Parhaps you have heard of the old saying that in the construction business it is not uncommon to see one guy digging a hole and three guys standing around watching him do it. Well, I have been a witness to this everyday out of my window here at work for the past couple of months. See, right across the parking lot from our office building, there is a huge construction project going on that is going to add several high-rise office buildings and an outdoor mall-type center to wonderfully block the open view I currently have. While it will be good to see the new development completed and have a couple of more dining options close by, the noise and view has been distracting. But it was something that caught my eye the other day that got me thinking about productivity...
See, I am not a construction expert by any stretch of the imagination. I have no idea why they moved that one pile of dirt six times and now it is back where it started a month ago. I also don't understand why those big beams need to be nailed into the ground during prime phone time, but I trust they know what they are doing. After all, I sit in an office building that was constructed by teams like those out my window. But what I do understand is that I have seen a lot of guys standing around watching another dig a big hole and then fill it in with dirt. So the other day I was thinking that if we handled our recruiting efforts that way, three of us would be let go!
See, our performance is measured by productivity, or as I like to think of it, as throughput. In our industry, it is pretty much every individual for him/herself. We don't have time to stand around and watch others make calls. We need to be constantly moving people through a process to produce a sale. Productivity is such a soft word now-a-days. Look, every industry is different and how they measure production is different. In recruiting, it might be measurements like sendout-to-placement or in sales it might be something like sales cycle measurements. But not every industry requires hands-on work to be productive. A teacher, for example, might sit in his or her desk for an hour, just watching the class work on an assignment. Are they being unproductive? Perhaps not. Who knows - maybe those three construction workers are serving a purpose I am not aware of. Maybe it is required production (output) for them.
I think of my desk a lot like a manufacturing plant. I need to have inputs, a process, production, efficiencies, and output - all while keeping a close eye on operational expenses and inventory levels. If I can balance all of these on my desk, I end up being very productive. But while I manage these dependent events, as every recruiter knows, what makes us successful is our ability to deal with statistical fluctuations (market conditions, unexpected roll-offs, etc.) and adjust our process accordingly.
Productivity is a fine line to evaluate in most industries. Not in recruiting, that is for sure. Either you produce or you hit the bricks...
- Robert Stanke