Editor’s note: Jeff uses the German word for robot – roboter — to mean the human operator of the robot. Roboters, though, may have a short job life. The sophistication of recruiting robots is growing fast. An Australian university, working with NEC, has developed a mechanical robot named Sophie, that conducts interviews, assesses candidates on both what they say and how they say it, and makes comparisons. More details are here.
Things have really changed. More in the past year than in the 50 before. A new generation of Internet search engines is here. They go far beyond matching resumes to jobs.
They appear to be “recruiting robots” because they actively crawl. They seek, find, and stalk candidates. This is done by globally trolling all online sources (including social networks) for personal and professional information. Anything written by or about someone over the Internet at any time makes that someone a potential candidate. It is a sophisticated matching from keywords the roboter inputs.
Before we get into this further,
- Google HR Recruiting Robots.
- Click on the links.
- Regain your composure.
Think about the depth and breadth of searches that can now be done by relentless web crawlers like that. The implications are staggering.
Perhaps the most wonderful thing about this technology is that it has the capability to explode human potential. In your case, yours.
But it must have safeguards against misuse. With this kind of power, a nefarious roboter may be able to input age, race, marital status, sexual preference, medical condition, criminal record, whatever. It just makes you want to consider a career as an employer lawyer.
Click a key, and any matching keyword ever posted about that person could appear, along with contact information. Then just refine the search, smile, dial and pitch. You already know about candidate likes, habits, gigs, opinions from acquaintances, goals, and whatever else surfaces. That’s the coveted marketing intelligence behind closing sales
Speaking of careers, why not become a roboter yourself? You could decide on a system, make a major investment in it, spend endless placement hours learning how to maximize its effectiveness, and continuously pay to keep updating it as new versions get even better. You’d then be competing with the largest companies in the world who have already purchased the robots and pay the roboters to operate them.
The Recruiting Video Gamer
But would you really be competing? That depends on whether you can leverage the information.
How? Wow!
I could easily make the case that the computer actually inhibits your ability to make placements. Exhibit “A” would be a list of the highest-billing recruiters on the placement planet.
Around half of them don’t use the Internet at all. Of that half, a majority don’t even use a computer except for e-mail. They handwrite notes on index cards or simple forms they’ve designed. Crazy, ay? Not so crazy if you really understand real recruiting reality.
The Intuition Card
Placements are made from the high-biller’s intuition.
I can help you spark your intuition by writing the perfect job order. In fact, that’s the title of Chapter 19 in The Placement Strategy Handbook – “Writing the Perfect Job Order.” It includes our famous 60-question Job Order Questionnaire.
The questionnaire is too long to include here, and I’m afraid someone won’t spring for the $32.50 for the book that has helped more recruiters make more placements than any other. So I’ll just have to give it to you.
To open this gift,
- Go to www.placementlaw.com.
- Click the red JEFF’S ON CALL! button.
- Type Perfect Job Order Questionnaire in the Subject field.
- Click Send.
I’ll reply with the questionnaire.
The Placement Strategy Handbook is filled with the forms, techniques and information that the most successful recruiters use every day. The PSH continues to outsell all other recruiting aids combined because it contains all of the forms, tips and information necessary to make placements. It is available online at www.SearchResearchInstitute.com.
I began this conversation talking about how much things have changed in the past year. Yet recruiting – as opposed to reclining and now roboting – hasn’t changed at all.
Recruiters MAKE Placements
Every time I drive by that office building where I worked, I think how I could walk into my old office and be as good (or bad) as I was 50 years ago. The reason is simple. I recruited. I was active not reactive.
There was a phone, phone books, old company directories, old JO’s, old resumes, and a box filled with punch-cards in a sorting system nobody used. No computer screen to hide behind. No fax machine. You just cold-called into businesses, either prying out openings or prying out employees.
You can airlift any recruiter to a desert island with a phone, a list of employer phone numbers, a list of their competitors’ phone numbers, and email capability. He’d make placements without skipping a meal. Because he literally makes placements.
Why is this so? Because recruiters don’t let digital static scramble their analog intuition. They know who to pitch, what to say (not write – writing allows for reflection when they want impulse), and how to close.
Hey, you could be an expert witness in my case! We’d swear you in, and you could testify about your last placement. Then we could go back through every placement you’ve ever made. Each one was different, but you’d swear that every one was made through the magic of your intuition. We’d compare the resumes of any of the placed candidates to the JO specs. The jury would be stupefied that they don’t match. I’d then ask you to step down and rest my case.
Steve Finkel recently wrote a book entitled Real Recruiting! It’s available for $45+$4 P&H by calling Placement Marketing Group at (314) 991-3177. As you probably know, Steve is a veteran recruiter and a gifted trainer. His wisdom comes from being a student of the art of making placements. (A roboter thinks it’s science. A recliner thinks it’s luck.)
When I read Real Recruiting!, I was struck by how Steve’s approach follows the time-tested rudiments that awaken the intuition in the mind of a recruiter. (A roboter doesn’t need them and a recliner doesn’t use them.)
If intuition is the recruiter’s “how,” motivation is the recruiter’s “why.” For more on this subject,
- Go to www.placementlaw.com.
- Click the red JEFF’S ON CALL! button.
- Type Reprint of Why Biller Article in the Subject field.
- Click Send.
I’ll send you the “Why High Billers Are ‘Why’ Billers” article that originally appeared on the front page of the August 2011 issue of The Fordyce Letter. Since its publication, more copies have been requested and posted in offices worldwide (I’m told) than any other non-legal article I’ve ever written.
You can’t be a recliner. Those days are gone. But you can be a roboter. Just know that you’ll “make” the placements. You’re a recruiter.
So may you really recruit like never before!