The idea behind it was to get hiring managers to do the right thing, which conceptually is easy, less so in practice. With this perspective, here’s the short list of how hiring managers mess up the hiring process and why they need some tough love to get it right:

1. They complain they don’t have time to describe real job needs. Of course, it takes extra effort to hire a top-notch person, and no effort to fill a seat with a sub-par person. So take your choice.
2. They haven’t thought through real job needs and instead rely on skills-infested job descriptions to screen candidates. Their counter to this is that they’ll know the person when they see him, so this is okay. My counter to their counter is top people want to know what they’ll be doing before they agree to meet, so you need to think through the job ahead of time and tell the recruiter why the job is a step-up, not lateral.
3. They knowingly let candidates accept offers without giving the candidate the true story about the job, about their management style, what the culture is actually like, and how they’ll be judged. In my mind this is unconscionable. For example, being responsible for developing the material selection for an advanced product line is not the same as conducting an exhaustive evaluation of different metals 45 days after starting, with no budget, when it normally requires six months and a fully staffed research lab to do this properly.
4. They exclude good people for superficial reasons based on flawed assessment techniques, rather than their inability to consistently deliver the results required for on-the-job success. In my mind hiring top people should not a game of chance.
5. They hire underperformers for superficial reasons, like strong handshakes, strong communications, strong academics, strong first impression, affability, etc., rather than their ability to meet the results required for on-the-job success.
6. They narrowly focus on the wrong stuff. It takes more than technical brilliance, affability, strong communication skills, and a great personality to consistently deliver high-quality results. While these are often necessary, they’re certainly not sufficient. Worse, even if they are necessary, you can’t assess them properly in 30 minutes.

Now sometimes hiring managers don’t have enough time. If not, they’re in a Catch-22 of being forced to make short-term decisions just to get the spot filled. More often than not, it is lack of good managerial ability and the use of traditional job descriptions to screen and select candidates. The problem with this is that the best people, even if they have the skills, are rarely looking for lateral transfers, so they never apply. The best people with fewer of the skills listed, or a different mix of them, who might see the job as a career move, won’t apply since the job spec indicates they’re not qualified. Collectively, this makes no sense if a company wants to hire better people.

With this in mind here are some ideas on how to tame your hiring managers and in the process see and hire more top performers.

1. Implement a raising the talent bar committee. Don’t let managers who aren’t able to hire people stronger than themselves make the decision alone. Either include the manager’s boss, or create a raising-the-talent-bar team, with one member involved in every hiring decision to ensure talent standards are always met.
2. Give managers quality-of-hire objectives. Make hiring top people part of the manager’s performance objectives and review process. Some of the metrics as part of this must include team turnover and job satisfaction and performance reviews.
3. Use a performance management process to write job descriptions. Have your company require all managers to provide new hires their performance objectives on the day they start. Use these as the screening and selection criteria, instead of job descriptions. Most managers are weak at clarifying expectations, so this logical step eliminates this problem in the bud.
4. Create the employee value proposition before starting the search. If the person is not looking, and/or has multiple offers before starting the search, ask managers why a top person would want this job. Generic statements are not acceptable. It must describe what the person can learn, will be doing, and could become, if successful. To highlight the importance of the position, tie it to the company strategy or a major project.
5. Conduct exploratory interviews before the in-person interview. Don’t let managers talk with the candidate in-person first. Ever. More mistakes are made in the first 30 minutes of the interview than any other time. An exploratory interview over the phone starts as a two-way dialogue among equals. It allows candidates to evaluate the job from a career-move perspective before deciding to be seriously considered a candidate. Adding online video minimizes the impact of first impressions, so there’s a double-benefit with this type of exploratory interview. (We’re now launching a beta test combining an exploratory interview with video, so email me if you’d like to consider participating. We’ll be taming hiring managers in the process.)
6. Control the first 30 minutes of the in-person interview. I worry that managers will become distracted during the critical first 30 minutes when they meet the candidate in-person. To minimize the impact of first-impression-related errors, I ask the candidate to write a quick summary of two major accomplishments related to actual job needs. I then ask hiring managers to review these right after conducting a quick work history review. As part of this, I highlight things in the candidate’s resume I want them to focus on. This allows me to know what goes on behind closed doors without actually being there.
7. Conduct more panel interviews. With hiring managers I’m really worried about, I lead the first interview between the candidate and the hiring manager. The way I can be sure biases are held in check and we both can focus on the candidate’s ability to deliver consistent results. Interestingly, this is always a second evaluation interview for me, and frequently my assessments of the candidates changes dramatically — some getting better, some worse. As a result, I always suggest hiring managers meet with their final candidates at least two separate times alone, and once in a panel interview.
8. Formal debriefing program. Under no circumstances add up a bunch of yes/no votes to decide whom to hire. This is akin to a popularity contest. Instead, use some time of formal talent scorecard system covering a broad range of factors. Assign different interviewers different factors and make them share and justify their rankings using evidence, not feelings. (Email me if you’d like to review the scoring system I describe in Hire With Your Head.)

Hiring is too important to leave to chance, yet most companies do just that by letting unsophisticated hiring managers run wild in a scarce population of in-demand top performers. A end-to-end companywide hiring process based on the needs of top people is one way to tame your hiring managers. Not only will you increase your share of the best talent available, but you’ll also turn your hiring managers into your best friends.

Monster said it lost $24.2 million on sales of $215.3 for the first quarter of this year. That compares to a loss last year for the same quarter of $10.3 million on revenue of $254.4 million.

That translates into a 20-cent-a-share loss, 2 cents more than the most pessimistic Wall Street estimate. Analysts, according to Yahoo Finance, had been expecting a loss in the range of 12 to 18 cents, with an average of 16 cents a share.

CareerBuilder, a privately owned company, voluntarily reports only its North American revenue, which, it said today, was $132 million, a 6.4 percent decline from the $141 million it reported for the same quarter last year.

Dice, the other major publicly held job board company, reported Wednesday that it earned 5 cents a share on revenue of $26.8 million. In 2009, it had revenue of $29.6 million and earnings of 6 cents a share for the first quarter. Wall Street bid up its stock, which closed today at $9.31, up $1.00 since Tuesday.

Monster’s financial  report sent its share price tumbling in after-hours trading. An hour after the release of the numbers, even as Chairman and CEO Sal Iannuzzi was beginning to explain the numbers during a call with analysts, the stock had dropped 10 percent. It closed Thursday at $17.89 a share.

Despite the loss, the numbers did show signs of improvement. As CFO Tim Yates pointed out, the revenue for the quarter showed the smallest decline in more than a year, and it was higher than the company had expected.

Yates and especially Iannuzzi pointed to bookings (contract sales) as a sign of growing strength for Monster. The $219 million in contracts booked during the first quarter was a 17 percent increase over the same quarter the year before, the first positive growth for a quarter in 12 months.

Iannuzzi credited the improving economy and the 6 Sense technology for the boost in bookings. “Product innovation is driving growth,” the CEO said early on in the conference call. Later, responding to a question, he specifically credited Power Resume Search, a premium resume search using the 6 Sense technology, for helping to increase sales.

“Once customers understand the value proposition,” he told analysts who had asked about acceptance of the 30 percent premium Monster charges for Power Resume Search, “They are paying it.”

He also credited the 6 Sense search technology (used by recruiters to search resumes and job seekers to search listings) with improving Monster’s market share. Monster, Iannuzzi said, has “successfully reversed the negative trend” in the U.S. At another point he said the company commanded over 30 percent market share. “We are confident that we are winning,” he said, without referring to CareerBuilder, Monster’s No. 1 nemesis.

CareerBuilder’s North American revenue, almost all of it coming from the U.S, was $35 million ahead of Monster’s. That gives it a pretty good revenue lead, which probably also makes it fairly strong in market share. However, when Monster completes the acquisition of HotJobs from Yahoo in the third quarter, it could move the company back into the top spot.

Still, Monster, like the U.S. economy as a whole, is not out of the woods. The company told analysts it expected to lose money in the current quarter and to lose between 12 cents and 20 cents per share for the year.

CareerBuilder doesn’t report profitability.

Valuable, robust networks need to meet at least four criteria: (1) they need to be focused and made up of people with similar interests and motivations who are seeking the same thing; (2) they need an instigator, a moderator, perhaps even a rebel, who rouses passions and gets people engaged; (3) they need a large enough number of people so that someone is always “there” to respond, comment, and keep the ball rolling; and (4) they need to save time and energy in some way.

They Need to Be Focused and Have Similar Members

Networks are collections, but they are collections of people rather than books or stamps. Successful collectors of anything do not just collect at random. The good ones have a system, a focus, and a rationale behind their collecting. For example, stamp collectors are usually focused on a specific country or on a theme. The same is true for coin collectors. Baseball card collectors concentrate on a team or league or person. Focus is necessary, and is the first rule for successful use of networks because it is so difficult to sift through thousands of anything to find the one(s) that meet your criteria. It is much better to have hurdles to entry that ensure the integrity of those who are admitted. A recruiter, for example, needs to know exactly what type of people they are looking for, and then spend the time to attract only those type, before admitting them to their community of similar people. If you are looking for dissimilar people, it is better to set up a separate network for each type.

There Needs to Be High Levels of Interaction and Useful Conversation

The second rule of getting value out of your network is to create a forum where there is interaction and conversation. You need to foster discussion and get people engaged in issues that shed light on their interests and skills. If no one comments on your posts, agrees or disagrees with your point of view, or adds their own thoughts that you comment on, most of the value is gone. When you think about the topics you discuss, you will probably see that much of it consists of small talk. We chatter about the weather events, books, music, and our kids — not that often about the big issues. And it is through these seemingly innocuous and even mundane chats that we learn what a person is really like. It is through the tweets and comments that we identify with people and come to understand their posture on issues.

It is very easy to think that people who always contribute to a discussion are the best, but I believe that the volume and frequency of communication are not necessarily indicators of quality. The networks where people engage in discussions about relevant issues and have arguments that are based on facts and evidence are powerful, but hard to find. It often requires someone to throw out the contentious statement or ask the tough question to get people interested enough to respond. It is by seeing how people respond that you can gain an appreciation for someone’s style and ability to get along with others or influence them.

Have a Number of Community Managers

The third rule is to always have someone ready to engage the network member in conversation, creating an widespread army of volunteers who are willing to monitor your network traffic and comment when appropriate. Nothing is worse that commenting on something or putting in a question and then getting nothing back for weeks. This person might be a full-time community manager. Even better, it could be many people dispersed throughout the organization. Crowdsourcing this role made sense and provides for more timely responses as well as for more variety.

Show Value

And finally you and others need to see that the network is delivering better candidates, better quality, and more hires than whatever you used before. I don’t think a social network can overcome the fact that other methods are cheaper or work better simply because it is new. We know enough about how to make them successful to ensure we get the metrics we need.

The number of people in your network is important, but not by itself. Size is important because it allows more network members to be equally engaged all the time, and the larger the network, the better the chances are that someone will be available and ready to engage in discussion and debate. Global reach and broader criteria for membership can help expand the numbers, but it is always a tradeoff between volume, quality, and focus.

If you watch networks for a while, you begin to see how many disappear after a few months. Only a handful remain for more than a year or two. It’s generally because they do not meet these simple, but tough to pull off, criteria.

In this article I’m going to discuss how Internet sourcing and phone sourcing can enhance each other.

Back in 1996 or so when the Internet began to gain ground in the consciousnesses of many there was much more “phone sourcing” going on than there is today because very few people understood how to find stuff on the Internet. Search engines were just beginning to become popular and only the mightiest of intellects really understood much earlier than that how they worked. I recall one sourcer telling me her mathematician-father recommended the new search engine “Google” because he knew the two guys at Stanford who’d created it and said they were plenty smart and knew what they were doing. I took her advice back then (it being the late 1990s) and trashed Dogpile and Altavista for Google in most of my daily Internet activities.

As we’ve discussed before, there’s a wide difference between phone sourcing and Internet sourcing. But that doesn’t mean the two never meet. They do, often. The bridge that connects the two is the Internet itself.

It’s a pretty well-received given that there are far more Internet sourcers today than phone sourcers. That may be the case, but I believe seasoned recruiters themselves are expert phone sourcers and when you add that back into the mix, the numbers become much more phone-centric. The one thing that successful recruiters find themselves pressed up against, time and time again, is time. And that’s where hiring outside research comes into play. Sourcing takes up a lot of time and in a recruiter’s ordinary day, an inordinate amount of time.

A phone sourcer typically relies on the Internet as a starting point. I elaborated on this in an article I wrote back in 2008 here on ERE called “Forgotten Fun.” Internet search is fun. If you’re the type (like my sourcer Pam) who enjoys learning new things, doing puzzles, or treasure hunting, you’re in for a treat! It’s easy to stay too long at the bar though and lose your way home. You’ll know this by that little voice in the back of your head that starts warning you that you’re procrastinating — putting off that moment when you must pick up the phone. You know: that voice.

That Forgotten Fun article includes some ways in which a phone sourcer’s work is amplified by the use of the Internet — how the two segue into each other, both forward and backward. I encourage you to read it.

If there’s one thing I want to impart to you as a prospective sourcer, it is to be constantly on guard regarding your time. It’s easy to sit down at your computer and have half a day gone by when you look up for air. That’s because a sourcer’s nature is to seek after things, and it’s very, very easy to chase off down dark mysterious alleys after shiny objects. The reasons some of those alleys are dark are because there’s no light at the end of those tunnels — they’re dead ends. Don’t forget that. Experienced sourcers know this, and that small annoying voice begins to pipe up earlier rather than later. But until you’ve run headfirst into that brick wall at the end of the tunnel more than a few times I suppose you’re just going to have experience this for yourself to believe me. My condolences.

The best use of the Internet, in my opinion as a phone sourcer, is to spend five, maybe 10 but not more than 10, minutes researching a particular target. After all, you only need a few names to “get in” to where you want to go. Grab three off LinkedIn to get started and then call in to the company location you’re tasked with penetrating. I say three because chances are one will “no longer be in the database” of the company’s directory and, as LinkedIn’s records are ever-more maturing, maybe even one more of those will have moved on to other pastures, long since forgetting that bright hopeful moment in their existences when they filled out their profiles at the networking site. So get three. One should still be there, and when that gatekeeper asks you for a name, you’ll be able to give her one that works for you like a key to pass you into the interior. That’s what a phone sourcer wants: to get inside.

Don’t fall victim to the thinking that LinkedIn can or will always be able to supply you with candidates. It can, but there’s a subtle cost included that experienced recruiters recognize. Of LinkedIn’s 65 million users worldwide, half are in the United States, 11 million from Europe and India, the fastest growing country (as of 2009) has only a surprising 3 million users. The Netherlands has the highest adoption rate per capita at an impressive 30%. Of the 33 million in the U.S., I believe about a fourth to a third have moved on to other pursuits and have not bothered to update their forgotten LinkedIn profiles. Another third are in danger of suffering the same fate at some time in the very near future. That leaves about 11 million registered users in the U.S. with current and correct information, and many of that number suffers the consequence of being contacted, time and time again, by recruiters about open job opportunities. You do the math and think about how many times someone can be contacted without tiring of the event. Of course, some never do tire of it and are on LinkedIn for exactly that reason: to keep their options open and their stock prices on the rise. I think they’re smart, but I suspect even this minority will show that even its patience can run thin.

LinkedIn has several other uses as well. As Shally Steckerl recently mentioned in a blog posting, LinkedIn “also provides some neat competitive intelligence.” Read his posting to learn how you can use the networking site to learn about different job titles companies use. You can also see location information on a company depending on where their people report themselves as being located. Not all company websites offer this location information anymore. In addition, you can use LinkedIn to “reverse engineer” a target list of companies based on where people worked before. I’ve found this to be one of LinkedIn’s most valuable provisions.

Here’s what’s going on in the ERE community this week:

1. Transformative vs. Temporary Change
2. Relocation “Next” Practices
3. Creative Sourcing Tactics for $500 or Less
4. Are Recruitment Mailings Considered “Commercial Solicitation”?
5. Vacancy Rate as a Recruiting Metric
6. Featured Group of the Week: TOOLS Group

1. Transformative vs. Temporary Change

Courtney Claiborne writes about the difference between transformative and temporary change saying, “We all agree that change is necessary … that in order to survive in the ever-changing landscape of our chosen professions, we MUST change and adapt — it’s the only way true performance breakthrough can happen. Yet why is it that even though we recognize the NEED to change, so many of us so often (and please forgive me for sounding harsh here) absolutely STINK at making change happen?

How do you encourage transformative change in your organization?

2. Relocation “Next” Practices

Jill Heineck posts a piece on how relocation plays a huge part in your overal talent attraction program: ”In the day and age of the war on talent and cost containment, companies are challenged with continued business growth in a volatile economic climate.Incenting top talent to make a move in Today’s real estate market in an effort to take the business to the next level requires creativity, planning, and a strategic approach.

What are your thoughts on relocation as a recruiting differentiator?

3. Creative Sourcing Tactics for $500 or Less

Sarah Welstead has some interesting tactics for sourcing that don’t require a lot of money. “Remember when having a job to fill meant spending $500 to post it on a job board somewhere? Well, these days, $500 (or less) can buy you a lot of sourcing — and without having to wade through the masses of unsuitable candidates that job boards can deliver. Here are five you may not have thought of.

Take a look at some ideas and see if any appeal to you.

4. Are Recruitment Mailings Considered “Commercial Solicitation”?

A forum member asks if recruitment mailings are considered commercial solicitation, “I work for a large veterinary company. We order lists of licensed veterinarians from various states to populate our CRM database. Occasionally we get flack from a state that warns us against using their information for “commercial solicitation.” Can recruitment mailings (with actual employment offerings) be considered commercial soliciations?

What do you think? Have you experienced this before?

5. Vacancy Rate as a Recruiting Metric

Another forum member asks, “After reading the article on DaVita, i was interested to know more about using Vacancy Rate as a perf metric. I would like to more about your experience with vacancy rate. Is it a reliable performance indicator?  Is it more applicable for a specific type of recruiter and/or recruiting situation (IE. exempt vs non-exempt, high volume, Executive)?  Is there anything else I should know?”

6. Featured Group of the Week: TOOLS Group

I am featuring some of the groups we are looking to find leadership and increase activity for and our TOOLS group is a popular one for finding information about software, training, and other tools used to improve in recruiting.

If you have a discussion or question about selecting or using tools in recruitment, this is a great place to start!

To see what else you’ve been missing, check out the ERE community.

Let’s talk through this one. You just made a hire. For the sake of round numbers and because it is too early in my day for me to break out my Ti 89, let’s call this person a manager making $100,000 plus 15% target bonus.

Since this manager is a “specialist” and you are a busy HR leader who doesn’t have the time or resources to conduct this search internally, you called in a headhunter. And by the way, I love this term. It is so aggressive, and whenever someone asks me “oh, so you are a headhunter?” I beam with pride. I have the image of some primitive tribal warrior with shrunken heads strung around his neck. But I digress.

When you were choosing to use a third party for this search, how did you evaluate that talent?

I know: the whole reason that you decided to go outside for this one is because you didn’t have time to evaluate talent. But bear with me. There are a tremendous amount of options, and all too often hiring managers and HR leaders don’t even consider the option of retained search because “why would you pay up front when you can use five contingency firms at once that will fight against each other, and you only pay them if you make a hire?”

I understand this. If I go out to a restaurant with my family, I am not going to give the waiter $20 just because his team “has more experience or a better process.”

But this is not a steak dinner, and frankly, if you had the resources in house, you would do this on your own.

My point here is that the industry is too competitive and too saturated for anyone to claim a distinct advantage over the candidates, or end product that they can produce, through a contingency search. If you were in their shoes and you knew that you were competing against four other firms, you are going to try to find people as quickly as possible, and just like in that restaurant, when your steak is rushed it either comes out way too rare or burnt to a crisp.

You can’t afford a rushed process and or no process at all. Retainers protect your investment. They are like insurance policies. You know that when a firm is retained, you have their undivided attention, or you should. If you don’t have that level of interaction, then you didn’t vet them properly. If a competent firm has the ability to truly screen candidates out of the process rather that screen them in, you will get a better product, and it will be guaranteed (another benefit of the retainer is a one-year replacement guarantee; why do you think contingency firms don’t make that promise?).

Back to cost. You haggled all of these contingency firms and played them against each other. We are down from a fee of 33% to 25% (which, by the way, many retained firms will entertain in the right situation). $100,000 plus 15% bonus is a $115,000 first-year total cash compensation. That’s $28,750. Nearly $30,000 just to hire this guy, and you want to rush this? It isn’t just the steak that is going to get burned.

Now you train this guy, and he gets through the 90-day contingent guarantee and you start to see the warts. For a litany of reasons, this guy isn’t working out and you let him go. How much have you spent? Three months of salary plus payroll cost is nearly $35,000. A search fee of $28,750. Many estimates put the training of skilled labor at this level at nearly double the salary — $200,000, but lets call it half that because this guy wasn’t there a full year, so $100,000.

Now you have down time or lost productivity to account for the loss of new business or any number of direct impacts to the top and bottom lines of your business. And you have to conduct another search that you now have to manage more closely because the rushed search the last time created a black hole that is sucking money from your company. We are talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars that this search has cost you because it failed.

How much have you spent? What is your total Cost of Ownership? I’m not trying to berate the contingency model. There is a place for every service, and there are many contingency search firms that can perform at a very high level in the right situations. Rather, my point is that there is a better way to control costs, develop talent, and find a partner that can help you … truly help you in your process. I cut my teeth in the contingency search business and ran as fast as I could away from that model. Retained search is more difficult and it is more intense and I have to be available at all hours. But I love it! I am free to add value in a positive way by deeply understanding my clients’ problems and finding creative ways to come up with solutions with them, as part of their team. Contingency search is transactional in nature, and when you are dealing with a commodity that is as variable and volatile as human capital, give retainers a chance. The total cost of ownership is lower in the long run.

The report by classified advertising consultancy AIM Group says quirky Craigslist will have revenues of $122 million this year. Estimates of its costs last year, suggest that it could have a profit somewhere between $89 million and $99 million. (See note at end of article for full disclosure.)

The estimated $122 million in revenue for 201o represents a 22 percent jump over 2009. Though the bulk of the growth is expected to come from the adult ads on the site, recruitment revenue is projected to increase 10.2 percent over 2009′s $59 million in estimated recruitment revenue.

If that turns out to be the case, it would be a significant achievement considering Wall Street analysts don’t expect much improvement in recruitment advertising. Yahoo says analysts expect Monster revenues to be flat to even slightly down this year. Last year, Monster and CareerBuilder (North America only) — the two biggest job boards in the world – reported declines of 33 and 27 percent respectively. (CareerBuilder is a private company and reports only some numbers voluntarily.)

Some other job boards have told me they don’t expect to see any appreciable growth until late in the year and expect to be flat to slightly up in revenue.That makes the Craigslist projections from AIM Group all the more remarkable. The consultancy counted job postings in February, projecting them for a full year. The results suggest Craigslist is already experiencing a lift in its job postings. And since the AIM Group counts, President Obama has signed a jobs stimulus bill, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the first growth in new jobs in three years.

How we should interpret the Craigslist projections is not at all clear. On the one hand, it could be an early sign of a recovering economy. Many of the jobs on Craigslist are part-time or entry-level or temp positions. Typically, these are the harbingers of a recovery.

Another possible conclusion is that acceptance of Craigslist continues to grow as a legitimate source of candidates. That acceptance likely has been nudged along by Craigslist’s attractive pricing. While recruitment is not especially price sensitive, a $75 job posting is pretty tempting compared to the $350-$400 the big boards charge for a single job posting.

Of course, it has to produce results. The evidence says Craigslist does; otherwise, it wouldn’t see the year-over-year growth it does. In past years, it has been able to increase the number of markets where it charges for job listings. Last year it added Austin, Texas to 17 others. Now, Craigslist charges in: Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York City, Orange County, California, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Portland, Sacramento, San Diego,  Seattle, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.

According to the report, some of these markets have surprisingly small counts, when their size is considered. The report says, “For its size, Houston — the fourth-largest city in the U.S. — recorded a mere 5,200 jobs, flat from a year ago. Chicago saw 9,900 jobs posted in February, slightly better than 2009’s 9,400 jobs. The fewest jobs in our survey were in Sacramento (3,700) and Austin (4,300).”

That tracks with the Monster Employment Index for those cities. In February, Houston’s index stood at 104 compared to the national index of 124. Chicago was at 66, and Sacramento stood at 62. Monster does not offer a local report for Austin.

Whether Craigslist is a bell cow for hiring trends this year will become a little clearer on Thursday, when Monster Worldwide reports its first quarter 2010 financial results. CareerBuilder, which typically releases its North American numbers about the same time, may also offer further clues. On May 7th, the Bureau of Labor Statistics will report on the jobs and unemployment picture for April.

Note: I participated in the AIM Group report. I did the analysis and writing of the section on Craigslist’s 2009 expenses.

We are thankful that we have great sponsors and a great summit chair in Kris Dunn. The folks at Fistful of Talent (one of Kris’ blogs) and Pinstripe (one of our primary sponsors) have put together a contest to give away a free trip to the #socialrecruiting summit. That’s not just a free ticket to the best social recruiting event money can buy. That part is easy. Pinstripe is going to cover your plane ticket and hotel as well. Check out the video below for the full details:

Click through to the post over at Fistful of Talent for the full details and the fine print. Oh yes, there will always be fine print.

So get cracking on this contest. You only have until next Wednesday to get it completed. And if you already have your trip covered, help us spread the word about this contest so we can get another person added to excitement that will be the #socialrecruiting summit.

After two years of decline, any good news will do, but let’s not get carried away. 162,000 new jobs given that 15 million Americans remain unemployed is barely a drop in the bucket. About a third — 48,000 — of those jobs are result of the census. They’ll go away in a few months. 150,000 new jobs are needed per month just to keep up with growth in the population. Since December 2007, the economy has shed 8.4 million jobs and failed to create another 2.7 million, for a total of more than 11 million jobs that are missing. So even with a recovery that was producing 300,000 jobs per month it will be five years before we’re back to where we were before the start of the recession.

How is that supposed to happen?

The engine of growth is consumer spending, and that’s sputtering for a lack of fuel. Consumers are focused on reducing debt, not spending. Spending has increased a little, but given how far it fell it could only get better, if for no other reason than that it could hardly get any worse. The consensus view among economists is that as much as a third of the jobs lost are never coming back, and not because they have been outsourced. Some have been, but that trend started long before the recession. A big reason is increases in productivity — up a record 7% in the last year alone.

Corporate profits and cash on hand are up by huge amounts, but that’s not making its way to spending. Wages have stagnated and even dropped for those employed, and new hires are often at lower pay and benefits than before. There’s not much point being judgmental about this. It’s simple supply and demand. But the fact remains that this dampens any recovery. The only group that has bucked the trend is federal employees, whose pay is up almost 30% over the last 10 years, compared to about 19% for those in private industry.

This is a F***ing Big Deal

Our esteemed vice-president phrased it perfectly, but he was talking about the wrong thing. America’s national debt now equals the entire GDP: about $13 trillion. The cost of the healthcare bill and expected deficits will add another $6 trillion to that over the next 10 years. At some point lenders will demand higher interest rates. One of the biggest lenders is China. As that economy becomes consumer-oriented, they are more likely to spend their money domestically than invest it abroad. Regardless, the current level of borrowing cannot continue. Higher taxes are inevitable. A lot of money will be diverted away from productive activities.

This may not be as much of a problem if the economy takes off, but the best we can expect is a sluggish recovery. The ideas that create lots of new jobs occur when entrepreneurs have lots of freedom to do what they want, take risks, and come up with innovations. Most fail, but some succeed spectacularly. It is very much a numbers game: fail quickly, fail often. But current government policies are hardly supportive of this. The goal seems to be to favor certain industries (green being the favorite color) and promoting those at the expense of others. There are only so many jobs for organic farmers, fuel-cell engineers, and wind-turbine mechanics.

Legislation like the proposed financial overhaul, however well intentioned, will only add to the burden on businesses, without doing anything productive, or in any way guaranteeing that the recent debacle won’t be repeated. Where we’re heading is a combination of the European and Japanese models. In Europe the government keeps you safe from all the nasty things in the big bad world, and in return you only have to put with 10% unemployment, stagnant growth, and high taxes. In Japan the Ministry of Trade sets industrial policy, basically picking winners and losers. That doesn’t always work but they’ll eventually figure it out; so what if it results in 20 years of stagnation?

The continuing extensions of jobless benefits is another symptom of this. Currently it’s at 99 weeks, or almost two years. People need help. No question about that. But instead of shoveling money at them it would be better to give employers incentives to create jobs.

There’s a reason why most patents in the world are filed in America. But we can’t have it both ways: a roaring economy and perfect control over all that could go wrong.

Where the Jobs Are

Recruiters looking for work should look to the government. The Feds are going to need lots of recruiters. The Partnership for Public Service estimates that the Feds will add about 600,000 new jobs in the next four years. You can get the details here. The IRS alone will add 16,000 new agents to enforce the requirements of the healthcare bill.

It would be better if those jobs were in the private sector, for the simple reason that government jobs don’t create wealth (in the wider economy, that is). In the private sector, the most reliable source of jobs will be energy. Recent moves to expand drilling for oil and encourage the development of nuclear power will create tens of thousands of jobs. And that makes some people mad, but that’s an added bonus.The level of hiring anywhere else is hard to predict unless we all start eating more organic food.

With the 2010 Creative Excellence Awards only a little over six months away, we are gearing up toward announcing the 2010 CEA categories, and during the process we have realized that not much has changed with these categories in some time. So, after conversations with many of you and other internal discussions, we have put together what seems to be a more current list of categories, shifting from a less print-heavy concentration to more web-based and up-to-date understanding of new ways companies are advertising today.

So here is one more chance to provide your feedback. Please comment below and let us know what you think, what you like/don’t like, and what may be missing, and we will then take that into consideration as we get ready to announce the final categories and start accepting applications on the site.

We also understand that some corporate recruiting departments stay in-house when creating ads, corporate websites, or other promotional items — rather than outsourcing that information to ad agencies — so we open this opportunity to you as well for your feedback on the categories below.

Categories:

Print Advertising and Promotions:

• Single Ad (color or b&w): Single ad in a newspaper, magazine or trade publication
• Campaign  (color or b&w): Series of ads in a newspaper, magazine or trade publication
• Single Brochure: Single brochure as a print promotion
• Collateral Package: A coordinated collateral package of at least 3 pieces
• Direct Mail: A direct mail/postcard promotion
• Other: Other promotional material and collateral, posters, flyers, table top materials, referral cards

Non-Print Advertising and Promotions:

• Radio: Radio ads
• Television: Television ads
• Video/Film, Movie Slides: Video or film promotional pieces
• Out of Home: Outdoor billboards, airport or transit displays, etc
• Electronic Display: Digital billboards, kiosks, POP electronics, projection devices
• Booth: Job fair, career fair, trade show
• Giveaways: Gadgets, gimmicks, T-shirts, etc.
• Online Tile or Banner: Online tiles and banners
• Corporate Employment Website: Company website or career site
• Microsite: Event or position microsite (no more than 5 pages)
• Electronic Direct Mail (E-card): Best electronic direct media (e-cards)
• Mobile Marketing: Recruitment mobile marketing campaigns
• Mobile Marketing (Media): Recruitment mobile marketing campaigns created and issued by the media (Newspapers, TV Stations, Radio Stations, etc.)
• Social Media Campaign: Social media campaigns or promotions
• Other: Any other non-print media not covered by the above categories

Best Campaign for a General Audience:

• Best Multimedia Campaign: Best Campaign/General Audience, using multiple media

College Communications:

• Newspaper or Magazine/Trade Publication Ad: Any ad placed in a newspaper, or magazine/trade publication designed specifically for college audience
• Brochure: Brochure designed specifically for college audience
• Collateral Package: Package of 3 or more coordinated pieces, designed specifically for the college audience
• Direct Mail: Postcard or other direct mailer, designed specifically for the college audience
• Poster/Printed Material: Postcard or other direct mailer, designed specifically for the college audience
• Career Fair Booth: Design for career fair booth designed specifically for college audiences
• Giveaways: College giveaways such as gadgets, gimmicks, T-shirts, etc.
• Tile or Banner: College internet tile or banner designed specifically for college audience
• Website: Website designed especially for the college audience
• Video: College multimedia (video) designed specifically for the college audience
• Social Media Campaign: Social media campaign designed to specifically for the college audience
• Other Recruitment Program: Any other recruitment program designed to attract college students
• Best Multimedia Campaign: Best multimedia campaign for college communications, designed specifically for the college audience

Employee/Internal Communications:

• Referral Program (Single medium): Best employee referral program using a single medium
• Referral Program (Multiple media): Best employee referral program using multiple media
• Retention Program: Best program promoting employee retention
• Motivation or Mentoring Program: Best program promoting employee motivation; best mentoring program
• Best Multi-Media Campaign: Best multimedia campaign for employee/internal communications

Special Award:

• Recruitment Advertising Effectiveness: Recruitment advertising effectiveness — M.O.R.E. Award
• Best Research Project: An advertising strategy developed from the use of research such as focus groups, market studies, etc. Samples of the research results must be included and a description of the objective; the research developed; the results of the research; the marketing strategy developed as a result of the research

Global Communications:

• Print Publication Ad: Best print ad published
• Print Promotion or Collateral: Best print promotion or collateral
• Non-Print Promotion or Collateral: Best non-print (radio/television) promotion or collateral
• Event Marketing Strategy: Best marketing strategy for recruitment event
• Online Media: Best online media
• Mobile Marketing Strategy: Best mobile marketing strategy
• Other: Any other recruitment program used by global agencies
• Best Multimedia Campaign: Best multimedia campaign

Media/Publishing:

• Direct Mail: Best direct mail campaign by a media/publishing company
• Banner Page: Best banner pages by a media/publishing company
• Job Fair/Event Marketing: Best marketing of a job fair or event by a media/publishing company
• Online Advertising Product/Service: Best online advertising product/service by a company
• Recruitment Website or Job Board: Best recruitment website or job board by a media company
• Research: Research used to help a specific advertiser achieve a goal. Must includethe goal; the research developed, the strategy developed as a result of the research

Diversity:

• Print Advertising Newspaper/Magazine/Trade Publication: Print advertising dealing with diversity in Newspaper, Magazine, or Trade Publication
• Print Promotions and Collateral: Brochures, collateral packages, direct mail and other promotional pieces dealing with diversity
• Non-Print Promotions: Non-print collateral/promotions (radio, television, video, CD’s, DVD’s, electronic displays, booths, giveaways, etc.) dealing with diversity
• Online: Online media promotions (including tiles and banners, corporate employment websites, E-cards and other online media) dealing with diversity
• College Communications: Ads, websites, giveaways, brochures,etc – all designed specifically for the college audience dealing with diversity
• Employee/Internal Communications: Motivation, referral, retention campaigns and programs designed for employees dealing with diversity
• Media/Publishing: Direct mail, banners, special sections job fairs, recruitment websites or job boards done by companies dealing with diversity
• Best Multimedia Campaign for Diversity Recruitment: Best campaign for diversity recruitment

Self Promotion: (Any company, advertising agency, temporary employment agency or media can enter the self promotion category. This category is reserved for those companies entering an advertisement or campaign for the promotion of their own organization. A company advertising in this category should be promoting their company as a great place to work and not necessarily promoting specific job openings.)

• Print Ad: Best print ad published
• Video: Video done for self promotion
• Online: Best online ad
• Giveaway: Gadgets, gimmicks, t-shirts, etc.
• Other: Any other self promotion not covered by the above categories
• Best Multimedia Campaign: A variety of media must be used when entering this category

Please leave your comments below about the updated category list. If you have any additional feedback or questions, feel free to contact me directly at ceawards@ere.net.

The assessment checklist introduced in the last installment of this series can not only help you assess your current effort, but also serve as a blueprint for developing a better online career site in the future.

In this installment, the focus shifts away from the corporate career site to measuring the authenticity of social media initiatives and structured interviews.

Assessing Your Social Media Initiatives

Corporations can’t control what people post on social media sites, even though they may try! Many companies today use social media profiles, much like they use their corporate website: just another place to blast generic corporate messages using one-way communications! They turn off the ability of profile visitors to comment, and in many cases, even limit the ability to submit messages to the profile administrator. These practices are so anti-authentic that if your organization is guilty of them, you should start this assessment with a negative 20 points.

Examine your social media initiatives using the following checklist. Tally your points to determine how authentic your efforts are.

1. Corporate profile page (4 points) — your organization should have a profile page on each of the major social networking sites that service your target audience, including but not limited to LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Qzone, and MySpace. If you set up such profiles, award yourself one point. If you do not restrict comments and wall posts, award yourself another point. If non-recruiting related employees, managers, and page visitors routinely comment on profile wall postings, award one point. If you assess your profile page using the checklist in part one of this article and score 16 or better, award yourself another point.
2. Function/Group profiles (2 points) — if your organization has set up profile pages for each of the major functions/groups within the organization to “dialogue” with customers, applicants, and other stakeholders, award your effort one point. If you have dedicated individuals throughout the organization who post and respond to posts daily on each of the function/group pages, award your effort another point.
3. Employee profiles (2 points) — if your organization actively encourages employees to establish profiles on social media sites and identify their company affiliation, award yourself one point. If you actively author social media posts designed for your employees to voluntarily share, add another point.
4. Blog development (2 points) — if your organization actively encourages decision makers, managers, and employees to blog about their work experience and learning, award yourself one point. If your organization actively publicizes employee blogs by linking to them via social media posts, award an additional point.
5. Driving visibility of social media (2 points) — does your organization drive visibility of social media efforts by linking to them from corporate maintained websites? If yes, award your efforts one point. If your organization also links to social media efforts in print via business cards, brochures, etc., award an additional point.
6. Using groups to engage (2 point) — Even a Facebook page established for the finance function of an organization can become overwhelming if too many conversations occur at once. To ensure adequate focus and better interaction, add two points if your organization uses social media groups in addition to profiles to support specific audiences.
7. Employee referral content/application (1 point) — if your organization has established content to support employee referral via social media or installed one of the applications available to support employee referral, award yourself one point.
8. Use of video (1 point) — more videos are viewed online each day than searches conducted on Google. If your organization acknowledges the popularity of video and makes non-scripted communication available via video hosted externally on sites like YouTube, award yourself one point.
9. Twitter (1 point) — while twitter can be a distraction, research shows that users sharing links among friends to other web-based content results in a significant increase in traffic to said content. If your organization uses Twitter (preferably via multiple accounts targeting specific audiences) to drive visibility of content, award yourself one point. If your organization uses Twitter as a market research tool to discover what people are chatting about, and actively seeks out talent to follow, award yourself two bonus points.
10. LinkedIn (1 point) — having employees visible on LinkedIn can be a curse, as LinkedIn has become the defacto phonebook for recruiters, but it also provides individuals interested in learning more about the organization with opportunities to dialogue directly with those individuals most likely to be able to answer questions share stories about life at your organization. If your organization routinely supports individuals publishing and maintaining their LinkedIn profiles award yourself one point.

How authentic are your social media initiatives? If you scored:

14-18 You are a social media best practice firm, congrats!

9-13 You’ve got a solid foundation, but probably need more focus on supporting specific populations.

1-8 You are not there yet, chances are those profiles you have created are rather dusty!

Assessing Your Structured Interview Process

Finally we come to what is quite possibly the most important communications channel, although not everyone recognizes it as one. The assessment and offer stages of the hiring process provide organizations with an opportunity to engage in two-way communications and build a thorough perception about what life will be like in the organization for those who join. Managing this perception is critical, as failure to deliver might not only result in short-term turnover; it could result in great talent leaving the organization disgruntled and happy to talk about it.

Examine your interview process using the following checklist. Tally your points to determine how authentic your efforts are.

1. Realistic preview (2 points) — do the interviewers provide a realistic job preview of both the positive and potentially negative aspects of the company, the region, and the job? If yes, award your efforts two points.
2. Opportunity to ask questions (2 points) — does your interview structure allocate at least 25% of the time to be spent with a candidate exploring topics of interest to them, i.e. responding to their questions and concerns? If yes, award your efforts two points.
3. Opportunities to meet others (2 points) — are interviewees for professional and managerial jobs asked “who they need to talk to” by title in order to make their job-acceptance decision, and then provided an opportunity to do so? If yes, award your efforts two points.
4. Review performance expectations (2 point) — does your interview structure allocate time to explain how your organization measures job performance, to walk through the instruments used, and to provide a detailed overview of near-term and long-term performance expectations? If yes, award your efforts two points.
5. An opportunity to meet peers (1 point) — are interviewees provided the opportunity to meet their future coworkers and to ask questions without a manager or recruiter present? If yes, award yourself one point.
6. Explore their workspace (1 point) — are candidates given an opportunity to explore the office space they may someday occupy? If yes, award yourself one point.

How authentic is the perception established by your interview process? If you scored:

8-10 You are doing an awesome job!

5-7 You’ve got a solid foundation, but going all the way wouldn’t require much more effort.

1-4 You are not there yet, chances are your managers still administer interviews as if it were 1960.

Validate Your Assessment

In addition to your authenticity self-assessment, it’s equally important to get a second opinion from others, namely those you need to influence. Consider:

• Testing your assessment with prospects — survey or conduct a focus group at industry events with targeted individuals who have not yet applied to your organization. Find out what they are interested in learning more about, what’s believable, what’s not, and where they are apt to go to learn more.
• Testing your messaging with candidates — survey a sample of your job applicants and interview candidates in order to determine which messages they consider the most and the least authentic.
• Test messages with new hires — during onboarding, ask each new hire specifically which messages were effective and authentic and which messages and communication approaches had no impact or made them think twice about saying yes.
• Compare with talent competitors — compare the authenticity of each message on your website (and in your recruiting materials) with the same topic on your competitor’s website. When the competitor looks better, investigate. Either your messaging or your practice may need revision.

Final Thoughts

Accepting a new job is such an important decision, one that many candidates consider life altering. Serving up generic information and failing to invest heavily in being both differentiated and authentic is a legacy practice that in today’s hyper-connected society can render your organization more than unattractive. In a homogenous society, it might be okay to assume that the author of a particular message can accurately determine if it’s authentic and credible, but we don’t live in a homogenous society. Recruiting organizations and their agency partners need to be much more adept at admitting they are not always right, and start testing messages before they go live. Like it or not, social media is quickly becoming a foundational element of society and your organization will need to master communicating via social media in an authentic way or continue to look foolish when you approach your profile as yet another static, dusty, webpage.

To augment the labor load balance of supply and demand, talent acquisition leaders restricted by headcount and budget limitations are partnering with external suppliers. Recruitment process outsourcing or RPO service providers are seen as a logical choice to partner for recruiting labor support. However, RPO service standards do not exist, and vary between organizations. Talent acquisition leaders are left to decipher between service offerings to identify the right partners to align with. With the term RPO being uses loosely by many suppliers, the marketplace can be confusing.

To contribute to the confusion, many of the true RPO providers have evolved from pure outsourced providers to offering specific task-oriented services to support the individual steps of the recruiting process. I describe the move from broad scope to narrow scope as the emergence of micro-recruiting services. In an attempt to understand the change, I will explore the relationship between RPO providers and their customers and the catalyst for transformation.

The RPO industry is evolving driven by client demand. The need for full-scale outsourcing has shifted as hiring activity waned last year. By definition, the PO in RPO means process outsourcing or shifting the burden of day-to-day management of a process to an external supplier. The idea is that the process, albeit important, is not part of the core business offering and can be better managed by a specialized vendor. An example would be the outsourcing of call center recruitment or a short-term recruiting project to ramp up a new business unit. The value being that internal recruiting resources would remain focused on critical employment and not be distracted by spikes in demand or less strategic initiatives.

As many companies hunkered down in 2008 and 2009 and implemented cost-cutting measures, hiring slowed and corporate recruiting functions were fighting for relevance as the downturn continued. The broader RPO services were not needed and RPO suppliers found themselves in the dubious position of being perceived as a threat by corporate recruiting functions. The term “outsource” became a cause for concern for many talent acquisition leaders as layoffs cut deeper into organizations. RPO businesses needed to reinvent. In performance review meetings and sales calls, RPO representatives changed their language from touting the value of outsourcing to supplemental or support services. They positioned themselves as an ally and not a threat to internal corporate recruiting functions. They listened to their customers challenged by req creep.

Many talent acquisition leaders evaluated their current operations and looked for ways to become more efficient in handling the demand. The obvious challenge was to figure out how to balance the load. They found that most full-cycle recruiters working on 20 or more professional openings lose their sourcing effectiveness and become project and relation managers. The more innovative functions divided the labor into sourcing, administration, and recruiting but found limitations to scale as the req load increased. Contract recruiters are a viable option; however, training and workspace issues burden ramp up time and the cost of additional ads and sourcing tools burden tight budgets. Creative RPO providers jumped at the opportunity to close the gap on recruiting labor shortages. They unbundled their broad offerings and developed individual services such as full cycle, co-sourcing, response management, and pipelining to better meet their customer requirements.

In deconstructing the recruiting process, talent acquisition leaders evaluated the effectiveness of hybrid models, using a blend of supplier-provided services with internal recruiting resources. They found they could expand their recruiting teams with full-cycle services without expanding headcount. Internal recruiters at load capacity would benefit from co-sourcing assistance which allowed external recruiters to work with the internal recruiters to populate their pipeline of talent with qualified candidates, while internal recruiters maintained ownership of relations with the hiring manager. Sourcing and administration teams burdened by the candidate-rich market and the overwhelming response from their efforts, welcomed the extra support from external recruiters offering response management in helping to qualify resumes and phone screen qualified candidates. And for those functions with candidate relationship management strategies put on hold, pipelining support allowed them to reinitiate strategic talent efforts to help position their organizations for growth and finding key talent.

Talent acquisition leaders are attracted to three key value propositions of these micro-recruiting services: cost, scale, and intelligence. At this stage in the economic recovery, companies are varied in their levels of investment in recruiting. For example, technology companies are investing heavily in recruiting as product development and marketing initiatives increase demand for talent, whereas healthcare companies are cautious as they interpret the impact of reform but still look to position themselves for growth. In both cases, companies are investing at some level and hiring more recruiters is not always the answer. Talent acquisition leaders are looking for ways to maximize their investment.

With regard to cost, micro-recruiting services are significantly less than broader project-based or standard search fees. Micro-recruiting service fees are anywhere from $1,000 to $5,000 based upon project or monthly cost and include advertising, phone, and computer related burden. Versus hourly rate or percentage of annual salary, the cost is typically contained and predictable, allowing for accurate forecasting in measuring against cost-per-hire benchmarks. With regard to scale, as compared to hiring recruiters or engaging contract recruiters, micro-recruiting services can be engaged within 24 hours, if not sooner. It is a true plug-and-play resource with recruiters on call. Obviously size of project and volume of recruiting labor needed affects the time to engage, but in the spirit of the service, it is on demand. It can be disengaged just as rapidly when it is no longer needed. As for intelligence, the information gleaned from sourcing is not lost. Companies are paying for recruiting labor and the recruiting labor is an extension of the existing corporate recruiting team. Candidates sourced and qualified belong to the corporation, and that data or intelligence is shared and input into the client’s ATS. And in some cases, a seamless relationship is developed where the external recruiters work directly in the client’s ATS. Applicant and diversity tracking requirements remain intact.

This is an exciting time for corporate recruiting functions as they continue to evolve and define their value within organizations during the economic recovery. The ultimate goal remains the same: to find top talent as quickly as possible. But how they execute against that goal is rapidly changing, with the advent of suppliers offering new services to augment and support their initiatives. The challenge for talent acquisition leaders will be to identify, pilot, and find the right supplier with the right services. And as RPO organizations continue to partner closely with their customers, new services will be developed and the industry will continue to advance. Ultimately it takes a cataclysmic event such as the Great Recession to enforce change and the adoption of new ideas. We find ourselves in some stage of evolution of recruiting services and some experts are predicting full-scale outsourcing, but ultimately change is driven by demand. Today less is more, flat is up, and micro is in.

Use of Social Media

Recruiting teams need access to all the popular online destinations, such as Twitter and Facebook. Give them the ability to comment, blog, share, and have real conversations with potential talent on the web. They’re grown-ups, aren’t they? You hired them because you trust they will represent your company well. Put a social media policy in place and get moving. Once up and running on social networks and in the blogosphere, learn to have more than just an account. Build a real presence. Build community. Build excitement and buzz that spreads and attracts talent. AT&T and Starbucks are examples of two companies using social media the right way to attract high-caliber talent. Check out Trust Agents and The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web to get a better picture of using social media the right way.

Push vs. Pull Marketing

Gone are the days of the post-and-pray mentalities for recruiting departments, dumping budgets into job boards and search firms. That is push marketing: pushing out job orders. Here now are thousands upon thousands of free resources, sites, and online communities at your disposal. Use them! Recruiters can go beyond job postings and place tailored PowerPoints on Slideshare, insightful pictures on Flickr, descriptive videos on YouTube, and select whitepapers on Scribd and Docstoc. Spread your content in key places online and make sure to provide good titles, tags, and keywords to be found. This is pull marketing, and will bring more traffic to your career site and ultimately produce a better applicant pool to work with.

Lack of a Sourcing Function

Recruiters are overworked today with paperwork, processes, and compliance laws, not to mention the fact that they need to find and source quality candidates for their positions. It’s nearly impossible without having a sourcing team or resources internally or externally. Outsourcing is an option. Training and shifting internal talent is an option too. Hewitt Associates is an example of a company that understands the importance of the sourcing function. It breaks its talent acquisition team into specific tasks, with dedicated sourcers being used on and offshore, finding and submitting talent to recruiters. Sourcers today need to be well-versed in the latest trends in social media and mobile recruiting, as well as a high proficiency in advanced Internet search techniques with Google. This will ensure the sourcing function covers good ground to find qualified talent.

The Application Process

Don’t make job seekers jump through hoops to apply to your positions. Some companies have more than 10 steps amounting to over 20 minutes to fill out. This is too long! Simplify the application process. Fewer steps equal more candidates, guaranteed! The best application processes require uploading your resume, verifying your information parsed by the ATS, and hitting the submit button. Done! Better yet: how about giving your email address and bypassing everything. For most, this just isn’t reality though. Recruiters need data to be successful, and an ATS helps to get this data in the form of extensive profiles and questionnaires. Recruiters also need to be more accessible, more visible during the application process. Think about providing a live person via instant message or video chat on your career site, or a dedicated job applicant support phone line to guide confused candidates and do light screening. Other options such as company Twitter accounts, Facebook fan pages, LinkedIn groups, and YouTube channels that tie-in are a must.

Job Descriptions

Most employment ads online either have too little information or way too much. The information that is available usually has too much corporate-speak mumbo-jumbo and uses company acronyms and internal program names. Ads like these can be confusing and misleading. Sit down with the hiring manager and get all the facts out on the table. Uncover every detail possible. Develop a job description that really sells the job! Make it relevant to the job seeker. Make it interesting. Show some excitement. Talk like a real person. Tell people what the job will really do and the importance it plays with your company or client. Strike a good balance of information with an enticing sales pitch. Make me want to apply!

Many more talent barriers exist today. I’m interested to hear about the makeup of your recruiting team, how you find talent today, and what unique challenges you face.

“Interviewers haven’t changed their techniques,” says the CEO of Hire Authority, a recruiter training firm. “But the job seekers have. They’ve been studying. Applicants have beefed up their ability to really look good.”

It’s her feeling that over the last couple of years, as recruiter ranks have been thinned by the recession, those left behind have had neither the time nor often the budget to improve their interviewing skills. On the other hand, job seekers, with nothing but time, have gotten better.

“There are so many sources catering to these hungry job seekers looking for a paycheck that they don’t have to look very hard for help,” says Quinn. As a point of illustration, Quinn told me that several months ago she came across a tweet pointing to a collection of videos of recruiters using behavioral interviewing techniques with a candidate. The candidate’s responses, she says, “were spot-on.”

“Go to the bookstore. Go to the library. Do you have any idea how many hundreds of books there are on interviewing? You can get all the behavioral questions and all the answers,” says Quinn. “Everyone can look like a top performer.”

Quinn teaches a style of interviewing she calls motivation-based. It’s a system that seeks to identify high-achievers by unearthing their internal drivers and examining their passion for the job and for achieving goals.

Sound like behavioral interviewing? It is, at least in part. The differences are more subtle than they are revolutionary.

The example she offers is of the fairly stock question, “Tell me about a time when you satisfied an irate customer.”

“Every person can tell you about a time like that,” Quinn says. Instead, her motivation-based method would finesse the question along these lines, “Tell me about a specific time when you satisfied an irate customer. How you did it and what you got out of it.”

That may not sound like a big difference, but it does kick things up a notch. The “how you did it and what you got out of it” part isn’t as amenable to a formula. It also has the benefit of surprise, and that is something every job seeker wants to avoid in an interview.

Being prepared, even for mediocre performers, isn’t hard when the Internet is swarming with interview coaching videos. In one, entitled “How to Answer Questions at a Job Interview,” among the bits of advice is this: “You want to be honest, but not too honest.” Another, How To Ace a Job Interview,” gives the A++ answer to this other stock question, “Why do you want to leave your job?”

On YouTube alone there are 21 videos with the title “How to ace a job interview.” And dozens and dozens more on the same subject.

But it would seem that a being well prepared as a job seeker is a positive. Quinn doesn’t doesn’t disagree with that, but she sees that as a minimum.  “I have found that the people who come in well prepared and interview well aren’t necessarily going to perform well in the job,” she says.

A few years ago, before the behavioral Q&As were all over the Internet, interviewers schooled in the technique could get beneath the veneer to see more of the individual. Now, Quinn suspects, recruiters are going to be more easily fooled by polished job applicants and wind up hiring people who aren’t going to perform as well on the job as they did in the interview.

Her advice to recruiters is to focus equally on the motivation, attitude, and passion of the candidate as on their skills. “Candidates don’t fake specifics well. Go after details and pursue how they responded to challenges, especially impossible obstacles.

“High performers achieve better results despite the obstacles.,” she says. “Low performers think the obstacles are responsible for not achieving the high performance.”

Here’s what’s going on in the ERE community this week:

1. The 2% difference
2. Core skills of an effective corporate recruiter — Part III: Selling skills
3. What’s wrong with this picture?
4. How important should salary be to a sales person?
5. Does your company allow and encourage use of social media In the workplace?
6. Featured group of the week: Healthcare staffing

1. The 2% difference

Mark Bregman writes about how a 2% drop in management efficiency can actually be quite a bit of lost opportunity saying, “If you run this company for 5 years, and you tolerate 2 “B” players rotating in and out of your management team, it might cut your annual average growth to 7%. Over 5 years time, you give up $7.5 million in revenue. If you have a $200 million company, you gave up $30 million in growth. This could erode equity by an equivalent amount when the company is sold.

What’s your feeling on this? Is getting all A players in an organization realistic or is it worth fighting for?

2. Core skills of an effective corporate recruiter — Part III: selling skills

Louis Kadetsky posts a nice piece on how important selling skills are to corporate recruiters. Louis says, “There is no substitute for sales skills in the corporate recruiting business. If you can’t sell a client not just on a company but on an offer, you’ll lag your peers and your employer will question the value you provide. Sell well, on the other hand, and everything you do will come with an implicit return on investment.

What is your take on selling skills being critical for corporate recruiters?

3. What’s wrong with this picture?

Charles Kapec takes companies to task for bad stock picture usage (and includes some fun examples). He writes, “When developing the visual side of an employment brand, photo choice is very important. You need images that truthfully capture your organization. The best solution? Commission a photographer who can build a bank of professional photos that truly represent your workforce. The next best solution? Choose your RF and stock images wisely, to make sure they avoid the mistakes listed below.

Read on to see some of the mistakes you can avoid in your next advertisement or branding!

4. How important should salary be to a salesperson?

Stephanie Huff asks in the Sales Recruiting group about the importance of a base salary. She writes, “[S]hould a senior level sales person who has been selling for 5 or more years that is earning an income over six figures be concerned if a position they are considering has an extremely low base salary in comparison to what they are currently receiving if the total target income expectation is greater than what they are earning today? What are your thoughts and experience with this? Should and does salary really matter?

What do you think? Is base salary important?

5. Does your company allow and encourage use of social media in the workplace?

Mike Temkin writes about the use of social media in the workplace. He says, “The days of controlling an employee’s internet access is slipping away with the increasing market penetration of smartphones. First and foremost, social media and portable access to internet media is an advantage for every employer wanting to stay connected with employees, prospects and alumni. Furthermore, I firmly believe you cannot control the message; you can only make a contribution to the dialogue.

Check the comments for some interesting feedback!

6. Featured group of the week: Healthcare Staffing

I am featuring some of the groups we are looking to find leadership and increase activity for and our healthcare staffing group is a critical one. Anyone with experience knows that healthcare staffing can be one of the most challenging areas to work in.

Some of the discussions in the past have been around comparing different job board’s effectiveness in the space and agencies that place pharmacists. If you have an interest in any sort of healthcare staffing issues, please join us and contribute!

To see what else you’ve been missing, check out the ERE community.

Even through our economic woes, downsizing, right sizing, decentralizing, centralizing, compartmentalizing . . . there are still recruiters out there who are proud to be in this profession and passionate about doing things “the right way.”

For those who missed it, we discussed the competencies/skills of Elite Recruiters and the journey to go from good to “elite.” We announced the results of our Elite Recruiter Self-Assessment Benchmarking Study in which over 1,000 recruiters have participated!

In conducting research for this webinar, I asked every recruiter who participated the question “What do elite recruiters do that average or good ones don’t?”

Shamelessly stealing from Jeff Foxworthy’s “You know you are a redneck if …” comedy routine, this question quickly evolved into: “You know you are an elite recruiter if …”

The feedback I received was not only inspiring, but also challenged me to reflect on what it truly means to be an elite recruiter, and what I need to do to be one!

Performing at an elite level doing anything is very difficult. Recruiting is no different. Documenting these attributes/competencies/skills, in a fun way, helps keep this passion burning and top of mind. Pick a few that are new to you or ones in which you know you haven’t yet achieved elite status and make it your goal to improve in these two or three areas over the next quarter. Picking even just one will no doubt increase your performance overall.

Outlined are some of my random thoughts on this topic!

You know you are an “elite recruiter” if . . .

1. You get referrals from candidates you turn down for a position.
2. Your hiring managers ask you who they “should hire” … and listen to your advice.
3. Candidates seek your input on preparing for the interview with the hiring manager.
4. Your candidates seek your council on deciding between competing offers, knowing that you aren’t just trying to fill your own position, but truly want what’s best for them.
5. You keep track of all the people you have hired, and keep up an ongoing relationship with 90% of them.
6. You track your performance (quality, efficiency, responsiveness/delivery) on a quarterly basis.
7. You quantify the ROI of your services to your key stakeholders.
8. You have clearly written quarterly performance improvement goals.
9. You spend time each week helping those less fortunate find employment, craft a better resume, prepare for an interview, etc.
10. You invest at least 15 minutes to an hour developing a written — hour by hour — daily plan of action that you deploy before each day. The most successful recruiters are religious planners.
11. You stick to a schedule where during certain times of the day you are simply making calls and don’t allow for outside distractions.
12. You have received gifts from candidates/hiring managers for “changing their life” for the better.
13. Your hiring managers ask for your assistance in creating the job description, and you’re able to guide them in a consultative way to determine what needs to be accomplished, instead of a list of intangibles.
14. Your hiring managers ask for your assistance in creating interview guides which will help them discover the candidate’s true capabilities.
15. Your candidates turn into “centers of influence”: those people who are well-connected and to whom you can always turn for help on difficult searches.
16. Your outside clients see you as an expert on what’s going on in the marketplace and even in their industry.
17. You get referrals without even asking.
18. People who seek your assistance have heard about you from more than one person.

We are looking for more additions to this list. Please post them!

“This is America … a brilliant diversity spread like stars, like a thousand points of light in a broad and peaceful sky.” — President George H.W. Bush, August 1988

“… each of us has a role to play, and all of us have something to contribute. He (Bush) didn’t call for one blinding light shining from Washington — he didn’t just call for a few bright lights from the biggest non-profits; but he called for a vast galaxy of people and institutions working together to solve problems in their own backyard.” –President Barack Obama, October 2009

This article is a call to action for recruiters to actively participate in assisting veterans to connect with the support and resources they need to build a career in the civilian workforce — one connection at a time through the 1,000 Recruiters of Light Project. Below is one such story which we hope connects with you and depicts our shared vision and inspires you to become involved.

Steve’s true story:

———-

Last Tuesday night, I was lounging in a comfy club chair at the local Panera Bread with my sandaled feet up on an adjacent chair. It was a copacetic evening. The iced tea was perfect, and I was leafing through the barrage of daily emails that were left unopened from the day. An older man adorned with a U.S. Navy veteran’s jacket with a dour expression on his face started walking toward me; this fellow was not a happy camper and his low muttering mentioned something about my feet …

The place was nearly empty but he felt compelled to sit in the chair next to me. He expressed in a not-so-gentle-a-way that it was rude that someone would have their barely-covered feet up on a chair in a public place. He was angry in a way only someone with a real large chip on their shoulder is.

I could tell he was more hurt than angry — at no time did I raise my voice to escalate things. Here are some excerpts:

Navy: “I think it’s disgusting that someone would place their feet on chairs.”

Levy: “But I think I have nice feet; if they were gnarled and yellow I could understand, but look at these things.”

Navy: “I still think it’s disgusting and rude.”

Levy: “Sir, I’m sorry you feel this way, but I’ve been here for some time and at no time did the manager tell me to put my feet on the floor.”

After several minutes back-and-forth, I simply asked him why he was so angry; he told me he has been out of work for two years and could not get anyone to speak with him about a sales job. What a surprise!

Then I told him I was a recruiter and about my background working with people in the military. His demeanor eased.

For the next hour, I spoke to him about his career, what he has done in his search, what he likes to do for the simple joy of doing it — and I am sure he sensed that my interest was genuine. I introduced him to LinkedIn, reviewed his profile, and showed him how to join and use groups. I reviewed his resume and suggested changes based upon how hiring managers read resumes. We looked at several listed job opportunities. I explained to him how recruiters and hiring managers often think and act; this was all new to someone who truly believed that you must respond to HR and wait. We also shared stories about how tough it can be to be an older job seeker.

Looking back on this encounter one week later, I hope I helped him recognize how important his military service is and how he should be proud of it and highlight it — even if it did take place over 40 years ago. In reminding him to think positively and how to use the tools many job seekers should be using, a smile came to his face.

What this Navy veteran needed was someone who could mentor him as he navigated around the maze that has been created by industry and our profession — a massive field of corn stalks that in the minds of people often lead to nowhere and further exacerbate negative emotions. I believe in giving veterans a sense that recruiters do believe that one’s military service is not trivial; that job description buzzwords such as character, integrity, and motivation are not simply filler concepts that most interviewers are ill-prepared to assess.

While he hasn’t stopped calling since, his messages have not been rude or annoying; after all, he is a salesperson and he’s trying to sell himself. With my assistance — with your help — he’ll get the job he desires. And in the end he apologized for hating my feet.

———-

Serendipity: “An aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident.”

The next day, Rob posted a Facebook message asking readers if they wanted to help review resumes through the Wounded Warriors Project’s “Warriors to Work” initiative. .

During a subsequent phone call later in the day with Rob, it simply popped out that if we could engage 1,000 recruiters — like President George H.W. Bush’s “thousand points of light in a broad and peaceful sky” — and attached each recruiter to a single veteran, as Rob wrote back to Todd Raphael, “think of the impact we could make.”

Think about what President Barack Obama said last year: “Each of us has a role to play, and all of us have something to contribute. [President Bush] didn’t call for one blinding light shining from Washington — he didn’t just call for a few bright lights from the biggest nonprofits; but he called for a vast galaxy of people and institutions working together to solve problems in their own backyard.”

Readers, think about how our industry — the “vast galaxy of people and institutions working together” — can use their time and talent to thank our veterans for their service with individual action and connection. Would you be willing to adopt and mentor a single veteran in need of assistance as they separate from active duty? Would you be willing to show them how to initiate and optimally use tools for their job search? Would you be willing to stand bytheir side?

This call to action stretches beyond the borders of America. It echoes across Canada, the United Kingdom, and all countries where soldiers go to war with no expectations upon their return. Let’s give them something they deserve: the opportunity to have a chance at success beyond the Armed Forces if they choose.

If you want to be part of the 1,000 recruiter movement, please join the 1,000 Recruiters of Light Facebook Fan Page. When you join, please add your picture to the Recruiters’ Photo album. More information including logistics will be posted there as we firm up the protocols. Let’s help veterans, one connection at a time.

For the sake of this article, I will address the topic of exit interviews. To start, why do companies conduct exit interviews and not use that information to the company’s benefit? If you really don’t care about what exiting employees think, why go to the trouble of asking them, “What could we have done better?”

By the way, this is way too ambiguous a question, and one that when posed even with the best of intentions can make the exiting employee feel cornered. There are also questions like, “What did you like and dislike about your job?” This one makes me cringe. If ever there was a question that begged to be asked during the active employment lifecycle, it has to be this one. Employees must be provided opportunity to speak and to be heard while on the payroll. This means that waiting until someone has one foot out the door is tantamount to a missed opportunity. Another action that is at the very least unprofessional is be treating a soon-to-be former employee like she has the plague. This means avoiding her all together and placing the coins on her eyes before she has performed her last job duties. Understandably, if there is a proprietary project looming near, it is perfectly acceptable and sometimes necessary for the manager to keep it out of this person’s hands, but please don’t act uncouth about it. People will notice, and I mean all people, not just the exiting employee.

So why do companies partake in this exit interview exercise? This is a question I’ve heard many thought leaders in the field of human resources challenge for years. Maybe it’s the company’s way of maintaining control or having the last say in how someone may exit the organization. I would hate to think it’s just for the sake of finalizing the paperwork, or that it’s because “this is the way we’ve always done this, so why question it.” People have to mean more to an organization than just being a number that will no longer exist. I know there are companies that recognize the importance of a well-designed and meaningful exit interview. They gather the answers, sift through the fluff, and isolate the nuggets of gold they can profit from knowing. I applaud them.

A poorly delivered exit interview will undoubtedly affect the morale of the existing employee population, denigrate the exiting employee, and ultimately place a black cloud of negativity over the culture within an organization. At a higher level comes the perception about the employment value proposition and then a black mark against your employment brand. Companies that “get it” believe that the employment brand is as important as the corporate brand. Along with the corporate brand, your employment brand is the epitome of your organization’s humanity, the essence of your culture, the bench strength of your outreach to the community, and supports the ambassadors you place in front of your customers every day.

Organizations need to do a better job at recognizing that an individual who is leaving their organization may still value, and may be a source of value for, that organization. When someone leaves, that individual may be leaving the organization, but she is not leaving the friendships built during her time spent with the company. Sometimes I wonder if companies think about that, or even care. I liken this to sending a canary into a mine. If it doesn’t die from the toxic gas, it’s safe for others to follow. Think about this in terms of the former employee. She leaves and spreads the word that it’s safe “out there” for others to follow. Not only that, but you know that potential pool of good candidates from your top competitor? You need to believe they too will get wind of this and continue the conversation with their peers. So do you really want that former employee to tell her friends about how much better is it now that she’s gone? The obvious answer is “no,” but it does make me wonder, nevertheless.