all deals-this is the classic last but not least statement. Candidates have a shelf life. Business needs have a shelf life. To put that another way, if you wait too long your competitors will hire the best candidates and your business areas will find another way to get the work done without you.

Up-tick in the Employment Market Due Soon

Simon Meth — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 13:36:09 -0400

One of the most reliable indicators I've found for the employment market is job postings for recruiters. It stands to reason that if companies are hiring recruiters they are planning to add to their staff. I post corporate recruiter positions in the Jobs for Recruiters forum on RecruiterSpace San Diego. Here's the data from the past few months:

Month, Number of corporate recruiter posts

June (to date), 3
May, 9
April, 8
March, 1
February, 4
January, 3

Most of the posts are either education or medical related but I suspect that we're about to see a significant change in the market as a whole.

I don't pay any attention to recruitment agency posts but they would be an excellent indicator too.

Tactical Strategy or Strategic Tactics?

Simon Meth — Sun, 03 May 2009 19:28:27 -0400

For years now I've heard people use the adjectives strategic and tactical. In most cases I believe that people who use these terms are unclear about what they mean. I'm certainly unclear too. Often they are used interchangeably. First, let's look at what the Random House Dictionary says:

stra-te-gic
1. pertaining to, characterized by, or of the nature of strategy: strategic movements.
2. important in or essential to strategy.
3. (of an action, as a military operation or a move in a game) forming an integral part of a stratagem: a strategic move in a game of chess.
4. Military.
a. intended to render the enemy incapable of making war, as by the destruction of materials, factories, etc.: a strategic bombing mission.
b. essential to the conduct of a war: Copper is a strategic material.

tac-ti-cal
1. of or pertaining to tactics, esp. military or naval tactics.
2. characterized by skillful tactics or adroit maneuvering or procedure: tactical movements.
3. of or pertaining to a maneuver or plan of action designed as an expedient toward gaining a desired end or temporary advantage.
4. expedient; calculated.
5. prudent; politic.

So they are different? Right?

Not so fast! Just for fun, I checked the definitions of the corresponding nouns:

strat-e-gy
1. a plan, method, or series of maneuvers or stratagems for obtaining a specific goal or result: a strategy for getting ahead in the world.

tac-tic
1. a plan, procedure, or expedient for promoting a desired end or result.

The nouns are so close in meaning that I can easily see my source of confusion. One has to do with obtaining a specific result and the other has to do with promoting a desired result.

So what?

For me tactics are short term and strategies are long term. I think of a line with tactics at the start and strategies at the other end. Everything we do is somewhere on that line but very little of what we do is at one end or the other. To put that another way, everything we do is somewhat tactical and somewhat strategic.

Do you have any thoughts on the matter? Care to share? Could be an interesting discussion...

Dave Mendoza Featured Me on Six Degrees from Dave

Simon Meth — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 18:23:32 -0400

Dave Mendoza was kind enough to feature me in his series where he profiles people in our industry. If you’re interested in learning more than you probably need to know about me, please see his post here.

Thank you Dave. Nice work as always!

No Respect - Human Resources Don't Get No Respect

Simon Meth — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 16:55:11 -0400

I blogged recently about Things I believe in the Recruitment Space in which I asserted that Human Resources doesn’t get the respect of upper management because it doesn’t deserve that respect. Before I expand on that thought, please watch this quick video:

My assertion isn’t really a criticism of HR, it’s just an assertion. There has been a lot written over the years about the lack of respect by upper management for HR. I’ve wondered why that is? Clearly every organization of any substance has an HR department. HR is essential for many reasons. Perhaps the primary one is to keep organizations out of trouble. In the U.S. and in many other parts of the world, employment law is a veritable minefield. It’s almost impossible to follow every law. HR is usually focused on ways to protect the organization. HR is often responsible for staffing, employee relations, employee development, and the inevitable firings and layoffs. If HR doesn’t handle these areas then who does?

Upper management clearly sees the necessity of having a strong HR department or it wouldn’t have one. But still HR doesn’t get respect. I suspect that the main reason is that HR doesn’t contribute directly to the bottom line. HR doesn’t produce any revenue. In many organizations HR is perceived as the folks who take care of the touchy feely stuff. Just leave the business of running the business to the executive team.

I have worked in one organization where HR did get respect. The VP of HR was clearly a valued member of the executive team. But he wasn’t a typical HR VP. He had multiple engineering degrees and experience running a substantial business unit. The executive team clearly related to him as an equal. In fact he was often given non-HR related special projects to run. That situation is unusual but it shows that it can be done.

Bottom line is that I stand with my original assertion that Human Resources doesn’t get the respect of upper management because it doesn’t deserve that respect. Respect is something that must be earned and earning that respect takes time and focus.

Mike Rowe Celebrates Dirty Jobs

Simon Meth — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 13:05:18 -0400

Laurie at Punk Rock HR posted this video of Mike Rowe. I think that it is excellent!