How to Pay a Headhunting Fee in 15 Easy Steps

I hear statements like this all the time: “Ugh, I don’t want to pay a headhunting fee!”

I know this is because corporate HR folks think that it’s really hard to do, but I’m here to show you that it isn’t hard! In fact, in 15 easy steps, I’ll show you how you can do this all the time!

So, here are my “Easy Steps in Paying a Headhunting Fee.”

Post all of your jobs and wait for applications/resumes to come into your email and/or ATS.
Weed out as many candidates as possible for stuff that doesn’t really matter, like too many jobs, not enough time at a job, going to the “wrong” school, not a high enough GPA, working for a company that was too big or too small, making a grammatical error on the resume, not living in the “right” area, etc.
Email the few candidates you have left with a message about their interest level and make them fill out stuff like applications and questionnaires to be considered for the next step.
Wait for email replies.
Send the two (2) that reply as your “best” candidates on to the hiring manager. For the seven (7) others that reply after that, ignore them because they weren’t quick enough to be one of the “best” candidates.
Don’t follow up with the hiring manager on the two candidates you sent. If she is interested, she’ll get back to you.
Don’t respond to candidates following up and looking for feedback on next steps; you want to keep the power position in this arrangement.
Send another email to the hiring manager after two weeks looking for feedback on original candidates you sent. The hiring manager won’t like the two and wants more candidates. You go out and see who else has posted a resume for the position in the past week (forget about those other seven who first applied; they are old by now). Send five (5) additional emails to the new candidates. Get one reply. Send it to the hiring manager.
Let the hiring manager’s return calls go to voice mail, because you know they just want to complain about the quality and lack of candidates. Call her back at the end of business tomorrow. Of course, she’s already gone for the day.
Hiring manager comes to your office. Crap. They caught you. You tell the manager you’ve been working non-stop on their opening and the three candidates are the best you can come up with.
Hiring manager goes back to their office. I call your hiring manager. She tells me she can’t get any good candidates.
Hiring manager sets up their own interviews. Three days later, if not sooner, I send your hiring manager five (5) candidates who are all capable of doing the job. I call your hiring manager to highlight two of the candidates who I feel would be the best fit for your organization.
Hiring manager picks a favorite from the great interviews they just had. I’ve pre-closed both on an offer, so I’m what they call in the business a “sure-thing.”
Hiring manager calls you and tells you they found a candidate through an outside source.
You process my invoice.

See, it’s really not that hard to pay a headhunting fee. In fact, you practically don’t have to do much of anything! Just keep doing what you’re doing.

This was originally published on Tim Sackett’s blog, The Tim Sackett Project.