Viewing All Posts In The ‘Industry Perspectives’ Category
My 1.5 Sense continued…
I have a question.
At OnRec there were the usual suspects from the Recruiting Technology world; ATS vendors, Social Networking vendors, niche and other job boards and some “filters” and selection and assessment vendors. What there weren’t were a lot of Recruiting Leaders. Maybe with budget cuts and the economy, people are just not making investments in their recruiting technology this year. Which makes what I’m about to point out all the more unbelievable. (prepare for shameless plug)
AllianceQ is a strategy to solve recruiting problems. It is generated by and for Corporate America and is the only strategy of its kind in the market today. Oh, and it’s FREE!
Yet at OnRec for two days I watched the gurus of recruiting, the people whose job it is to review, assess and write about what’s new for Recruiting departments, walk right past our booth and not even acknowledge our presence. Interesting but not funny.
One prominent “thought leader” walked by our booth (a double size booth, bright, white and conspicuous as Charles Barkley in a yoga class) no less than 6 times in 2 days. Not a smile, not a question, no interest at all. I shook hands and said hello to another ”pundit” who failed to ask one question about what we are doing or how things are going. The only guru who took the time to check it out was Joel Cheesman putting him, once again, at the top of the list of thought leaders in my book. The guy is actually interested in solving recruiting problems!
I guess a few of these folks got burned by touting Itzbig as revolutionary and then watching it go belly up. They may be gun-shy about really looking into anything new and different for two reasons:
- They are vested in the paradigm of Internet recruiting (keyword matching, advertising “impressions” focused, fragmented model).
- Breaking the paradigm of Internet recruiting (i.e., creating a solution instead of another way to make money from the problem) threatens their businesses.
So here is the question I need help with:
IF the “internet recruiting” industry is 13 years old (1995ish – today) AND if the thought leaders who have been around for 1/2 that time or more are truly focused on solving problems THEN why are we still doing things the same way today that we were 10 years ago?
Hope to see you at ERE this month!
Frustrated Job Seekers
Completing the concept that a fragmented internet recruiting world is ruining online recruiting, here is an article that touches on the job seeker frustration. In it, Jennifer Hamm mentions some of the frustrations:
My 1.5 Sense
File under: The Truly Ridiculous:
At OnRec in Chicago last week, there was a panel discussion on the future of “big boards” which included 3 expert panelists; a rep from Careerbuilder, a rep from Hotjobs and the VP of sales from a company who hosts online advertising sites for everything from cars to jobs. Really? This is the perspective that OnRec feels is going to provide the “leading edge” information on the future of big boards? 2 votes for big boards ruling the world and one vote for localized, fragmented niche boards. Here’s Joel Cheeseman’s video exerpt. Listen and see if you hear what I did. Crickets.
Opening New Channels
As I read through the recruiting blogs and articles from the last couple days this morning, I saw a common theme that is running in the background of many of them;
Corporations need to open new channels to talent if they are to survive looming labor shortages
I’ve written about this before and believe that shifting the hiring paradigm from “resume/job description” matching to “competency/talent spotting” is crucial to the evolution of corporate recruiting. It is interesting that more people aren’t making this case prima facia in their articles but are touching on it. Let me explain.
Continue reading
Back to Cruel?
September 2 and many of us adults woke early, fearing the return to school. Old habits die hard. Kids are either excited or terrified but they are all on the bus this morning.
Summer is officially over and as many people push through the melancholy of hanging up their flip flops, some will be looking for new career opportunities. After the vacations are over, the beach house is empty and the neighborhood pool is closed for the season, life will become routine again and discontent will settle in.
People will look around and see that friends and rivals have been released in layoffs and wonder “will I be next?” and go in search of something new and different. They will determine what they want in a new role, new company, and new boss etc. and go in search of the promised land of a new job. They will polish their resumes (loading them with key words and a thousand “I was responsible for…” sentences) and begin the arduous task of applying for a job online.
How will you treat these new applicants this fall? Continue reading
Talent Spotting
I just read a great article by Steve Lowisz, President and CEO of Qualigence, Inc. about Recruiting Metrics and how the rules have changed for recruiters in today’s business environment (shifting demographics, workforce dynamics etc.)
I couldn’t agree more with Steve and believe the “new” metrics he suggests are fundamental to the success of any recruiting department. Shifting business environments necessitate change in the business units that support the business. Change is hard but imperative for corporate recruiting professionals.
I believe there is an even larger change that Corporate Recruiters and Hiring Managers need to make if business is to survive and thrive in the “new” labor landscape. This shift is around the ability to spot talent. Now many people are saying, “Hey, I’m a Recruiter, I get paid a lot of money to spot talent” but I’ll challenge that thinking.
For over a decade, Recruiting has increasingly relied on technology to do the “talent spotting” for them. Through key word matching, screening questions built into ATS systems and cumbersome interview processes, we (I count myself as one of the Recruiters in the room) narrow prospects to candidates and candidates to applicants and present and hire what we assume is the best person based on their talent. But are we actually evaluating talent or are we hiring the resume + best interview?
Talent is defined as:
-
a special natural ability or aptitude:
-
a capacity for achievement or success; ability:
When was the last time you spoke about a candidate in these terms? I find that most hiring managers are relatively poor judges of talent (as defined above) and rarely evaluate candidates based on their “special” natural ability or capacity for achievement /success. I’m not blaming them; they don’t get any training on how to do this. Recruiters and Hiring Managers have been conditioned to use the paradigm of job description/resume matching as first pass at spotting talent and then use interviews to narrow the field – an inexact science at best!
Let me give you an example of the “magic” that can happen when this paradigm is broken:
A Global Company I know lives and dies by its sales force as all companies do. This company’s hiring philosophy is based on the definition of TALENT referenced above and here’s the result; in 2006 their #1 sales person made $350K and won a new Maseratti! In 2004 this same person was a CHEF! By being skilled “talent spotters” (i.e., using the ability to identify talent and not just match key words on a resume) this organization has opened new channels to passive talent.
This is the future of recruiting in Corporate America – becoming highly skilled in finding and recognizing people with talent – remember: the brightest talent may not be the best resume writer or interviewer.
Embracing Change
One of my favorite quotes is from George Bernard Shaw;
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”
In my inaugural blog I referenced the need for immediate change in corporate recruiting. Why you ask? Because in the 17+ years I’ve been in recruiting, we haven’t changed it. Sure, we’ve added technology, we’ve invented new and creative ways to find the people we are tasked with locating (admit it, Recruiters were the first people to “Google” anybody!) and we’ve created an entirely new industry around “sourcing.” However, the fundamentals of Corporate Recruiting – defined as those of us who choose to be on the inside instead of where the money and fame is – have not changed in over 20 years.
Earlier this year I presented a webinar for the HCI Talent Acquisition – Re-Engineering Recruitment Community where I pointed out this lack of change. I also mentioned that we in corporate recruiting wrongly define our “competition” as those companies in our industry with talent we want. Our greatest competition in Corporate Recruiting is Recruiting Agencies and RPO firms. These organizations base their value proposition on being able to do our jobs better, faster and at lower costs than we do.
To compete in today’s employment landscape, Corporate Recruiters have to:
-
Specialize within Recruiting to add significant levels of efficiency to the department.
-
Utilize tools that level the playing field with Recruitment Agencies and their different business model.
-
Adopt “rapid cycle” innovation to change in the Recruiting Department, mirroring the rapid market adjustments corporations make to acquire new customers.
I’ll leave you with another “change” quote;
“like an umbrella, a mind is only useful if it’s open!”
Shelf life of candidates
I’ve recently been talking to Recruiting professionals who seem to be holding onto a antiquated misconception:
“I own my candidates”.
In the past, when you sourced a highly valuable candidate, it was common practice to hold onto them with white knuckles, never knowing if you’d see them again or if they might get “discovered” by one of your rival companies.
It’s 2008 and there are no secrets in recruiting anymore. If YOU know a candidate, so does your competition, in fact, that candidate may have already interviewed with your competition! So this “open source” idea of recruiting begs the question:
“What is the shelf life of a candidate?”
We all use some form of the acronym “QIA” (Qualified, Interested and Attractable) so we’ll use that industry term to answer the question.
Qualified: Chances are, if you find them qualified today, they will be qualified tomorrow – for the role you have today! What you don’t know is what new qualifications they may have in 6 months or what new competencies you would want to leverage for a different role.
Interested: Hopefully, if you’ve created interest in a candidate today, that interest will last. But how long? Today we all have a bit of ADHD due to the bombardment of stimulus from our electronic addictions and therefore our interests wax and wane. Here is where we start to lose “shelf life”. If you’ve brought someone to the table, passive candidate or active candidate, chances are that person is ready for a meal! This means, if you don’t hire them they will probably not go right back to being the heads down passive candidate they were when you first called. Don’t kid yourself, once someone has crossed the line and committed to interview with your company, they are ripe for someone else too!
Attractable: I use this term to denote your ability to actually ATTRACT someone to your role. You can have someone who is Q and I but wants too much money or has knowledge of your hiring manager and won’t work for them etc. Once you’ve chosen someone else for the role, a declined candidate’s ability to be attracted AGAIN goes down. Think of dating, if you date someone a few times and then are told “I just want to be friends” – you are less likely to answer the phone 6 months from now when he/she calls!
In short; the shelf life of a candidate (even in today’s economy) is about 30-45 days, even less if they possess competencies that are in high demand. Act today, act swiftly, and stay in touch with relationships you have but don’t think for a moment that Silver Medalists are loyal to you because you called first!
Heartburn on Monday morning.
It’s 9:27 a.m. and I have heartburn. I thought it might have been acid reflux from the bowling alley chili dogs on Saturday night but then I read a blog post by Phil Rosenberg from “reCareered & Rainmakers Global” and the dogs were off the hook.
What gives me heartburn is the concept of “Resume Search Optimization” as Phil discusses it. Basically he takes SEO (search engine optimization) and applies the concepts to creating a resume tailored to the job description for the job to which you are applying . Here’s why this concept does nothing to “optimize” the recruiting process:
-
Job descriptions are rarely written any better than a resume. They are usually a complex amalgamation of inputs from HR benchmark reports, Compensation, Recruiting and some final tweaking from a Hiring Manager with too much on his/her plate. They don’t really tell you about the person needed to do the job. They simply describe the laundry list of skills and arbitrary timeframes (3-5 years? So if I have 2.5 or 6, you DON’T want to see me?) the “machine” says will produce the best employee. Matching one poorly written document to another poorly written document is not anyone’s definition of optimization!
-
Optimization is not desperation. Today the talk in recruiting is all about the “passive candidate”. The virtual panacea of recruiting is locating people who are NOT looking for a job (because they are engaged at work today!) and convincing them to make a move. There is a spectrum between “passive” and “active” and in between the extremes is where quality meets quantity. None but the most active candidates are going to tweak every resume sent/posted to each job description. This means that recruiters who pull up your “rigged” resume will see it but may also perceive it as less quality once they see how “optimized” it is (indicating a very active candidate).
The system is broken and “rigging” resumes is a HUGE part of the problem. There has to be a better way; one that relies on a more reliable search methodology that produces the best resumes coming from people currently looking for a job as well as those who may be putting a toe in the water but are not desperately active in a job search. Recruiters have to balance the need for speed (easily retrievable resumes from the top of the search) with the imperative for quality (those who are not rigging and therefore lower in the search results) if they are providing the service they promise to hiring managers.
Please don’t rig your resume, it doesn’t optimize anything. Find a better way to get in front of the people who are actually looking for YOU and the unique competencies and value you can add to their company.
Inaugural Blog
Welcome to the first AllianceQ Blog. Actually, this Blog represents a series of firsts:
This is the first blog on the AllianceQ website. This is also my very first post. As such, it will be simple, but will give you a flavor of entries to come. I believe Corporate Recruiting needs to change immediately to remain relevant in the new landscape of hiring. Occasionally my posts will touch upon AllianceQ updates and news, but that isn’t the focus of this blog. It’s about sharing my perspectives on industry trends and insights around what’s next in Corporate Recruiting.
This is also the first time I’ve made a move from the world of recruiting to the world of recruiting software solutions. AllianceQ is a very unique solution for Corporate Recruiting and it took something of this magnitude to pull me away from my 17 year career in recruiting.
And finally, AllianceQ is the first true recruiting collaboration of F1000 companies. As such, AllianceQ represents the change I will be advocating in this blog. When companies come together to collectively solve the issues and challenges that have been plaguing recruiting departments for so many years; we are on the precipice of true industry change! As we head into the coming “war to talent” (more on this in posts to come) it is the mantra of “we are more powerful than me” that will truly win the war. AllianceQ embodies this mantra.
I look forward to getting to know your thoughts on corporate recruiting and sharing mine with you!
Phil
-
-
-
About this blog
The purpose of this blog is to stimulate a dialogue that challenges long-held beliefs in Corporate Recruiting.
I, along with guests, will be discussing change and evolution in recruiting; two imperatives if the function is going to survive the coming "race to talent." Through inspection, dissection and robust dialog, it is our intent to explore and debate the evolution of recruitment in Corporate America.
-
About the Authors
-
