Author: The Organic Recruiter

A Speedy Sourcer’s Guide To Conquering The Intake Session

Posted on by The Organic Recruiter in Hiring, Interviewing, Latest News and Articles, Tools, Uncategorized

There are many ways companies want to set up their processes to find the right people. From finding the people,to who talks to them first and how many people are in the interview process. One thing is for sure, you need to hire people. So why is it taking so dang long? This is the first time I read an article from Nicole Nespeca and I find myself to be in love with what she has to say about sourcing.

Time to fill is taking far too long. You can blame it on the supply (just ask me for supply and demand information), the economy or even the election for some weird reason. But I think it is time for some reflection and accountability that you are just getting in your own way.

Let’s look at the 5 techniques Nicole has put in front of us and see if that makes it easier for you to make that sound decision quicker.

~ The Organic Recruiter

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By  Sourcecon

Now that the election is over, we no longer have to listen to donkeys or elephants. However, if you are a sourcing professional, you probably don’t mind purple squirrels and pink elephants and the PETA-approved hunt. Consequently, you will need to do the quintessential intake session and must prove just how valuable you are to your company’s talent acquisition team.

So where do you start? Should you read the job description first and start researching, or wait until you speak to with the hiring manager? Every recruiting paradigm is different and therefore will continue to shift. Some talent acquisition teams have intakes between the sourcer and the hiring manager and some are with the aligned recruiter only. The most advantageous are with the hiring manager and recruiter as it’s more streamlined. Anticipating the needs of your hiring manager and/or aligned recruiter is crucial to your success in finding the right candidate.

Here are five speedy techniques a sourcer can do to master the intake meeting.

  1. Forget about refreshing your Facebook page every two minutes, you need to research as quickly as possible before the intake session. I recommend focusing on market intelligence, specific demographic candidate pools, and the potential difficulty of the search.

Primarily, you must research the demographic of the open position as well as the candidate supply and demand. You can get this free data from Salary.com, Glassdoor or just by using a search engine. You want to know what the market looks like. Research this before the intake so you can speak to the statistics of the candidate pool and how you will circumvent any supply challenges. You want to come to the intake session armed with as much information as possible. This leads to my second action you should as a subset of research.

  1. Remember the old adage “In a race, I never look back?” Well, ironically it’s just as important when knowing your competitor.

Know your competitors and the market intelligence of the industry you are hiring for.  Sourcers are quick studies. They are fast and know how to speed read. One must be able to do this expediently prior to the intake session. Understanding the back story is pertinent to the search. You will impress the hiring manager and recruiter alike if you know what companies are downsizing candidates that could fit into the open opportunity. Furthermore, gaining knowledge as to where to find untapped talent is paramount.

  1. Use past resumes to source candidates in the future. Nothing compares to reading a resume in terms of learning about a person.

Once I reviewed a resume that had “Atari” as a skill. Until I saw that, the candidate looked like a match for the open requisition. You need to see resumes of previous candidates to succeed in a hire. Consequently, please get the resume of the person in the position being filled and read it carefully. Use the keywords in that resume to make Boolean searches and resume matches on social media. If the hiring manager or recruiter doesn’t have the resume, you can usually find it in your company’s ATS. If it’s a new position and therefore no resume exists, ask the hiring manager what keywords you should look for in your search and where the hiring manager has hired from previously in terms of competing companies to your own.

  1. Lighten your link’s load. It only takes two seconds to make a Bitly.

Every sourcer should construct a Bitly link because it makes campaign drivers and website pages much shorter for sharing on social, email, and SMS and directs applicants to an application typically. I highly recommend you write a catchy social media blurb to drive prospective candidates to your open requisition. When speaking with your hiring manager and recruiter on the intake you should share the blurb you will use on social media and ask them to share the same blurb. Leveraging another’s network is significant in giving visibility to the open requisition.

  1. “Organizations, schools and trade shows…oh my” as I say in my best Wizard of Oz impression.

When summarizing the job on the intake, make sure you ask about any organizations, schools or trade shows the team hiring might belong too. Part of being a good sourcer is uncovering lists of candidates online from job fairs or symposiums for example. In order to find these types of lists, you must delve deep into the hiring manager’s repertoire. Also, connect on LinkedIn with your hiring manager. Not only is doing so good for building a relationship, but it also allows you to see your hiring manager’s connections which could yield a hire.

Researching fast prior to your intake will help you establish credibility right away with your hiring manager and recruiter. You must perform this due diligence in order to be effective in hiring. Coming to the intake already understanding some of the challenges involved and then sharing resolutions to circumvent these issues will impress on the intake. Coming prepared is tantamount to being a successful sourcer. And all triumphant sourcers study and educate themselves on each position they recruit for. I hope these five tips will help you nail your next intake and if you can get a hold of an old Atari to play after a hard search, even better.

Do You Know Why You Want It?

Posted on by The Organic Recruiter in Employment Value Proposition, Hiring, Latest News and Articles, Military, Millennials, Uncategorized

why-you-do-itAs we move into December and hear the pitter patter of feet running to make their wish lists, we too quietly ponder what we’d like for the holidays and in 2017. After all, haven’t we all been good girls and boys?

During a conversation with one of my best friends this last weekend we discussed the entertainment business he works in. Our conversation was about how the original ideas of some TV shows get lost because the executive producers start fighting over who has the best notes. By the time it gets to the editor, the initial idea of the show is lost.

No one says it better than Simon Sinek in his book “Start with Why”.

Without the Why you have lost your What. If the producers had stopped to remember why they were creating the show, they would not have lost the What. What was the purpose of the show and why? Could the show have been more successful if the judgement was not clouded by ego?

Every day we go after the shiny bullet or the cool new toy that everyone is talking about on Facebook or any other social media or blog. Whether it be the latest ATS such as Workday or Greenhouse to the ever changing LinkedIn. As a society we are always getting sold into the pretty tool because it helped solve someone else’s problem. The question is: will it solve your problem? Are you chasing your own solution or what someone has told you is your solution? Do you know what your Why is? Why are you doing whatever it is?

Companies boast being “military friendly”. Why does the company want to be military friendly and how has the company achieved it? Was the purpose to check a box or was it to reach out to veterans to offer thanks and help transition him/her back into a civilian job? I once sat at a bar with a recruiter and in conversation with a stranger, she learned he was a vet. She immediately reached out to give her business card and offered to help. She mentioned military.com and how it had helped many vets in her network find a position. In my opinion, that’s “military friendly”. Simply posting a position on a supposedly “military friendly” site does not equate to being military friendly. What site is that? How many veteran viewers does it link to? What efforts does that site do to reach out to veterans? What else is the company doing to reach out to the veterans?

What is your why? If you have a wish list, what is on it and why is it there?  Are you looking to appease shareholders? Is it to attract the right talent? Is it to do the right thing at the right time? Is it to increase your ROI of time, money or retention?

you-why“Start with Why” explains how to inspire with ideas rather than product. Simon Sinek goes on in his 2 of his 3 theories being:

  • The Golden Circle:
    • Sinek states, most people in a company know what they do; less people know how they do it; and hardly anyone knows why they do it
  • The Celery Test:
    • If you’re at a grocery store getting food for your health food business, could someone look at your groceries at the checkout line and immediately know what you’re all about?  If you’ve purchased soy milk, chocolate, pudding, and celery the answer is no.  If you’re just purchasing the soy milk and celery, then yes.
    • In business, if you’re not passing the celery test, if you can’t walk the walk after talking the talk, you’ve lost credibility and frankly damaged your integrity.

People buy Apple products because even before Tim Cook, Steve Jobs would only speak on the Why long before he showed you the what.

The founders of Southwest Airlines knew people would love to fly with them because they built their airline on the Why they wanted to fly, rather than just getting to their destination through crappy service.

What’s on your list this year? Why do you want it?

Let’s talk about your Why.

~The Organic Recruiter | Co-wrote with Candy Store

Time Management For Sourcers And Recruiters – Resume Reading

Posted on by The Organic Recruiter in Hiring, Interviewing, Monster, New Job, Uncategorized

I’ve written a few articles on the importance of knowing your candidate because unfortunately, your hiring managers consider these awesome people as a resume and not an actual person. And you as recruiter spend 6 seconds on a resume if the candidate is lucky. Why is that? Not enough time, patience or the formatting is bugging you? I don’t know your answer, but these are the top ones. Kevin wrote some great points in managing your time.

This article has some good tips to manage your time but time-management is the most important tool you can use. You are missing great people and without a semantic tool (like Monster has a number of them), you’ll need to rely on your boolean prowess and great ctrl+F. But remember, that doesn’t mean you know the person behind the not-so-pretty resume.

Please practice time-management and get to know the piece of paper.

~The Organic Recruiter

timem-700x467By  Sourcecon

We first started with Time Management for Sourcers and Recruiters – Schedule Building which, discussed how to plan your day to be effective and efficient. In this article, I will go through various techniques that will help you be even more effective and efficient for better time management that I am sure will increase productivity for you.

In our business one thing we must do is read a resume, in doing so we are expected to decipher the “code” embedded in the resume, compare work experience to the requirements from the hiring manager, and decide to or not to call/email the candidate. Then after we have all of our notes we need to make a decision if this is a viable candidate for the opening. This is a process that is repeated on every candidate we come across.

This is very time-consuming. Now that you have built your daily schedule and are staying on track with that schedule which you’re already seeing yourself being more effective and efficient, now we need to take it up a notch. Follow these proven steps in order to do just that.

First, after you craft that beautiful award winning Boolean string and enter it into whichever job board you prefer, you return a list of potential diamonds, and now the issue is to go through as many as candidates possible and build your list. The issue we all have is time, so why not use it to our advantage.  One thing we are all guilty of is getting sucked into the words on a resume or maybe the format is horrible and we’re just lost in translation. You need a two-minute sand timer.

When you pull up that list of potential diamonds and compile a bunch of resumes to filter, flip over the two-minute sand timer. You shouldn’t spend more than two minutes viewing a resume. Our attention on one aspect loses its ability to decipher new information after about two minutes and we need to take a minute to reset. With timing yourself you don’t get lost and develop the ability to say, yes this candidate looks great on paper, I still have a few questions regarding some of the experiences and technologies, or this candidate is not on the right track of what we are looking for.

As time goes on once you get the repetition down you will see yourself having time left out of the two minutes and becoming a resume reading legend.

Second, when you are getting ready to start using your timer and reading resumes, make sure you are prepared to understand the technology and what the surrounding words should be. Here are some red flags that will arise questions on candidate profiles:

  • Titles
    • A title is either what they want to be called or what they are given upon hire. This can be miss leading because each company may have a different ranking system however if you see someone progress from a help desk tech to a system engineer, to a desktop support tech, to a senior project manager, then there are some immediate red flags there.
  • Tenure
    • Look at the dates. Months and years are huge. If someone is only in one to two month positions for several years that raises a concern for a hiring manager that is looking for a stable candidate. If someone has gaps in the resume for more than six to nine months that is also concerning, but should be discussed with the candidate to dig deeper.
  • Description
    • This is where the research comes into play. If someone lists themselves as a project manager, they should be describing project manager work in that role.
  • Technologies
    • Candidates who put EVERY technology they have EVER worked with may just be looking for fluff. Tech is changing so fast that something they did in the 90s is irrelevant today!
  • Education
    • If your hiring manager requires a degree in a certain field of study views this first. Be sure it is listed and aligned with what you’re looking for.

Another cool trick is Ctrl + F (Find) which I’m surprised a lot of people are not using. Each opening role we have listed three to five skills that are MUST HAVES. A quick way to filter through other than the highlighted words on the resume from your Boolean string is to use Ctrl + F and pull up alternative spellings. You would be surprised what you may miss.

For example when candidates love abbreviations or alternative spellings so they are “hard to find:” Manager – Mgr or Mangr; SaS – S@S, $a$, or $@$; Citrix – Zen, ZenApp, ZenDesk, XApp, or XDesk etc. Now you may be thinking, well how many candidates actually do this? Who knows, but I have seen them and wouldn’t have found those candidates without doing just this. If you are searching for a hard to find skill set and need to take a different approach craft two Boolean strings, one narrow and one broad.  When you pull up the candidates that are found using the broad string, this is a tip that may work best with that.

If you are searching for a hard to find skill set and need to take a different approach craft two Boolean strings, one narrow and one broad. When you pull up the candidates that are found using the broad string, this is a tip that may work best with that.

I’m confident with this best practice you will see yourself being more successful with resume reading and utilizing the limited time you have to be more effective and efficient.

Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Honor, Integrity, Personal Courage

Posted on by The Organic Recruiter in Diversity, Employment Value Proposition, Hiring, Latest News and Articles, Military, Monster, New Job, US Employment Numbers

It is Veterans Day next week and time to figure out if we are as loyal to them as they are to us. Military.com and Monster.com have many ways to help you with your loyalty. Because waiting to help them may in many ways be too late. Like Mayor Garcetti in Los Angeles (largest population of veteran homeless) has begun with the assistance of Military.com, he is trying to end homelessness of our Veterans. Let’s join the forces and do our part.
~The Organic Recruiter

By  Sourcecon

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The 1st Infantry Division of the US Army has a saying: “No mission too difficult. No sacrifice too great. Duty First!”

Over 30,000+ veterans are placed in corporate America each year and there are over 7,500 companies that do the hiring per year of those military individuals. What is even more impressive is that these military officers do not even have online job seeker profiles like those you see daily on the web boards like Monster or Dice. What tops everything else is that these amazing individuals who defend our freedom look to us as civilians in their transition into the corporate environment. However, there are stigmas that they have to fight just the same.

One stigma is the negative stereotype. First are the assumptions and stereotypes about members of the military that make some employers reluctant to hire them. About one in three employers considers post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to be an obstacle in hiring veterans, according to a survey report by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM). In particular, seven percent of post-9/11 veterans are estimated to be suffering from PTSD, according to the U.S. Army.

Another stigma is how skills can be mismatched or misunderstood by a hiring manager. Hiring managers can easily understand a resume that shows any technical skills whether it is Java or .Net in a related field. What hiring managers do understand and how it correlates to corporate is the skills that a battery fire direction officer or artillery specialists can bring to an organization.

When speaking to a field grade army officer (with a specialty in tanks), who asked for obvious reasons to keep his anonymity, he gave a firsthand account of what the interview process is like for a military veteran. Now keep in mind this is an individual that brought in new equipment (mostly paratrooper equipment) for an army corps and has an MBA from Duke, a prestigious university.

“I interviewed with a few large companies that are looking to hire vets. I think I received interest from them because of my vet status. HR wanted to talk to me and their MDs (and even one CEO of a fortune 500 company) liked me. So I got through many rounds of interviews but then I went to talk to the direct hiring manager and my potential future boss. They needed a plug and play a guy that had experience doing the job (corporate finance, pricing, operations management, etc were some of the jobs I interviewed for). This happened over and over again. That was an obstacle I had to overcome in finding employment.”

A lot of companies have veterans programs. From a top-down perspective, it makes sense and sounds even better. Hire veterans as they offer great skills and attitudes that will add to our company and in the long run, it will make us look good too. There are some companies that are doing their part to help in the hiring of military veterans. In 2016, Union Pacific Railroad hired approximately 3900 new employees of which 15 percent were military veterans, where military experience was more relevant than certifications earned. JPMorgan Chase hired over 40,000 new employees in 2016, where approximately 15 percent were military veterans.

The question remains, how can other companies follow suit? First would be to educate management of the companies so that they are not scared that a few months ago this person was killing someone or seeing others killed, and now they have to integrate them into their “team.” There might even be hiring managers cannot comprehend what really goes on in the military, but they get the college and internship type of experience, so they hire what they are familiar.

There are some companies that have gone the additional mile and have set up assistance programs as well. AT&T has helped launch the 100,000 jobs mission initiative to hire 100,000 veterans and transitioning service members by 2020. Even GE plans to hire 5,000 veterans over the next five years through its “Hiring Our Heroes” partnership to sponsor 400 veterans’ job fairs this year.

Another company, Orion International is a firm that spends over 11 months with each military candidate before they are even hired, to ensure the best possible match for each company and candidate. Orion represents 34 percent of military technicians and technical NCOs separating from the military. A Naval officer from Pennsylvania explained how helpful it is to have someone, a company that can help make the transition that much easier though daunting.

 “To have a company willing to stay with you every step of the way was extremely comforting. I was transitioning out of the Navy and my wife had family here so I needed to find a way to get a job locally. Not too many companies looking for a naval officer. There were coaches that shared with me the proper interview techniques and the things not to do during interviews. It’s a blessing.”  

In November of last year, the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics found that veterans had a lower unemployment rate at 3.6 percent than Americans overall, who faced a rate of about five percent. This reflects ongoing efforts to train members of the military with valuable job skills before they join the workforce, new initiatives by businesses get veterans jobs and the slowly changing attitudes among everyday Americans about the value that former service members bring to the workforce.

In a time where there is increased the level of violence, political deceit and increasing cost of living we need to find solace in those that put their lives on the line every single day for us to even have a living, to have the ability to speak our mind. When that military personnel leaves the armed forces and transition into civilians looking for employment just like those that haven’t served we need to stand up, recognize and do what we can for them as they have done for us. Hoorah!

 

Why You and I Need One Another

Posted on by The Organic Recruiter in Big Data, Hiring, Latest News and Articles, New Job, Uncategorized

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You buy, we sell. Does that mean we don’t need one another? Sure if we want to walk life to the next journey on our own. Vin Scully (Vincent Edward “Vin” Scully – sports broadcaster and Brooklyn/LA Dodgers MLB play-by-play baseball announcer) just retired after 67 years yesterday and was bitter sweet. A man needs to take his next steps sometime, even if it’s after an amazing run like his. Vin said over and over these last few weeks, “I have needed you more than you needed me”. This rings true to you and I as well.

Think about it. You have goals to hit and so do I. Tomorrow I will be on a plane to Chicago to share with the West and Great Lakes Regions on how my quarter went. I won’t get into my quarter but why I bring this up is because as much as you think we are trying to sell to you to get that fat check, I want you to sit back and think, “is he really trying to help me hit my goals like he says?”.

The answer is yes. A good majority of us are trying to get you to your goals as it will also help our goals. But your thoughts are, “why is he always calling me?”. To that, I answer because I am here to help and I monitor what your goals are (from what you told me…plus keeping a pulse on your industry) and where your stand today on those goals.

Relationships are defined as: the way in which two or more concepts, objects, or people are connected, or the state of being connected. While a symbiotic relationship occur when two organisms, individuals or groups of people work together by helping one another with the intent of getting help in return. Keep in mind, even when we are dressed like a shark, it doesn’t mean we are, we are just you to have our back as well.shark-symbiotic

Let me let you in on a little secret. We like to go to sleep with a clean conscious of knowing we gave you the best deal to get to your goals. We spend countless hours, days and months on your account to manage what we sold you. When we are calling you to share updates, insights, and possible twist-a-plots, it is so you hit your goals. By using me as a consultant to what is really going on out there, you get free advice and knowledge in case there are any curveballs you did not anticipate. There may be a time when I offer you something and it comes at a cost, but keep in mind it is to assist you in hitting your goals.

You may not realize, but I am aware you have KPIs like time to fill, cost per hire, and for the few lucky ones out there, you get bonused off those KPIs. I am here to help as a friend who understands symbiotic relationships. As we embark on the 4th quarter or what you affectionately call ‘budget season’, keep in mind when you ask for that discount, favor or freebie, just remember, the rhino and Vin, we all need each other. Let’s work together towards 2017.

~The Organic Recruiter