artofrecruiting blog

Preparation Goes A Long Way When Executing Recruiting Cold Calls

Several weeks ago I delivered a webinar presentation entitled, “Advanced Introductory Calls to Passive Candidate Prospects – Making Every Call A Great Call.”   With roughly 200 or so recruiters on the call, it seemed only logical to start out the presentation by ascertaining the audience’s overall comfort level with respect to making cold calls.   I provided four options that program participants could respond to, as follows:

1)      I am highly comfortable making recruiting cold calls (I live, breathe, and eat this stuff!);

2)      I am fairly comfortable making recruiting cold calls (I’m effective at making cold calls but interested in seeing if there’s a better approach);

3)      I am fairly uncomfortable making recruiting cold calls (Making cold calls gives me the “Willies” – I’d like to get more comfortable);

4)      I am highly uncomfortable making recruiting cold calls (These types of call make me break out into a cold sweat).

In candor, I really had no idea of how the audience would respond, but the results were as follows:

1)      11% Responded: I am highly comfortable making recruiting cold calls;

2)      40% Responded: I am fairly comfortable making recruiting cold calls;

3)      33% Responded: I am fairly uncomfortable making recruiting cold calls;

4)      8%  Responded:  I am highly uncomfortable making recruiting cold calls;

5)      8% Provided No Response

In simple terms, 51%, or roughly half of the participants felt that they were good at, or at least comfortable with making cold calls.  Interestingly, however, another 41% were far less comfortable with making cold calls.  Why?  Well, there are lots of reasons why people feel uncomfortable with respect to making cold calls, including: Fear of Rejection, fear of the unknown, fear of seeming unknowledgeable, and finally a fear of intrusion or imposition.   In my experience, the best way to conquer a fear is to recognize it, embrace it, and to devise a rational approach to overcoming it.  With respect to overcoming a fear of making recruiting cold calls, the most important antidote is proper preparation. 

From my vantage point, proper preparation is much more than having a written script to use when making calls (and frankly while I see great value in drafting call scripts, I certainly don’t advocate reading from a piece of paper, as there's nothing worse than sounding “canned”).

Proper preparation starts with being able to articulate your firm’s compelling story (or that of your client firm, if you are a 3^rd party recruiter).  It may seem terribly simplistic, but over the years I’ve been amazed by the number of recruiters, and hiring managers for that matter, who are not especially adept at crafting and utilizing recruiting selling messages that will resonate with prospective candidates.  After all, as recruiters we would ideally like to secure what I call the “WOW” response from candidates, as in “WOW!  Your company has a great story!”

The second aspect of proper preparation ties into the exact words, phraseology, and speaking pace that you use when making recruiting cold calls.  I’m a huge proponent of Unfocused Cold Calls, as opposed to Focused Cold Calls, because I’ve found that it’s far more effective to orient the call around discussing a prospect’s career first and our opportunity second. While there’s not enough space here to adequately address the many distinctions between these calling formats, trust me, Unfocused Cold Calls work.

The third component that ties into proper preparation is knowing exactly how to respond to the candidate prospect regardless of whether the individual is interested in hearing about a potential new situation or not.  This is the part of the call where you have to be able to think on your feet and come across as a genuine, engaging, and “no pressure” recruiter.  Too often, it seems that recruiters measure whether or not a cold call has been effective based entirely upon whether or not the call yields an immediate candidate for a given opportunity, when the real measure should be whether the call ultimately resulted in the creation of an actionable business relationship that can be appropriately leveraged over time.

While there is no magic elixir that will make everyone comfortable when executing cold calls, there’s also no substitute for solid preparation.  Knowing who you are calling, what you want to say, how you want to say it, and having a clear appreciation for the specifics associated with a particular position or opportunity that you may be interested in sharing with a prospective candidate collectively reflect on your expertise and ability as a recruiting professional.

The Candidate Experience & Fine Dining - Service In Recruiting Matters

Recently, I delivered a presentation to a group of recruiting professionals that addressed how an organization's employment brand is directly impacted by the positive and/or negative experiences of individual candidates in consideration for existing openings.  The underlying premise of the presentation was that the manner in which a job applicant is engaged throughout the recruiting process has significant bearing on a candidate's perceptions about an organization's values, culture, and people.

In kicking off the presentation, I decided to do a quick social experiment by asking everyone in the audience whether or not they could identify the single finest dining experience that they had ever enjoyed.  As I began to poll audience members, I was struck by the fact that everyone could identify one particular dining encounter that was truly exceptional and that stood out among all of the others.  One individual cited an incredible meal at a restaurant in Orlando - a meal that she had over seven years ago.   Another individual highlighted a D.C. based restaurant that was consistently superior (and regrettably, was no longer in business).  A third individual became sentimental about a small bistro in Italy's Dolomite region.  As these dining experiences were briefly recounted, you could see other participants nodding in acknowledgement.  In short, everyone was able to think of a specific time, place, and experience that approximated dining excellence in every respect.

As the dialogue progressed, it became apparent that the common denominator that made each dining experience outstanding was directly tied to the quality of the service that each individual had received.  While fine dining is synonymous with great food, great service was unquestionably the critical factor that made the total dining experience unlike any other.

As recruiters we are ultimately afforded the opportunity to create a highly memorable experience for the candidates that we navigate through our hiring process (or client's hiring process).  As recruiters we have the capacity to directly engage candidates in a manner that embodies great service.  This, of course, doesn't mean that every candidate will end up getting a job.  But, by providing candidates with candid feedback, by managing expectations, and by responding to candidate inquiries or requests for status updates in a timely manner, we not only are provided with an opportunity to distinguish ourselves as being highly professional, but are also more likely to mitigate the potential for hard feelings or a negative experience - especially if a candidate doesn't end up getting an offer of employment.

It may sound simplistic, but if we can take steps that result in candidates feeling that they have been well treated throughout all phases of the recruitment process, there will be a favorable impact on our employment brand.  And, while we may not be able to leave candidates feeling quite the same way that they would upon departing a fine restaurant that provided a superior meal, we can leave them feeling that they were respected, treated with integrity, and well served by working with us.

If you would like to view a short video that highlights some of the concepts inherent to providing quality service (from a recruiting standpoint), check out "Protecting Your Employment Brand From Social Media Backlash," available here on the artofrecruiting.com website.  Alternatively, you can access the program via YouTube, by clicking here.

Wishing you ongoing recruiting success!

Paul

Recruiting & Unvarnished - A Lawsuit In The Making??

While watching the evening news recently, I learned about a fascinating new website that will likely impact recruiters and the candidates they engage.  The website is called Unvarnished (http://www.getunvarnished.com/).  

According to the "About Us" page, "Unvarnished is an online resource for building, managing, and researching professional reputation, using community-contributed, professional reviews. Unvarnished reviews help you get the inside scoop on other business professionals, providing candid assessments of coworkers, potential hires, business partners, and more." 

Essentially, Unvarnished is a place where you can provide ratings on peers, superiors, subordinates, etc.  What's interesting, of course, is that these ratings remain anonymous to anyone viewing them.  To create a rating, you do need to register for Unvarnished via Facebook, which means that any rating that is published can be traced back to the author.  This begs a really interesting question: How long will it take before someone files a suit against Unvarnished because they feel that a reviewers comments are libelous? 

Of additional interest will be how the courts evaluate the applicability of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 as relates to reviews that are posted on Unvarnished.  Section 230 of this law stipulates that the courts can't entertain claims that would place a computer service provider in a publisher's role, which means that if Unvarnished is deemed to be a distributor of negative posts, and not a publisher (i.e.: creator) - little can be done.

And, of course, we can only wonder how this service might be used or viewed by recruiters.  If a recruiter finds a negative review or even a mediocre review of a prospective candidate or active candidate, what impact will this have?  How long will it take for one individual to potentially "trash" a current or former colleague?  Lots of questions, but we will have to wait to learn the answers.  One thing for certain is that with the advent of Unvarnished, we see yet another illustration of how the internet continues to shape and impact the world of recruiting.

Protecting Your Employment Brand From Social Media Backlash

As social media channels gain traction, individuals will continue to cultivate a greater degree of comfort in expressing their views and experiences online regarding everything - including recruiters and employers. 

In fact, you don't need to look very hard on the internet to find candidates regularly venting about their "not-so-positive" experiences in working with recruiters, or their efforts to navigate through an organization's recruitment process.

There are several key things that recruiters need to do in order to protect the employment brand of the organizations they represent, as well as protect their individual brand or reputation. 

To this end, I encourage you to check out the presentation that I just produced, entitled, "Protecting Your Employment Brand From Social Media Backlash."  Click to access this 15 minute training program for free, or upon the icon at the top of this thread.

I hope that you enjoy the program, and get some worthwhile takeaways.

Wishing you ongoing recruiting success! 

Paul

Recruiting, Recruiting, Recruiting & Blogging...

Well - it had to happen at some point, right?  Over the recent past I've debated the wisdom of firing up a blog.  My primary concern has been whether or not I can allocate the time to creating what will hopefully be both timely and relevant posts.  As the saying goes, however, "nothing ventured, nothing gained."

Hopefully, the posts that appear here periodically are both relevant and interesting (on some level) to anyone working as a recruiter or within the talent acquisition landscape - believe me, that will be the goal. 

Also, I hope to provide posts that also focus on recruitment training, and more specifically on proactive recruiting best practices.  To this end, if you see something that you like - let me know.  If you see something with which you disagree - let me know that, as well.  Regardless, I look forward to the dialogue. 

Wishing you ongoing recruiting success - Paul.