As recruiting and staffing professionals, we all need to be detailed and diligent when interviewing our hiring managers to ensure we are prepared for both effective advertising and sourcing strategies. But what things do we really need to ask a hiring manager?
It all depends on what we currently know and don’t know about the position we are recruiting. List the things we do know about the position to make filling in the gaps much easier when discussing them with the hiring manager.
Let’s take a look at some topics that we may to discuss depending upon the current relationship we have with the hiring manager.
If we have not worked with a hiring manager in the past, then we will need to discuss all of the following with them.
Have a list of 3-5 competitors ready for the meeting, even if we aren’t sure those should be on the list or not. Sometimes a target company may just be a company that is local and not necessarily in the same industry.
*Note, oftentimes if a particular company has lower hiring standards and a hiring manager knows that already, it can save us from wasting time trying to present those candidates upfront.
Make sure the profiles you take offer a slight variety, to give you a hint of what the manager will bite on. Ask the hiring manager if they have 2-3 example profiles either from current employee resumes or someone who has left the company who had the right resume profile for you to compare your sourcing with.
Ask questions around the skill/educational requirements to identify where this hiring manager is flexible.
Oftentimes, a hiring manager has the name of at least one person in mind who they have either previously worked with, or know through others, or even know them as they are an internal candidate working in another group.
Recycle what is known and then add to it. If a hiring manager has had success with particular resources in the past, then don’t discount them as a “repeat resource.”
As staffing professionals, we need to ask the hiring manager for names of organizations and associations. We can definitely conduct our own research; however, there may be a particular group the hiring manager already knows. You need to get that information from them.
This will give you some understanding of the departmental culture to gauge the type of person who will “fit in” to this team.
As a recap, below is a list of things you should know after an initial hiring manager intake meeting:
As recruiters, we do not have the luxury of time to have gaps in our initial intake meeting with a hiring manager. Be organized and ready for both our advertising and sourcing efforts after the first meeting with the hiring manager. If we have an organized list of what we need ready for our meeting, we will save time in the long run being able to identify the right slate of candidates the first time around and fill the requisition more efficiently.