What a thought provoking article! I agree 100% with your article and with Mr. McIntosh’s perspective.

Just because all these nice and shiny tools gives us access to more recruiters, it doesn’t mean that I am more effective than I was without them. We still have to have real-life conversations whether it is over the phone or in-person. We still need to build long-lasting relationships based on trust.

Just so you know, Howard, I have over 6 million people in my LinkedIn network. How many do you have?

As always, thanks for providing your thoughts to an interesting topic.

Shea

Howard Adamsky

I am little sensitive to the term ?dinosaur? as I may just be one (at least chronologically). And interestingly, I stopped worrying about fashion when I entered the world of corporate high tech recruiting world (denim is always in fashion).

I think your article really brought out the state of things in the post modern business world. We seem to be stuck with in this ?either/or? mind set. Specifically, if you don?t use certain contemporary tools (?high tech?), then you are out of step and somehow stuck in a prehistoric age. And the opposite echo is we will not provide the right level of human interaction unless you go back to the good old ways (?high touch?). There seems to be an eternal struggle between ?high tech? and ?high touch.? Either you are data mining, email blasting, cyber sleuth surfing deep into the hidden web OR you are a control freakish sales person managing attempting to micromanage a hiring manager and a prospect in order to get both parties to say yes. As with most ?either/or? extremes, practical reality takes us to the middle ground. Perhaps it is time to drop the ?either/or? paradigm. Perhaps that is the innovation you are suggesting? Or perhaps it fits the definition of thinking differently?

I have found that the ?both/and? model fits the current state of recruiting much more realistically. I have found that some of my prehistoric recruiting lessons and techniques are foundational for the success of more technology driven initiatives in my daily activities. Frankly, I have doing the same thing for three and one half decades; it is just that today?s version is better, faster, global, and on a much larger stage.

For example, my current role is to develop a talent community for specific types of technical, marketing & creative talent for a consumer products oriented division. This role is a ?both/and? role. It requires both ?high tech? and ?high touch? to develop the types of relationships that community requires. And you can trace the roots of this effort to a desk, a phone, a rolodex, and a word processor with snail mail.

The prehistoric approach might work today, but certainly is not as impactful and effective as the technology clothed version of today. And it certainly would not meet a better, faster, and global initiative.

A final thought about the need for interpersonal communication. Even in those ancient days, I wrestled with the tension between high tech and high touch. Back then, the question was, do I really need to meet the prospect in person before sending out on an interview. Or do I really need to meet the client in person to gain a sense of the company and its culture. The right balance was worked out. Today, I find the dynamic between high tech and high touch still is at the center of recruiting conversations. The questions are do I really need to personally telephone interview the prospect before sending them on an interview. Or do I really need to set down with the hiring manager and understand their organization. And, history tells me the right balance will be discovered.

Excellent point. I couldnt agree more. We all think that the grass is greener, even in marketing initiatives. Most industry will take for granted that segment which ‘floats the boat’ for lack of a better term. It generally happens because incentives are attached to ‘new’ and ‘fresh’ markets. I also really like the water quote, thanks, that will be used by me in the future I’m certain.

I think the key point to remember is that we’ve become so used to assuming that innovation is a good and necessary thing that we often don’t even think properly about the options we have. In order to gain legitimacy, we often revert to preaching the gospel of innovation, as this is the safest option. Back in the day you knew that no-one ever got fired for buying IBM, today no-one ever gets fired for suggesting an innovation project.

But what I think Howard is onto is that this gets us into trouble simply by making things more complicated than they have to be. Yes, Facebook is a great tool (but becoming increasingly uncool, as the hip kids are already out looking for something even cooler and less pedestrian), but in recruiting the lowly meeting over coffee is a greater tool still. And we only have so much time and energy to spend…

I have no problem with innovations – I’d die without net access and mobile phones (well, not really, but I am not willing to forgo them without a fight). But in an age where everyone is touting their innovative credentials, it might be that the most creative thing to do is to go against the stream.

My prediction is that 2008 will be the year when ’simplicity’ becomes the hot topic. We need a simpler life, partly because simplicity can make us more efficient. I’m considering shutting down my Facebook-account (yes, I have one), getting rid of a lot of the other innovation-chaff I’ve collected, and generally pare down. Right now, this seems a lot more beneficial to my working life than adding innovations to it. I think Howard would agree.

For example, if you know that 80% of your beverage product is consumed by a particular market segment, then do what you can to increase consumption within that very segment. Sure, you can invest in other market segments if they pose growth opportunities, but don’t take resources and money away from your ‘meat and potatoes’ or ’sacred cow’ to undergo the ultra capital-intensive route of driving demand within a completely new market segment (yes, it is here that companies barely, if ever, break even until you reach a critical mass of consumption). Is the prospect of creating a new market segment appealing and exciting? Sure it is . . . but don’t get lost in the hype. As Robert Mcnamara (the former US Sec of Defense during the Vietnam War) says, ‘Seeing and believing are both often wrong.’

To Rob’s point . . . if 50% of all hires come from employee referral (and maybe even 75% of your highest 12-mth QOH ratings), then why aren’t recruiting leaders spending more to increase these numbers??? Have we reached a point of saturation in which incremental investment yields little to no return? I seriously doubt it.

When I first got into lifting weights about 12 years ago, I read a quote from the late Mike Mentzer that sticks with me to this day, ‘Water is the greatest bodybuilding supplement out there, but nobody ever talks about that because you don’t have to buy it out of a magazine.’

The article is wonderful for a contrarian, but it hardly passes for ‘thinking differently’.

Amen! In today’s world, though, more (often any) face time isn’t an option — at least not traditional face time.

This is when technology can be an enabler, but ONLY when it is used in a thoughtful manner. For example when face-to-face isn’t feasible, a Webcam can allow the recruiter and job seeker or client to interact at a more personal level than via phone alone. In our virtual world, developing deep relationships is challenging — but not insurmountable.

In this context, I argue that ’simple’ is better defined as ‘natural’ — that is, in the absence of face-to-face, a mix of communicative technologies should create a virtual relationship that feels as natural as a traditional face-to-face relationship.

‘Naturalness’ is the ‘missing link’ that needs to be built into the virtual workplace environment to simplify the building of deep relationships. To Howard’s point ‘we can do our jobs with less as opposed to more’ (my comments) when simplified marries naturalness.

I have had it up to my back teeth with people saying ‘why can’t you find more ways to find more talent’ = Innovation. The reality is that most of the ways to identify talent have been exhausted and the new ones that pop up from time to time (Social Networking Tools, Blogging, Twitter, etc, you get the gist) yield very little (yet + maybe).

Wow…big statement you might say. Yes it is and the only way I can make such a statement is to have historically measured and continue to measure the effectiveness of these source’s or approaches. The reality is that the majority of organizations if they look carefully at where their hires come from (and track it accurately removing the historical issues of capturing source of candidate data), they will find that the nothing much has changed in the last 5 years.

Employee Referrals (generally are the highest source) = Should be 50%+
Careers Web Page (this has been increasing slowly over the last few years) = 20%+ is good
Job Boards (have increased over the last few years but is flattening out) = 15%+ is good
Networking/Cold Calling/Headhunting (Generally referred to as Sourcing) = companies will fluctuate from 0-20% of hires
Agencies (should be your lowest percentage) = less than 10% should be the aim for more strategic partnering/hiring

Where are all the % of candidates from LinkedIn, Myspace, Spoke, Ryze, FaceBook, Twitter, Blogging etc……I could go on.

Most companies will find that yes there are a small number of hires from these niche spaces but at this stage people seem to want to write endless articles, comments, posts about innovative new techniques. I see leaders that get their organization in a tizzy over an article or conference speakers suggestion with something that will yield very little or in simple business terms is a poor ROI (Return on the investment).

What leaders should really be doing (and yes some are) is focus on on adjustments and improvements to the sourcing channels that can have the biggest impact to results. Unless you are a corporate leader where volume or quality is not your major problem to solve the go innovation crazy.

Look at what a slight improvement, tweak or adjustment would have on a employee referral program or improving the usability of your careers page…….We all know that Employee referrals are the greatest source and quality of candidates so why not invest the time to see how you might be able to improve it or re-invigorate it with the existing employee base…..But unfortunately a lot of leaders or industry luminaries like ‘new, shiny and bright objects’ so they gravitate towards ‘new’ and ‘innovation’ vs. the hard slog which is quality improvements and adjustments.

Don’t get me wrong, I like innovation as much as the next person, heck I even come up with some brilliant ones from time to time, but at the end of the day when business leadership is looking at me for results and ‘what have you done for me lately’, I learnt many years ago that ‘new, bright and shiny’ does not necessarily equal results.

My 2 cents on the subject and I will now go back to adjusting, tweaking and improving what I know works

:-)

Rob

In the words of the great Sergio Zyman, perhaps we need to focus less on innovation and more on renovation. In his 2004 book, ‘Renovate Before You Innovate: Why Doing the New Thing Might Not Be the Right Thing’, Sergio again breaks new ground in the marketing world by teaching professionals to think about improving what they already have before trying something radically new.

Maybe it’s just me, but that sounds like good medicine in a world that seems to be over-advertised to, and moreover, methodically taught to believe that solutions are in new products and toys, not in the improvement of the process or individual TA employees themselves!

Here’s an example: I often see TA leaders focusing on increasing the quantity of high-potential candidates, when their fallout rate is 50% or more! Is the problem really ‘more’ HiPo candidates? . . . or is the problem closing the ones you already have in hand?

Deep inside, we all know the answer to that question, but it’s easy to say our results would be better if we had the newest and coolest tools du jour. There isn’t a week that goes by where I don’t have to tell a client, ‘Um, it’s not the sourcing quality (or the technology) that is the problem here . . . ‘

You give us two words that, I believe, will offer great lenses for us to peer through in 2008: Think and Simplify