Happy New Year : Peace and Prosperity

Not my intention to go all religious, spiritual or zen on you (this is a recruitment/HR blog after all!)…

….but yesterday I visited the Tian Tan (Giant) Buddha in Hong Kong. I climbed the 268 steps and looked out over the peak and monastery. The Buddha’s setting had been chosen to symbolise the relationship between man and nature. It was a very peaceful moment, and a great experience. Reading the various inscriptions of wisdom and teachings, I focused on

Peace and Prosperity

and decided that, although I’m on holiday, I wanted to share a New Year message.

Now I appreciate the words ‘peace and prosperity’ have been discussed, appropriated and mis-appropriated by many people and groups over the years, however I think that the true, intended meaning, the spiritual meaning is as important as ever in these troubled times.

I know that 2009 has been a difficult year for so many. I have been following end of year blogs and messages from a whole host of people and it is plain that some of them have had a hard, challenging, stressful year for a variety of personal and professional reasons. Many have undertaken difficult journeys and transitions, and others have found themselves facing challenges that they may never have imagined a year ago.

Certainly a lot of people have suffered this year, and despite the sounds of optimism emanating from so many business commentators, I think most of us know that 2010 may well prove to be just as testing and challenging.

But reading those blogs and messages you also get a strong sense of enthusiasm and energy, of hope and determination…of motivated individuals really looking to act and take charge of their own destinies, looking to create activity and opportunities, not feeling sorry for themselves but feeling determined to make something for themselves.

So whatever kind of year you’ve had I wish all of you Peace and Prosperity in 2010.

Peace with those around you and with yourself, your hopes and dreams…your actions, efforts and achievements.

And the Prosperity and satisfaction that comes from knowing you’ve taken control, done everything you can, taken advantage of chances that have come your way and have achieved as much as you could have hoped for.

A Happy, Healthy and Lucky New Year to you all…

…see you in 2010

Power of Social Media : Collectivism, Individualism or another ism

We’re all allowed to change our minds, right? One of the exciting things about Social Media is its instantaneousness. And if you’re using Twitter, it’s brevity. 140 characters don’t really give you the space to evolve a theory, put forward an argument. You act, you react, and you shoot from the hip and type. You hit ‘send’ and think ‘did I say what I meant to say?’

I say this because I’ve changed my mind over something. On Sunday night in the UK a lot of us got excited about the race to be Number 1 in the Top 40 music charts. I say ‘music’ because it used to be the singles chart. But it isn’t anymore. A lot of music is now downloaded, not bought over the counter, and last year this led to the chart compilers deciding that tracks did not have to be released as physical singles to feature in the chart. If they could be purchased as a download then they could be counted.

This isn’t a post about music though; it’s about Social Media and the potential that it has to change things.

My immediate thought on hearing the news was ‘YES’!! The marketing might of the Cowell machine has spent its millions but had just been outsmarted by a Facebook campaign started by a part time DJ and his wife who wanted to challenge the omnipotence of the mediocrity that X Factor represents.

I immediately tweeted that this was a big moment for Social Media, that the big issue wasn’t who won but that a social media campaign, starting with 2 people and spreading to 700,000, made a big statement to big business. I noticed other tweets saying much the same, and Bill Boorman summarised it very well in his blog.

And yet…and yet…thinking it through yesterday morning I began to question, to see lost possibilities.

Fed up with seeing the Xmas Number 1 (in the great cultural scheme of things a fairly irrelevant accolade) effectively chosen for us by 1 individual, we have slapped him down and really shown him who controls the marketplace by ensuring that this year’s Number 1…has been chosen for us by 1 individual. Plus ca change??

Now I’m not knocking Jon Morter at all, am fully supportive of his motivations, and I can understand why he would choose a song with such a strong anti-corporate message for this purpose, but I ask you…our response to people buying any old mush that Cowell releases is to rush out and buy a download of a 17 year old track that a Facebook Group tells us to. Is this just another form of naive collectivism…following the herd for the end not the means?

To me Social Media offers unlimited possibilities for individualism. If we really want a revolution then shouldn’t we just go out and do it, find like minded people and make things happen, rather than just find others doing it and tag along?

Oh the sweet victory if those 700,000 could have found a talented, unknown musician fully deserving of a wider audience and propel them to Number 1! Over 500,000 downloads selling because people use the power Social Media to spread music that wouldn’t otherwise be heard would be a real coup.

Maybe we should be running a Social Media X Factor…let up and coming musicians circulate their work within a chart acceptable download environment. Lets face it, 700,000 Facebook members bought 500,000 downloads whilst 20 million TV viewers only bought 450,000. Doesn’t that show the passion and power that should be tapped in to?

I’m hoping that the ‘power’ of Social Media doesn’t just become a channel for evangelical causes created by people with time on their hands for others to follow. Maybe I’m being too much of an idealist, but my question is:

What should the Power of Social Media be about?? Collectivism or Individualism. How do we get a mixture of the two?

It would be great to get your thoughts!

Optimistic recruiters don’t create jobs. Growing companies do.

Ask a jobseeker what they want from their recruiter and the chances are they will say, in one way or another, truth and honesty. Obviously they want us to find them a job, but – surprise, surprise – they know that there aren’t many around. In fact I sometimes think that jobseekers are a lot savvier about the market than many recruiters.

I’ve been following some discussions through LinkedIn and Twitter recently and I see little fact or detail but a lot of optimism and confidence. One thread, involving a mix of recruiters, trainers and online recruitment was summed up with this particularly depressing comment:

‘Jobseekers can return from a well-earned festive break to a veritable alpine snowfall of newly-budgeted vacancies’

Just think about that comment for a moment…hidden within the word ‘jobseekers’ are 2.5 million unemployed people, almost a million of them aged under 25, some still struggling to find their first job. Are we, recruiters, really telling them that a Christmas facing the desperation, desolation and uncertainty of continuing unemployment is a ‘well earned festive break’? And even if we don’t say it, do we really believe it?

Are we really saying that in January they will face ‘a veritable snowfall of vacancies’??

Is this what recruiters honestly believe?

With only 10% of companies planning to hire in the next 3 months (which means that 90% are NOT planning to hire)

With 50% of companies maintaining wage freezes/cuts (meaning they can’t really recruit until they can return their existing staff to full pay and benefits)

With 42% of companies who are not operating a recruitment freeze already saying that will REDUCE recruitment in 2010.

With GDP in excess of -5%, and a public debt of almost £200bn??

Is this Honest? Is it Responsible?

Recruiters don’t create jobs. Growing companies do. And companies grow when there is demand for their goods or services.

We are a long way from growth. Recent reports from leading businesses in retail and leisure talk about demand not returning in any strength until 2012, hence a stagnant job market.

We can all talk up a good quarter. Spread some confidence to colleagues.

We’ve just closed our biggest quarter for 2 years, and we’re certainly working on a lot more roles on than we did 9 or 12 months ago. But then I also spend a large part of my days speaking to unemployed candidates.

It’s when unfounded, casual optimism is passed on to candidates that I get upset. The job market is a particularly tough, unforgiving battleground at the moment, and NO recruiter should forget what that means to candidates who need to work, to feed families, pay mortgages, restore dignity.

I spoke with one candidate yesterday who said ‘when I speak to you I know you’ll tell it to me straight. I know it’s bad out there, but some recruiters just keep telling me that things will be picking up very soon. They’ve been saying that all year and it hasn’t happened yet! Do they think I’m stupid? What planet are they on??!!’

What we say to candidates during their job search is as much a part of candidate care as how we treat them when they apply…if your business model has to rely upon an unfettered wave of optimism, then make it responsible optimism!

(Note: Figures quoted above are taken from the recent CBI/Harvey Nash employment trends survey 2009 see page 15)

Candidate Care – do you value your currency??

Candidates are the currency of any good recruiter. We get paid by a client when we deliver a great candidate, and let’s not forget that today’s candidates become tomorrow’s clients.

We need clients, yes, but then clients can also brief any number of recruiters…it’s the recruiters with the best candidates, the strongest community, who will ultimately deliver.

Yet most candidates you speak to have a common complaint…no feedback, I blogged about it here and it is something that arises every day, whenever I speak to a candidate about how they are finding the job market.

I was at a family party this weekend and spoke to a relative – he’s 25 and finding the job market tough at the moment. I asked what his biggest problem was and he said:

‘I never hear anything. I check the job ads online, look on agency websites, I see jobs that look right for me and I send my CV with a note, trying to show how my experience relates to what they say they are looking for. And I hear nothing.

You’re in recruitment…why do they do it? All I want is a call, e-mail even, just to let me know that they’ve got my CV and that I’m not right for the role. It would also be great if they could just tell me why I wasn’t right for the role’

It’s embarrassing. I don’t know why recruiters do it, why their managers and directors incentivise them in such a way that they see no value in taking care of their currency…of the people who will ultimately deliver their fees, and who will be their next clients.

Where I work we took steps many months ago to make sure that this didn’t happen. We’re a values based business and we value our candidates – the people who will be our ambassadors in the market, who will deliver future fees, both as candidates and clients.

We put our money where our mouth is…we set up a Candidate Care Team. That’s right recruiters, a team without targets, metrics, KPIs, sales…a team whose raison d’être is purely to ensure that EVERY candidate who contacts us gets a personal, informed, consultative service, that makes them feel VALUED.

It’s quite simple really…every single candidate who applies for a role gets a call, either from a consultant or the Candidate Care Team. That team can easily pass a CV straight back to the consultants and say ‘this person’s great, you need to see them’. We’ve been going a month and we’ve already placed candidates who the CCT team have picked up on…candidates who we could easily have overlooked without them.

Candidates who we know our competitors are not even bothering to call!

What they are doing is helping to build our community…making sure that candidates know we care, and we can deliver.

And it works! So is anyone else going to do it?? I can see the head scratching now…a team of people who aren’t targeted to produce fees, but who do! You can’t measure them…a lot of their time is spent on calls that may help develop relationships but from which there is no immediate ROI.

Who’s up for this challenge??

Are there any recruitment companies out there willing to create a team, in a recession, to talk to candidates who they can’t immediately place?

Willing to invest in their future?

Recruiters need to get smart to win the Generation Game

There’s been a lot of debate recently about the future recruitment landscape, and how current events and technological advances will transform the way companies recruit. I took part in at least 2 separate discussions about this at London Unconference.

Certainly we 3^rd party recruiters have many challenges ahead, and one the biggest, I believe, will come from the generational shift in decision makers from Baby Boomers to Generation X.

Over the last 20 years or so agencies have mainly been briefed by Baby Boomers. They’re the generation that have been the key decision makers, and in the main they like external recruiters. We have been their friends; helped them to build careers, kept them in mind for the big jobs, also helped them to build their teams. They have trusted us with exclusives and retainers, and we have entertained them…lunches, networking drinks, sporting events. We have been their eyes and ears in the market and they have valued this, putting little pressure on the traditional recruitment sales model and fee structure.

Inevitably, the decision-making baton is being passed on and nowadays we are more likely to be briefed by Gen X. They are stepping in to key roles as hirers and decision makers. And there’s a difference…I’m not sure they see 3^rd parties the same way.

Whilst I do subscribe to the view that Generational classifications can often be no more than a state of mind, I do think that with Gen X there are certain effects of cultural, social and economic changes that define their experiences. In career terms they certainly seem to have things a bit tougher…largely entering the job market in (or at the end of) a major recession they now find that at just the time they should be making the big career step up the ladder…there’s another recession.

They have also built their careers during the rise of a different recruitment ethos. Whereas the Baby Boomers were comfortable in the knowledge that they had a trusting business relationship with recruiters, Gen X have rarely had the same luxury. During the growth years they have found a lot of recruiters to be focusing on the deal not the detail, instead of building deep relationships they have been more concerned with speed, CV, size of fee, and swiftly moving on to the next deal. There has been no continuity, no engagement, little post-placement care, and when Gen X have started briefing 3^rd parties, they have too often received just a CV shifting service, with no proper matching, value add or consulting.

Any wonder they’ve gone for multiple briefings, with reduced fees and a winner takes all approach?

And any wonder that if you ask them about their resourcing plans for the future they talk about direct resourcing and reducing agency spend?

They usually ‘get’ social media, are big users of LinkedIn and Facebook (with a growing awareness of Twitter) and can see the business benefit of going down this route.

It will be a long haul to win them back, and I’m not sure that they will ever see us the way that Baby Boomers did…the challenge won’t be to turn the clock back, but to work with them collaboratively to map out the future.

On Talent Street the 3^rd parties used to lay the paving stones, and often also had a hand in filling the cracks too…moving forward, could we just be filling in the cracks?

Recruitment Agencies : the Jedward of the business world??

Spontaneous blog time…

Jedward – young guys brimming with confidence.

They can’t sing, rap or dance very well, but they muddle through using a mixture of exuberance, tenacity and confidence and because they’ve got a manager constantly telling them that they’re the best and they can do it.

‘The Judges‘ don’t like them but recognize that the general public have an affinity with them so they tolerate them.

As soon as the general public lose the affinity, ‘The Judges‘ get rid of them.

Now replace the word ‘Jedward’ with ‘Recruitment Agencies’…

…and ‘The Judges’ with ‘Businesses’ and what have you got…???

Any ideas….???!!!

(note for non UK readers – Jedward are an act that were voted off of last night’s X Factor (the original American Idol) … no-one could understand how they kept in the competition right until the last 6, but they did!)

Do Recruiters really get Social Media??

I had a great time at the Recruiting Unconference (trulondon) last Thursday…lots of interesting and thought-provoking debate and information. Over the next few blog posts I am going to write about some things that have had me thinking.

A key track for me was the one on Social Media…I have certainly tried to embrace LinkedIn, Twitter, Blogging over the last year or so and talk passionately to candidates about the need for them to get connected and get in the conversation. I was keen to learn more…

Track host Matt Alder started by asking each group member what social media they used and why…and four things immediately stood out for me:

Hardly any recruiters seemed to use any Social Media other than LinkedIn

Those that use LinkedIn seem to regard it as a database, a source of names to headhunt, and a medium to advertise jobs

Most recruitment companies seem to regard a consultant’s LinkedIn connections as owned by the company not the consultant

The only interest in Twitter seemed to be as a medium to advertise jobs

Clearly there are a lot of recruiters in the UK who haven’t yet got Social Media. There was little talk of developing networks or communities, of engaging candidates and clients in groups. It seemed depressingly familiar, just another medium for finding names to headhunt and for advertising roles. I’m not saying that there aren’t recruiters who provide a service doing just that, but why do we have this amazing new medium which opens up all sorts of possibilities, can really transform the way we work and interact, enables us to deliver some real value for candidates and clients…and then just try and find ways of using it to do the same old, same old…

I’m going to share some of my thoughts about LinkedIn here…Twitter will get its own post, hopefully soon!

On the question of ownership, I firmly believe that my contacts are mine…and I say that having been employee and employer within the industry. I appreciate that I have made contact with people whilst in employment, but it is how I have worked and interacted with that network that has provided fees and therefore revenue for the business. I know that there was a court case involving Hays last year which they won, but I believe in that case that the employee in question was sending invitations to clients that he hadn’t met or worked with, whilst at the same time setting up in competition. Sorry, but that’s unethical. Also when it was heard, use of Social Media as a business tool was still fairly embryonic.

I have met virtually all my contacts; those that I haven’t met I do have a working relationship with, and would have spoken to them at length on the phone (or social media). I have never invited (nor accepted an invitation from) anyone that I have not had interaction with. I can share information with them through status updates, and will call or send messages on a regular basis especially acknowledging when they have a relevant change to their status. Used properly it provides a great platform from which to start building a network/community (Twitter can help further develop this)

My LI network has delivered fees, not just for me but also for colleagues…and I am transparent with the network, giving them visibility of my Twitter feed, and this blog, on my LinkedIn profile.

Someone on the track, who owned a small IT recruitment business, legitimately raised the fear that a consultant leaving and taking his LI connections was taking business away…and Paul Harrison (Carve Consulting) who co-hosted the track made a great point when he said that the company may lose someone’s contacts, but then they would hire in someone who would bring with them a whole new set of contacts.

My personal view is that the attempt to protect is old, sales led recruitment thinking and does not take into account the possibilities opened up by social media. Recruiters, in future, will be hired because of their network…not just who they know, but how they engage with the network, what information and knowledge they build, what business opportunities the network offers. There’s an onus on the recruiter to behave ethically and professionally if they want flexibility and trust from their employers…certainly not adding connections that are not technically part of their network, and with whom they have had no personal interaction, particularly if their intentions are to leave soon.

I did make the point on Thursday that in my opinion recruiters probably would not join a business that made them leave their contacts when they left…I certainly wouldn’t sign a contract that effectively said ‘we want you for your contacts, and when it’s time for you to leave, we’ll keep the contacts, thanks’

Social Media policy will soon be an extremely important criteria for candidates to consider when assessing a company (actually, why isn’t it now?)… and a legitimate question for the interviewee to ask. In fact as recruiters I think we should be finding out what the policy is when we take a brief.

I can certainly see a time soon when businesses will be rejected if their policies are not forward thinking, encouraging, empowering and trusting.

No transferability, no feedback – candidates have feelings too…

We have just completed some research to find out what candidates find most frustrating in the current jobs market.

300 candidates gave their views on a number of scenarios in the current job market, and indicated whether they were satisfied or frustrated. We also asked them to grade their frustration…

The headline results are that the following had the highest percentages of ‘very frustrated’ or ‘quite frustrated’…

The overall lack of relevant job opportunities for me 88%

The transferability of my skills into new sectors is being ignored 82%

The lack of feedback as to why my CV is rejected 74%

The lack of constructive explanation on why I’m not right for the job 73%

The very slow selection process 73%

There isn’t much that we in HR & recruiting can do about number 1 at present, but there is a lot we can do about the rest.

Why aren’t we looking at transferability of skills?? CIPD research recently showed that HR professionals believe that skills are transferable between sectors…so why isn’t it happening??

Why aren’t we telling candidates the reasons why their CVs aren’t right for the roles that they’ve applied for?? Why aren’t we offering simple, constructive advice??

Recently on our LinkedIn group a candidate told of a call she had made to a recruitment company. She had submitted her CV to the recruiter, who had sent her CV on to their client with a note saying that ‘they would let her know the outcome ASAP’. Two weeks later she hadn’t heard, assumed it was a ‘no’ so put a call in to the recruiter to try to gain some closure. She was told that the recruiter was no longer with the business, and that the role had been filled…she was then told…

“To be fair if we spent all day phoning people who were ‘no’, which we’d like to do because it’s the ‘experience’ as much as anything that counts, we simply would go bust”

Whatever business model it is that dictates that communication with the people that enable it, or could enable it, to make profits is not worthwhile, is a repugnant, failed model….

Surely all of us…recruiters (3^rd party and in-house), hiring managers and talent professionals have a duty to treat with dignity, respect and compassion the people who show an interest in working for our businesses and clients….

It’s your Employer Brand – be careful who you trust with it

Chatted with a recruitment manager yesterday…he had gone to set up an in-house function for a company which had a 100% reliance on 3^rd party agency recruitment. Within little over a year they were doing 40% direct hires. He told me how he set about it, most of it would be pretty familiar to in house recruiters, then he said…

we needed to really develop the employer brand, but you can’t have a great employer brand unless you give a great candidate experience, so we really looked at that and how we can create a great experience

Got me thinking… companies put in a lot of effort to create a great candidate experience, to enhance their employer brand, and then may brief 3 or 4 recruiters to fill a role…but how do you know that those recruiters will pass on the experience you’ve carefully created?

One thing I have found is that a candidate who applies to a company through a 3^rd party recruiter will link the service they receive from that recruiter to your brand. Happens all the time…we’ve all heard candidates say things like ‘not interested in that company, I applied for a role there last year through an agency and got really mucked about/never got any feedback/went for interview and never heard another thing/never got a reply to my application/left loads of messages but heard nothing….’

Now you may have done your part, but how do you know the recruiters have done theirs?? When you select your recruitment partners what criteria do you use?? Cost? Speed of response? Reputation? Size of database? Recommendation?

Do you visit your recruitment suppliers, see their offices, meet their consultants and see how they work? How they are structured and rewarded? Will they just focus on closing a deal, or will they make sure that everyone applying for a job in YOUR company gets a really positive experience and impression of YOUR company?

How do you know that an under pressure recruiter, inundated with responses, waiting for feedback, isn’t going to use a throwaway comment to a candidate which can give a really poor impression of his client…which is you.

You may outsource to an RPO…but how often does an RPO get judged on candidate experience? Cost per hire…yes! Time to hire…yes! Routes to market…yes! ATS…yes! Promotion of employer brand…???

It’s your brand…be careful who you trust with it

Getting the best out of your people – It’s a Question Of Trust

When I wrote last week about looking at a different way of rewarding recruiters so that they focused energies not just on the deal but on developing deeper, collaborative relationships with clients, and on building and engaging with their candidate community – almost certainly 2 key objectives of the future recruiter (hey, did I miss a rhyming alternative blog name there??!) – I didn’t expect everyone to agree.

I got some encouraging comments on the blog, and by tweet and e-mail, and I did get the ‘so does that mean if candidates like you but you don’t bill any fees then you still get a bonus’ objection.

My reply to this was that if a consultant was delivering to their clients and candidates what they really wanted, then they would be billing…it was all a question of trusting your consultants.

Move forward to the weekend and I was involved in 2 particular conversations on twitter that bought home to me the question of trust.

Firstly a quite detailed debate (due to run and run) about Social Media strategy…who, if anyone, owns it, who controls it, and what policies/guidelines should companies create for its employees.

Now this topic has already been written about on many blogs, and debated at many conferences and unconferences, and will continue to be debated, and there is a great summary of the conversation on the unblog for the London Recruitment Unconference…there you will see me say “management need clear vision on SM for their business & then have to trust employees to be professional”

Some of you may follow Gareth Jones (@garelaos) on Twitter…he’s the director I report to and he has given me complete freedom over how I build my professional social media profile. He’s encouraged me to blog, and is happy that my blog and twitter feed are visible to all candidates and clients through my LinkedIn profile. I’ve offered him the chance to read my posts in advance…to approve or censor them if he wants…but he said no…just post it and get in the conversation. Clearly he trusts me…

The second conversation was about Power Naps, and how Power Naps Rule! Karla Porter sums it all up here in a great post, and it got me thinking…how many companies have a quiet room, or put aside space where employees could take a short Power Nap to keep them fresh for the rest of the day? How many businesses would TRUST their employees enough? It’s helped Presidents and Prime Ministers rule our countries, but would management allow it for their workforce?

It’s all a question of TRUST…if you want to get the best out of your people, trust them. Whether you’re looking for sales, trying to build a social media profile, or looking to get maximum performance…loosen the rules, guidelines, structures and KPIs…and trust your best people.

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