Dear Barb:

I am a new owner and need to begin hiring recruiters. Can you provide me with a profile of individuals who do well in our profession? Should I look for someone who already has a book of business?

Susan E., Milwaukee, WI

Dear Susan:

It’s important to realize that we are in a sales profession. Individuals who do well in the staffing and recruiting profession are usually over-achievers who have done well throughout their life. If they have been an over-achiever for someone else, chances are they will also be an over-achiever for you.

I hire individuals who have sales experience, a track record of success and who want to sell. I find that individuals who have hotel, retail, and outside sales experience do very well in our profession. Actors and actresses also make great recruiters because they are excellent at improv. I also like to hire individuals who have successfully competed in sports because they are open to being coached. Write a job description, set up minimum standards, write specific expectations, and develop a hiring process. You can’t make someone a top producer in our profession, you hire them.

Barbara J. Bruno, CPC, CTS

Would you like to Ask Barb a question? Email her at support@staffingandrecruiting.com. Each month in The Fordyce Letter print edition, Barbara Bruno answers questions from individuals in the Recruiting Profession. We will bring you some of these Q&A responses from Barb each week on FordyceLetter.com.

Do not wait, it may be too late.

Get a lawyer. Get one now. Do not wait. It may be too late. Do not hesitate. Be the first one on your block to be represented by an attorney. Don’t wait until you think you need one. Don’t wait until you are faced with a problem collecting a fee and need help. Know one now and get advice before that happens.

You are in a business. I know it is a professional occupation, but it is also a “business;” a business based on contracts between you and your clients. And your clients have lawyers on their staff or use them on a retained basis. You have to get on an even par with them before they have the advantage over you. Do not delay any longer, stop and get a lawyer now and then come back to read the rest of this article. But if you put it off, do not blame me. Read on.

Jurisdiction and Venue

When your client tells you that they will not pay your fee, you then go to see your lawyer, with those immortal words on your lips: “Sue the ——–.“ The lawyer’s first question will probably be, “Where is the company located?” Chances are it is not located in your town, or may not even be in your state. Why are you being asked this question? There are several reasons. Your lawyer is licensed in your state and practices in your state with an office in your state and cannot go running around the country suing defendants in other states without using local counsel in that state. Besides which, it is inordinately expensive to do that.

But you say “Sue the company!” here in your town, in your state, and make them come to you. He says in response that, “We need to have jurisdiction and venue over the defendant company to be able to do that.” What does that mean?

Venue

Venue is the location where you are suing; in your case your town, your state. In order to be able to sue a defendant in that location, the defendant has to be located within the state or has to have committed some act as defined by the applicable statute that subjects it to the courts in your state. The definition of venue is as follows:

The proper or possible place for the trial of a lawsuit because the place has some connection with the events that have given rise to the lawsuit.

Jurisdiction

Jurisdiction on the other hand refers to the power of the court to try the case and is defined as follows:

A court’s authority to hear a wide range of cases that arise within its geographic area without any showing that a connection exists between the claims and the forum state.

As an example, a court may have a minimum dollar claim amount in order for the case to be tried in that court. In the case of federal courts, for example, the claim must be for a minimum of at least $75,000.00. Various levels of state courts may have similar requirements with differing amounts.

So the big question is usually about venue and whether the defendant is subject to being sued in your local court, and that will depend on the controlling statute in your state. Simply said, state laws generally require that the defendant company have a place of business in your state, or a representative came to visit you at your office and so became a presence in your state, or the defendant company was “doing business” in your state.

“Doing business” has a definition all by itself and varies from state to state. In some states it requires that the other party have been physically present in the state. In other states the fact that the company retained your services and knew that your work would take place in your state would satisfy the venue requirement.

Ask your lawyer

So now, seeing the problem, you seek counsel’s advice and this is what he might suggest you consider: insert a clause into your contract that requires that the company client submit to the jurisdiction and venue of the courts in your neighborhood in the event that any controversy arises out of the contract. It might read as follows:

This Agreement will be governed by and enforced in accordance with the laws of the state of _____. The parties agree that state and federal courts within the City of _____ and state of ____ shall have the exclusive jurisdiction over any litigation brought or arising out of this Agreement.

Now what you have is the ability to sue the company that has not paid your fee — in your own backyard — and the company has to come to you from wherever they are. That makes it inconvenient and expensive for them. The opposite of what they would like you to see happen. Will some companies balk at this provision? Yes, that can and will happen. But what other controversy is likely to arise out of your relationship other than the fee and the company’s failure to pay it? If the company objects, is that a warning sign for what could happen? It becomes your business decision.

Long Arm Statute

Some states have a statute that might say:

“… a court may exercise personal jurisdiction over any non-domiciliary…who in person or through an agent: …transacts any business within the state….”

It is called a “L o n g  A r m” Statute. So you can reach out from your own state and sue that non-paying client on your home turf.

In layman’s language this means that if someone has purposely availed himself of the privileges and benefits of your state’s laws, he is deemed to have subjected himself to the jurisdiction of the courts in your state.

Simply stated, what this means is if a client in California asks a recruiter in New York to find a candidate and then does not pay the recruiter the fee that is due, then the client can be sued in a New York Court. So if you are a California client you have to come a long way to defend that lawsuit.

But it may not be as simple as it sounds, because it too is subject to interpretation as to the meaning of “transacts business within the state.” So here again you have to ask your lawyer about the use of this statute to sue your non-fee paying client.

All Placements are Local

One last but very important matter to keep in mind — like the saying “All politics is local,” the same is true about all fee litigation; it too is local.

A lawyer can only bring suit in the state in which the lawyer is admitted to practice. A lawyer in one state cannot institute suit in another state where the lawyer is not admitted. That is why you need a local lawyer wherever you intend to sue. That is why having a local jurisdiction and venue provision or using a Long Arm Statute allows you to use your local counsel. So if you want or need to sue the company in its home state, you need to have your lawyer find local counsel in that state to do it.

But can your lawyer send the company a “lawyer letter?” Of course you could have that done. Will it have any effect? I doubt it and I consider it a waste. If the client is not paying, you need to think in terms of suing, not letter writing. In these days they are generally ignored.

Conclusion

I am a strong believer in using a lawyer to review your contract before it becomes the subject of a controversy. Your contract is the basis of your doing business and you should know what every provision means and what can or cannot be enforced in a court of law. You should not just use some competitor’s contract as though it was just a “form.” A contract is a living instrument as it governs the relationship between you and your client. Why not then be aware of what it all means? So, get a lawyer; now.

More on contracts to come in future articles.

Note: This article is not intended as legal advice. In all instances the reader is cautioned to consult with legal counsel when utilizing this information. A.B.F.

When I travel, which is somewhat frequently, I often have a house sitter to care for my cat and dogs when they are not traveling with me. I have several different people to call upon depending on when I am traveling and which of my animals will need to be cared for. One of the other duties I ask of my house sitters, besides checking the mail, is to water the various plants in my greenhouse.

Now, I don’t claim to have a green thumb but I am much better at keeping my plants alive than I was in the past. I have herbs, vegetables, and flowers growing together in my greenhouse. Lately, though, my plants have been larger and healthier than ever. In looking for the source, as I haven’t changed my routines, I concluded that it was because I was traveling. Someone besides me was giving my plants the attention that they needed, perhaps even more than I normally would when I am there. This experience is what I would like to term the Greenhouse Effect.

A greenhouse prevents heat from escaping and traps the energy within the space to help plants thrive in a warm, moist environment year round. My greenhouse can be the best, most efficient in the world, but because the environment is controlled, someone still needs to water and care for the plants or they will not thrive. Despite the fact that I care for my plants regularly, when someone else cares for them I see more growth and production than when I water them myself. My “greenhouse effect” is the resulting prosperity that my plants have when my greenhouse is in the care of someone who has time to attend to them.

Of course, we can attribute this phenomenon to the fact that because I am gone for a few days I notice the growth more than when I see the plants every day. But there is no denying that the number and size of my tomatoes increase overall when I am not the one watering them.

If I’m honest with myself, green thumb or no, I tend to water only when the leaves start to droop, which is to say not as often as I should due to a hectic schedule. When I am away, the house sitters water them per my instructions as often as the plants need, and the watered plants are happier plants.

This greenhouse effect for my plants is similar to what happens when I leave my clients in the care of my team while I travel. I can usually continue to correspond with my clients on the fly when I’m out of town, but for emergencies where my remote access may not be the best, I keep my team up to speed and let them be a point of contact. My clients can be taken care of on time, not just when I am able to get to them.

Do my clients need me specifically to help them all the time or would my team actually do a better job of watering my client-plants in my absence than I do? Just because I can be connected in a pinch, do I need to be? The uncertainty of whether or not I will be able to respond to my clients’ needs when I am not at the office can be defused by the knowledge that my team is able to connect with them more easily and service them as well as I would. Perhaps my team can give the clients more TLC because they know how hard I have worked to earn my clients’ respect and they will want to be recognized upon my return for a job well done.

Either way, expanding your client base through involving your staff will generate additional synergy and energy, just like the greenhouse. Offering your colleague or subordinate a chance to work together with your client will present everyone new opportunities for growth by helping you identify areas of improvement for everyone — including yourself.

Dear Barb:

I’m having a hard time convincing my recruiters that the recession is over. I keep hearing business is improving, but that is not the case in my office. We’re struggling to keep the doors open. Many of our clients are not hiring and when they do, they often find their own candidates by using Job Boards and Social Media. I’ve never seen it take so long to obtain job offers. When we do finally get a job offer, often our candidates are no longer interested. I need to turn this around before I lose my business. Any suggestions you may have are greatly appreciated.

Sheila M., Memphis, TN

Dear Sheila:

The recession is over, but it’s still not easy to land new clients. Client development is a process based on building rapport that leads to a profitable client relationship. If you don’t have sufficient job order flow, 85% of the day must be dedicated to client development. We have a twelve-step client development process I’d be glad to share with you if you email support@staffingandrecruiting.com. Check nine references daily and convert these into marketing presentations. Also have everyone in your company market a candidate daily into 5-7 companies. You will get results where you put your focus.

When you do write job orders, obtain interview times and a target date to fill. This will give you the appropriate timeframe for offers. When clients fall in love with a candidate the process shortens and hires are completed quickly. Continue to submit candidates until an offer is extended. It’s interesting that talk about the recession disappears when production increases.

Barbara J. Bruno, CPC, CTS

Would you like to Ask Barb a question? Email her at support@staffingandrecruiting.com. Each month in The Fordyce Letter print edition, Barbara Bruno answers questions from individuals in the Recruiting Profession. We will bring you some of these Q&A responses from Barb each week on FordyceLetter.com.

Recruiter, ignite yourself. You’re a firecracker. You’re a bomb of performance just waiting to explode…that is, if you haven’t already set your world on fire!

Some of you have already created such wealth and power that it’s genuinely hard to get your head through normal doorways. You’re like an NBA giant who has to have the doors in his mansion refitted so as not to duck when he walks around his palace. You need custom hats made to provide shade for your forehead since you’ve transformed your world and the world of those you love with your achievements. You’re a bomb that has already exploded.

The rest of us often present with much longer fuses and much riskier paths to true ignition. In fact, many of us just don’t know how to even light our own fuses at all. There is that dream of glory, waiting for the moment of initiation, but often fading and growing dimmer, even evaporating in the haze of confusion and disappointment. Many of us have forgotten our dreams of glory; lost our passion; allowed the inner fires to die down.

I say again, recruiter, ignite yourself. Allow me one more metaphor and then I’ll get down to brass tacks. Picture a magnifying glass in your hand, with the hot summer sun beating down. Your fuse is right there on the ground, and all you need to do is focus the light from the sun sufficiently and hold your hand steady enough to let that fuse heat up. You know the number, don’t you? You read Ray Bradbury’s incredible book Fahrenheit 451 in high school, didn’t you? That’s your number. Your fuse has to have sufficient heat focused upon it by your steadily held magnifier so that it hits the magic number and ignites. The key thing to picture is the cone of light zeroing in on the fuse. Stick with me…

A circle of light is concentrated by your magnifying glass into the shape of a cone. It is widest at the point the light goes through the magnifier and narrows as it descends. Your job, of course, is to get the smallest possible, most utterly concentrated single point of intensified heat on your fuse. If you don’t get the point – just one point of light – properly concentrated directly on your fuse, your fuse will not ignite.

We’re now done with our metaphor. What is the application? Let’s talk about numbers in general, recruiting numbers, to find the answer. I’ve never met a recruiter who argued that numbers in recruiting don’t count or matter. I’ve met hundreds, literally, who confessed that they kept no numbers, or worse, that they kept scores of numbers but paid them no real attention. The interesting thing, compared to all the other professions I’ve served as a consultant, is that no one in recruiting that I’ve met argues that the numbers are actually meaningless. In virtually every other profession I’ve encountered, there are always many and often even most performers who simply don’t believe in the numbers at all. That’s one of the reasons I decided to specialize in serving recruiters, but that’s another story.

Believing that the numbers count, why do so many recruiters fail to benefit from the numbers, or fail to benefit more than they do? Why don’t recruiters – ALL recruiters – know exactly how to light the explosive fire of performance through their numbers?

Part of the answer comes from that cone of light emanating from your magnifier. Most recruiters do not realize that before NUMBERS – in the plural – can count, you must find a single NUMBER – in the singular – by which you concentrate their force and ignite your fuse. You must narrowly concentrate your focus to what point; what ONE SINGLE point?

The answer is this. You must find the ONE NUMBER that guides you to ignition.

In the rest of this article, we’ll work through concrete steps you can take to begin the firing process so you can obey my initial command to ignite yourself. Right here though, let’s cut to the ultimate chase. Do you already know what your one number is? Let’s talk about that one number and what it looks like first, and then we’ll lay out and follow the other steps and wrap up with our conclusion.

Knowing Your Number

If you know your one number already, then you already know exactly where to turn for guidance toward immediate yet sustainably ongoing performance improvement. Your one number rises and falls. As you watch it, you know you must do this or that, more of this, less of that, etc., so that you will do better this month or quarter than you did last month or quarter. Your one number – to grab another metaphor – is just like a flashlight in the dark for you. It shows you the path to walk upon.

But is there just one number that can serve all performers? Shouldn’t I be telling you exactly WHAT the one number is? Listen up — ABSOLUTELY NOT! There is no such thing as one “right number” for everyone. Not only is there NO one right number for everyone, there isn’t even a type of number that universally succeeds for all recruiters. To follow that, you have to be able to distinguish between a number itself and a type or category of number.

Technically, a number is a digit, such as 7. Seven what? The answer to the “what” question is a type of number. In my work, most often, I recommend that my clients track seven types of numbers, and here they are:

• Phone Time
• Candidate Data Sheets
• Job Orders
• Introductions (called EPOEJOS in the old days)
• First Time Face-to-Face Send Outs (although many of my clients add in first time Telephone Conversations here, too)
• Placements
• Dollars Billed

Each one of these seven measurements is a type or category of number. Let me say that again, slightly differently:

• Your Phone Time is a number measuring the amount of Effort in you accomplish each day and week, month and quarter, etc.
• Your Candidate Data Sheets are a number measuring the Supply you bring to market.
• Your Job Orders are a number measuring the Demand you procure out in the market for the Supply you vend.
• Your Introductions are a number measuring the amount of Attraction you create between players.
• The Send Outs you arrange are a number measuring the Romances or Courtships that result from your Introductions.
• Your Placements are a number that measures the success or failure of the Chemistry – the bonds that tie relationships permanently together, ending courtship and commencing marriage – that unites players into new hires.
• Your Dollars Billed are a number that measures the amount of Value you create for both your Candidates and your Clients, a portion of which they pay back to you as your reward and the basis of their investment, from which they expect to gain extraordinarily profitable return.

These are the seven types of numbers I’ve found to be most powerful in modeling a recruiter’s performance, through the thousands of recruiters whose performance numbers I’ve tracked. I’ve experimented with if not many dozens of other types of numbers then at least quite a few. Here’s the bad news. Even my testing — and I believe my testing has been more exhaustive than anyone else’s in the industry — leads me to NO single number that I can actually recommend for any and all recruiters. What I’ve found is this…

The one number that helps a recruiter perform must be the one number that he or she actually believes in most.

Here is part of where we tend to go wrong. When we have a number, we focus on the number itself, when it is actually the actions that the number tracks that matter. The purpose of the number is to tell you to do more or less of those actions. So, when identifying your single most important number, that’s the thing to select. What action do you believe in that has the greatest impact upon your placements?

Yet another mistake I see constantly is that people argue that you can’t select a single thing, since so many factors must be properly addressed for placements to occur. It is a true statement, but it misses the mark anyway and here’s why. You cannot improve all the factors that lead up to a placement at once. If you try, you’ll end up improving none. Recall our magnifying glass and its single point of intense heat. The way to improve all of your performance is to select a single area to focus all your effort on. As it rises — and if you honestly select just one, it will always rise — you can then monitor your outcomes to determine if you must continue focus here, or, with these improvements in hand, switch to another part of your placement process and repeat. These targeted focus points can be considered as projects.

Outcomes and Activities

When you’re just getting started in your search for your one number, the most important step to take is to divide your world up into just two great categories: Outcomes and Activities. I’ve served many recruiters who simply turned their eyes away from their outcomes and lived in denial. And, I’ve seen many such recruiters simply catapult their performance forward just by coming out of denial and looking closely, carefully, often, and with greater accountability at their outcome numbers. Some people are motivated that way, and will not improve until the back-end results of their daily and weekly work begins to be tracked religiously.

The second great category is effort, action or activity, as you prefer. In traditional sales theory, this is called “prospecting.” In my experience, managers tend to believe in tracking the front-end activities that lead to results more than AEs do, and it’s hard for a consultant not to side with the managers. But as I’ve studied the process over the years I’ve come to believe in neither the front-end nor the back-end, unless the performer also believes in it. Performers perform by their own beliefs. You can affect their performance from the outside with sufficient intensity of effort, but that investment will usually not lead to real change. Real change, true improvement can only be supported and sustained by belief. Belief and honest motivation. Neither of these things can be provided from the outside in the end.

On the other hand, for those recruiters who know the power of focusing on the front end, an activity measure can be the one thing that matters the most. My own favorite is phone time. But we’ll come back to this in a moment.

Let’s look again at the back-end in just a bit more detail. The ultimate back-end is dollars. Myself, I can’t ever find that I care about the difference between billings, 45 – 90 days earlier, or cash in, 4 – 8 weeks or so later. Many people do care, and I understand that. I just can’t keep accounts receivable in my mind. Besides, I believe that fall-offs are a real problem only when they’re excessive. Other than that, the vast majority of the deals I’ve monitored really are deals and the fee check really does get sent. So, I always recommend that we track billings as opposed to cash, when I’m asked. But, I’ve learned here that I have to ask back, “What do you care about?” and “How are you best motivated?”

But what about deals as opposed to dollars? If I could, I’d use an average fee ratio and just not care about the dollars at all, since a deal is a deal, and a small one is every bit as challenging (if not more so) as a big one. Besides, I’ve never seen recruiters fail due to closing small deals. I’ve even kind of come to love them, somewhat, since the recruiters who specialize in small deals do tend, in my observation, to rack them up fast and consistently. I used to hate the term “low hanging fruit.” Over the years I’ve revised my reaction. Picking the low hanging fruit is just about as unarguable a thing to do as can be.

So if it was just left up to me, I really would pay most attention on the back-end to deals alone, regardless of dollar results, just tracking those by ratio. But, it really is NOT ever just up to me! What I’ve found is that both deals and dollars have to be monitored for what I’ve come to call the “reality factor.” If we don’t watch them both, we’re very likely to slip away from reality and live more by denial or fantasy.

There’s been so much discussion in our industry over the years about such things as the four-hour connect time day, marketing, and all other front-end activities that I almost feel like no further discussion is needed. But this is not the case. Let me ask: do you have a firm opinion about front-end activity tracking? Do you have a number or set of numbers you truly believe in, monitor, and correct against?

Here, if your faith is absolute, you may well have all you require. Most people I’ve served though, no matter how strong their faith in the front-end, are still not completely motivated by it. Front-end tracking suffers from an almost inescapable “should” factor. You know you should, but…

I’ve found that for those who care enough to track the front-end, we truly do end up needing a powerful tie to the back-end through our ratios. Action – to – Outcome; Effort – to – Reward; these are the kinds of cause and effect relationships our ratios must track.

That brings us to the question: can your one number, the one that lights your fire, be a ratio – which is technically two numbers?

My answer is yes…but.

Yes, if you really do work out your ratio to the degree where you can feel its meaning intuitively, a ratio may actually be the best kind of number there is. For my part, the way I work with ratios is that I do place effort in front, reward in back, and I’m always looking to increase reward, no matter what. So, if I have to increase activity – through blunt effort alone – in order to get the back end number to rise, then I just have to work harder. But, if by analysis or better planning or even better tactics I can increase the quality of my effort I find I can often drop the front end while improving the back end, and that is just pure fun!

With a ratio, though, you really may not have two numbers, but one that’s kind of gussied up. It may be that you watch one side or the other carefully, but simply keep the other side in mind. This is a fine way to hone in your one number, as fine as any for certain.

Perhaps the ultimate physical metaphor for a ratio is a teeter-totter. Push down on one side, and the other side goes up. The tie is instantaneous and absolute. When you live by a single ratio, you come to know this ratio with the same kind of intuitive certainty. It may not be my favorite ratio, but the Send Out – to – Placement Ratio is surely one of the most important tools in our kit. As your Send Outs rise, against flat or even worse, falling Placements, you can see your pain itself in objective clarity. If your Send Outs continue to rise, though, sooner or later you will see a snap back down in the ratio as ultimately the placements come together. That snap is a moment of release and intense joy and power. How much pain can you tolerate? How much joy can you win?

Other ratios are worthy of your consideration, indeed. The key is that, when you understand your ratio as well as you understand our teeter-totter metaphor, your ratio will trigger both intellectual and emotional response, and powerfully. This is perhaps the form of recruiting ignition by the numbers that is worth whatever effort you must exert to attain it. When your emotions and your intellect come together, understanding your numbers, this combination is really just like fuel and oxygen. The heat of your passion, your dream, sets it aflame, and the power of the numbers releases your faith and your action toward your dream of recruiting prowess.

When it comes to new client development, great questions get great results.

Professional recruiting firms exist to connect great employers with the top talent needed to meet their business goals. Firm growth requires those within the organization responsible for bringing in business—the sales professionals— to continually seek new client companies to serve. New client development is essential to success and the most successful recruiting sales professionals know that the emphasis is on development.

Small and medium sized recruiting organizations can compete with much larger firms when development of strong business relationships takes precedence.

Value is created in the eyes of the receiver. Value for me will be different than value for you, so you have to walk in your client’s shoes to know what will be valuable to him or her.  It’s easy to assume that we already know and understand the other person’s perspective, but often this is not the case.

So how do you create value?  By providing leadership, building relationships and delivering creativity.

Leadership provides direction. To provide leadership and direction, you need to know your prospective clients’ goals. You must seek to understand the obstacles they are facing, their fears, and what’s keeping them awake at night.

Relationships offer support and confidence. But building relationships requires you to know what your prospective clients have accomplished and where they are still feeling uncertain.

Delivering Creativity

Delivering creativity means providing capabilities in the form of skills, knowledge, tools, technologies, processes and systems. Although creativity and capabilities are unlimited, only a few will resonate with your prospect because they meet their needs or will help them reach their goals.

Chances are good that your prospects’ needs and goals fall into the following categories:

1. Profit enhancement. They need to find ways to maximize revenues and minimize expenses. Their goal is to increase profits.
2. Productivity enhancement. They need people with specific talents, skills and knowledge to produce enough to meet demand. Their goal is to maintain an effective and smooth running operation.
3. Professional enhancement. They need to be seen in their organization as a leader who can attract the top talent.  They want top management to see their team, their talent and their contributions as a highly valuable part of the company.

One of the most critical elements to developing trust during the sales call is to ask good questions.  What are their needs? What are their goals? You are judged by the questions you ask.  Successful sales professionals prepare thought provoking questions that allow them to better understand the prospect’s perspective, build rapport, develop relationship and bring the prospect on board as a client.

So try starting your conversation with this powerful question:

If we were meeting here, a year from today, looking back over that year, what has to happen during that period for you to be happy with your progress? 

Why is this a great question?  First of all, this question is all about them, which is important to laying a foundation for developing a relationship.  But even more importantly, in answering the question, the prospect gives you valuable information from which you learn several things:

1. Whether they want a relationship with you. If they accept and answer “If we were meeting here, a year from today…” then they are essentially telling you that they accept a relationship and initial trust has been established.
2. Whether you want a relationship with them. Their answer will reveal whether they have vision and it allows you to decide whether you want to be a part of that vision.
3. How they will measure success. Having a clear understanding up front about how your performance will be measured will help you determine whether your services can make the grade.

People do not want to be sold, they want opportunities to buy. You are offering that opportunity if your services or products help eliminate their problems, support their opportunities by eliminating complexity, or supplying additional capabilities that allow them to focus on their strengths.  This will maximize value to your client.

Which leads us to these great questions:

What are the problems or issues you would like to eliminate over the next year? 

What goals or opportunities are you excited about achieving over the next year?

What capabilities or strengths do you have that need to be boosted or amplified over the next year?

With these questions, you have laid the foundation for a game plan for their success. You are helping the prospect achieve some clarity about the future while providing someone to discuss it with— you!

Drilling down a bit deeper with your questions will open the door for establishing the expectations of the relationship. Understanding what both parties expect from the business relationship builds trust and is a key factor in a successful partnership. Questions that accomplish this include:

What are your priorities regarding this talent acquisition project?

Who is involved in the decision-making process and what does the process look like?

What obstacles are in the way of moving this forward?

How do you envision me helping you to reach your goals?

Now you have moved into a trusted adviser role rather than a sales role.  You are in a position to offer leadership, relationship, and services to assist them in this adventure.

Time to present those and close the deal.

It can be relatively easy to open a recruiting firm, especially if you’ve decided to be a sole proprietor working from home It is much more difficult to create a profitable recruiting business. Starting a small business takes courage, but courage does not pay the bills. Have you taken the time to stand back and review all aspects of business ownership?

If you are your business and it can’t profitably run without you, you have merely created a job for yourself.

You are in business for two primary reasons:

1. To generate profits
2. To live the lifestyle of your dream

If you are not generating profits, to be blunt you don’t have a business — you have an expensive hobby.

The good news: it is never too late to make changes necessary to elevate your business to a new level of success. You can’t continue to do things the same way and expect different results. As a business owner, you need to embrace and implement change in order to take advantage of trends.

Have you ever wondered why…

• Some recruiting firms barely generate $1m in sales, while others generate $1m each month or each week?
• Many recruiting firm owners lose their business during economic downturns?
• Some owners barely survive while other owners flourish?
• A small percentage of owners sell their business for millions of dollars while others have nothing to sell?

According to the Bureau of Census who tabulated data for the Office of Advocacy of the US Small Business Administration, less than 29% of businesses survive ten years or longer.

It is critical that you take steps to protect yourself and your business starting immediately.

Owning a small business should not be just another job. It should provide you with a different lifestyle. It takes 100% of your personal time and financial commitment to be successful. I started my business as a single mom to give myself the opportunity to provide for my children and take summers off to spend more time with them. You can probably guess that I never took summers off because of the demands of my business. I also didn’t consider that along with the unlimited income potential came the possibility of earning less than minimum wage if I was not successful.

Review the goals you had set when you opened your business, in three specific areas:

1. Personal
2. Economic
3. Retirement Goals

Most recruiting firm owners were motivated by money, freedom, flexibility, change, satisfaction, professional growth, and the security of ownership. Many owners also know and understand the pain of not taking a paycheck after they meet the financial obligations of their business.

Some of my own recommendations

Important essentials of a successful business include:

• Financing
• Budget
• Business Plan
• Revenue Generation Strategies
• Entity Structuring
• Insurances
• Equipment
• Value Proposition
• Corporate Credit Cards
• Website
• Repeatable Systems
• Applicant Tracking System
• Professional experts including legal, accounting, technical and insurance

If your business is set up as a corporation, you cannot pay personal bills out of your business or with a business credit card. If you are sued, an attorney will pierce the corporate veil and you will be personally responsible. That is why it is also imperative to have your corporate minutes up-to-date.

Some of the insurance coverage to consider includes the following:

• Property
• Business Interruption
• Liability
• Key Person
• Workman’s Comp
• Health
• Errors and Omissions
• Life and Disability

It is critical that you have a clear exit plan, or you are probably making wrong decisions today. In this issue, Mike Gionta will conclude his 2-part series on how to avoid making some of these bad decisions when planning for your retirement

Other elements that must be in place are the following: a company positioning statement, value proposition, structured training, social media strategy, memberships, publications, corporate minutes, and a trust. You want to control everything but own nothing. Trusts are inexpensive and not only for the wealthy. A trust will protect your family, your business, and your assets.

Where do you start?

If you are caught somewhere between where you are and where you deserve to be as a business owner, complete the following:

• Conduct a GAP analysis
• Rework the revenue generating strategies of your business
• Determine the best use of your time
• Set minimum standards of performance
• Manage by numbers — not emotion
• No time? – hire a team
• Hire eagles, not ducks
• Implement repeatable systems
• Hold yourself and your team accountable
• Identify coaches and/or mentors
• Work on your business at least one hour each week

The time to begin building and protecting your business is now. Review this article, conduct a GAP analysis, and then select three things that you will implement during the next calendar quarter.

If you want a copy of a GAP Analysis Sheet – email Barb at support@staffingandrecruiting.com

The increasingly diverse needs of organizations big and small demand a myriad of options in recruiting software solutions. Recent activity—including Salesforce’s acquisition of Rypple—is pumping new energy into this niche market. In the last month, VC funds have been flowing into the human resources software market, with large investments in SmartRecruiters and iCIMS. I’ve taken an in-depth look at how this dynamic software market will be impacted, how vendors will be poised for greater success, as well as how all of this may affect users.

Salesforce’s Social Enterprise growing in HR and Recruiting

Historically, CRM and recruiting have been the first business sectors to adopt new communications tools, and that continues today. Social tools have seen the most widespread adoption in these two markets. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff is the greatest evangelist of the social enterprise, and continues to drive deep social integration in business management software. With Sand John Wookey (previously of Oracle and SAP) heading their HCM unit, Salesforce is in a strong position to help HR departments extend social media functionality across their various applications—including recruiting.

Many of the core functions of Applicant Tracking and Recruiting Software—from sourcing to screening to interviewing—thrive in the social media arena.Iit makes sense that you’ll see more social capabilities evolving in this area first. Though I can’t speak directly to Salesforce’s plans to build out recruiting applications in their social enterprise, I can say that other vendors focused solely on the recruiting and applicant tracking systems are making strides. There are a few that stand out:

• Bullhorn, a leader in recruiting software, has broken into social with their new product, Bullhorn Reach. Currently in its infancy, I see a lot of potential in this product. Forgive me for throwing out some generic descriptors, but it really is easy to use. Basic features like creating and posting jobs are straightforward and the dashboard presents quick access to key information. The social functions—Radar (which monitors activity in the social sphere, flags potential movers, and notifies you of changes in position) and Engage (a tool for sharing articles and updates across your various social networks)—are very intuitive, and successfully automate two core components of social recruiting: ongoing engagement and information sharing.
• With new VC funding, SmartRecruiters is poised to continue shaking things up with its open platform for social recruiting software. CEO Jerome Ternynck anticipates a lot of growth in the coming year. According to Ternyck’s interview with TalentCulture, SmartRecruiters is going to put “all of the money into product awesomeness,” which makes sense when you have a free product. “We’re building features around a one-click apply and allowing candidates to express interest more easily,” said Ternynck, ticking off features that the SmartRecruiters team is adding while also naming features that were soon to be gone, like the application form.
• Jobvite‘s seamless integration of social functionality into the process of sourcing and recruiting candidates has received accolades left and right. Leveraging employee (or colleague) social networks, Jobvite allows for quick and easy sharing of your open positions. Suddenly, your reach is that much greater, and many users see a serious increase in the number of employee referrals and passive candidates they’re getting. The product continues to wow, and I expect they’re only getting started.

As innovative companies like Salesforce continue to dazzle, driving social tools deeper into business management, recruiting software will be right there leading the charge. In-house and third party recruiters alike would be wise to pay attention to continued movement in the market in the coming months.

For further reading, check out the full analysis and forecast on my blog.

Have your own thoughts? Join the discussion, and leave a comment.

Dear Barb:

What are your feelings about attending conferences? I attended the Fordyce Forum last year and I’m sad to admit that I have not changed one thing. So, am I going to get an ROI on the investment – the answer is NO. I wasted my time and money and I’m more frustrated now than I was before I attended. Too many speakers talked about trends vs. giving me ideas I could implement in my business. I know you often speak at these things, so maybe you can’t give me an objective answer — or can you?

Anonymous Fordyce Forum Attendee

Dear Anonymous:

No one can force you to enjoy an ROI on your investment of time and money. However, if you don’t, it’s 100% your fault! At live events you have the incredible opportunity to network with other owners and recruiters and learn from what they do. You need to pull out your notes TODAY and pick one idea you will implement right now. At the end of the month, select another new idea for next month and continue through the end of this quarter. If you continue to work your desk the SAME way, you will get the SAME results. If you implement one change for the next four months – you will more than enjoy an ROI on your investment and decision to attend the Forum.

I hope you’ll return to the Fordyce Forum again this year and find some new techniques and thought processes to apply to your business and start making some changes!

Barbara J. Bruno, CPC, CTS

Would you like to Ask Barb a question? Email her at support@staffingandrecruiting.com. Each month in The Fordyce Letter print edition, Barbara Bruno answers questions from individuals in the Recruiting Profession. We will bring you some of these Q&A responses from Barb each week on FordyceLetter.com.

Using a proper methodology for setting your goals is very important because the result must be specific, realistic, and most importantly, achievable. Additionally, you must baseline your performance and establish specific activity benchmarks that must be met on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis in order to achieve your goals (see my June 2008 article in The Fordyce Letter, “Baseline Your Performance”).

Observations from my consulting work with hundreds of search and staffing firms indicate that goal setting is generally a challenge for both management and staff. However, as turnover rates and year-end results clearly demonstrate, the bigger challenge is achieving the goals once they are established.

With most staffing/recruiting firms, the goals of the organization reflect the collective goals of the producers. If all the producers reach or surpass their goals, the organization will reach or surpass its goals. Consequently, for the purposes of this article, we will present eight key steps to follow for the achievement of individual goals.

As stated in the above referenced article, annual goals should be broken down into quarterly, monthly, weekly, and even daily goals. Once this is in place, each producer in the organization should monitor their activity and results in relationship to these goals.

Remember

The responsibility for performance always belongs to the performer.

For those of you who are performers (producers), here are eight steps you can implement immediately to help ensure you do not fall behind the pace necessary to achieve your annual goals.

Step One: Have a full week of marketing and recruiting calls planned before arriving at the office each Monday.

You determine the number of calls to plan by reviewing your performance ratios, particularly the job order/search to placement ratio, the marketing calls to job order/search ratio, the individuals called to individuals recruited ratio, the candidates presented to clients versus the candidates interviewed ratio, and the candidates interviewed by your clients to candidates hired ratio. You will also need to factor in the number of calls attempted to the number of calls (connects) completed ratio. This is essential if you are to have the proper number of preplanned calls in place each Monday morning.

Some will balk at the idea of preplanning an entire week’s worth of calls. Since ours is a dynamic business with circumstances and opportunities changing on a daily basis, they argue that flexibility is the key and therefore, planning an entire week’s worth of calls is a waste of time. Conceptually they may have a point but in reality the fact remains that the average producer wastes over 50% of their time every day. Remember:

Parkinson’s Law

“Work expands to fill the time allotted for its completion.”

They operate in a reactive mode rather than proactively pursuing the accomplishment of their goals. This is generally reflected in their lack of planning for a full day of productive activity. Consequently, beginning the day with little or no planning in place to keep them focused on productive activity, they exemplify “Parkinson’s Law” as the day slips away in a wash of avoidance behavior and reactive impulse. The do not control their time and therefore do not control their day. The first step to overcoming this problem is to plan enough marketing and recruiting calls (both targeted and continuous cycle) to fill an entire week.

Step Two: Make certain you always have enough calls planned to cover at least two full days of work.

This is a refinement of “Step One” and tightens the focus to help ensure your plan doesn’t run out before your week does. To illustrate the importance of this step you need only look at the results from a typical “intensive care session”.

An “intensive care session” is designed for the producer who is not meeting their goals because they are not putting in enough sustained, focused effort on a daily basis. It’s generally conducted by the manager who greets the producer as they enter the office. The manager explains that the producer will be working in the manager’s office that morning (or, the manager will sit with the producer at their desk). During their time together, the manager will not interfere with or distract the producer. The manager will only serve as an observer. The producer will not be taking any incoming calls (other than the ones agreed upon because of their critical nature), nor will they have access to email until 11:30 AM. The producer’s sole purpose is to execute their plan for the day without any interruptions.

On average, the typical producer who undergoes an “intensive care session” runs out of things (calls) to do within an hour from the start of the session. This is the result of poor or non-existent planning. Conversely, someone who has a minimum of two full days planned in advance will have no difficulty in filling the entire morning with productive activity.

Step Three: Start executing your plan as soon as you arrive at the office each morning.

Begin with your on-going activity (balls in the air) and then complete the part of your plan that you dread the most. It may be a specific call or perhaps a group of calls e.g. candidate marketing. Get those calls completed and behind you for the day. They will never be as difficult as you thought they would be and you will have gained a sense of accomplishment for completing them. This will help provide positive momentum for the remainder of your day.

Step Four: Keep your plan at the center of your desk at all times so that when you are distracted or interrupted, its visible presence will remind you to get back on task.

Don’t cover it up with paper work or shove it off to the side because if you lose sight of your plan you may also lose control of your day. Do not fall prey to the “out of sight, out of mind” phenomenon, which can cost you valuable time. Instead keep your daily plan the central focus of your desk.

Step Five: Give yourself a midday review.

Ask how you are doing in relationship to how you should be doing based on your plan for the day. This midday review is critically important, particularly if you have fallen behind in executing your plan. If you do find yourself behind, the good news is that you have the rest of the day to catch up and complete your planned activities. The downside of not doing a midday review is that you may not realize you are behind plan until the end of the day at which point it is too late to catch up. Not accomplishing your planned objectives for a single day is not catastrophic. However, not accomplishing your plan several days in a row can lead to a less than productive week. These types of weeks can lead to a nonproductive month and a couple of nonproductive months can lead to discouragement and frustration as you begin to realize that the likelihood of achieving your annual goals is remote at best.

Step Six: Give yourself another review at 4:00 PM each afternoon.

If you haven’t had a good day or if you have fallen hopelessly behind on accomplishing your plan, use the rest of the work day to accomplish something positive, e.g. complete five more recruiting or marketing calls, arrange a sendout, complete a couple of reference checks on two of your best candidates. The objective is to create something positive so that when you leave the office for the day you have a sense of accomplishment and positive momentum to carry you over to the next day.

Step Seven: Always think a week at a time.

You may miss your plan on one day but with an entire week’s plan in place, you can maintain your focus. Keep your eye on the “end game” – completely executing the entire week’s plan.

Step Eight: Hold yourself accountable.

Remember, responsibility for performance always belongs to the performer — and you are that performer.

Terry’s Law

We all succeed in inverse proportion to the number of socially acceptable excuses we use to justify our own behavior.

Achievement-oriented people in all walks of life take responsibility for their actions and outcomes. They know the difference between reasons and excuses. If they have a set back one day, they make up for it on another day. When they establish realistic goals, they commit to achieving them regardless of the obstacles or difficulties.

One top producer explained it in this manner:

“Once goals are set there are only two acceptable reasons why they are not accomplished, death or total disability. Anything else is just an excuse.”

He makes his point in rather dramatic fashion. Do not take goal setting lightly. It’s not just an annual exercise in crunching numbers. If the goals you (the operative word being “you”) set are specific, realistic, and achievable, then give your full commitment to accomplishing them. This is done one day at a time. The steps outlined above, if followed, will help ensure you do not fall behind your timeline for goal achievement.

As always, if you have questions or comments about this article or wish to receive my input on any other topic related to this business, just let me know. Your calls and emails are most welcome.