Introduction To Recruiting

Over on The Recruiting Animal Blog, Michael Kelemen has an interesting post as an Introduction To Recruiting. Mr. Kelemen was asked for the basics of the recruiting business, and he does a credible, but limited, job of it. I realized that what Kelemen should address is the basics of the recruiting Profession.

In the early days of the Colorado Technical Recruiters Network, we had many discussions about recruiting as a profession. Some of what Kelemen missed were items that we CTRN founding members hashed out over many adult beverages. Here’s my take on recruiting as a profession:

There are three aspects to recruiting:
1. First Party or Corporate Recruiting – you hire employees to your own payroll, they work under your managers. Most contract recruiters are working in this role.
2. Second Party or Staff Augmentation – you hire to your own payroll, employees work under client management. Also called labor vendors, labor brokers or contract services. Most temp agencies use this model.
3. Third Party or Headhunting (a.k.a. Executive Search) – clients hire your candidates for their own payroll.

There are four kinds of Headhunting firms:
1. Contingency – paid when the client hires (I did this)
2. Retained Search – Paid a flat rate to find one or two of the best candidates.
3. Hybrid – I’ve heard these firms called fee plus, “retigency” and combination fee. Creative recruiters and sales reps can work many kinds of deals. One typical arrangement is an up-front retainer, plus a per hire bonus.
4. Source only – a newer model where the client pays a flat fee to receive a limited number of pre-qualified candidates. The client contacts the candidates and moves on from there.

Referring to contingency headhunting firms, The Recruiting Animal says:

If you work for a firm it works a lot like the real estate business. The firm takes half of the fee. The person who brought in the order takes 25% and the person who supplied the candidate takes 25%.

My experience is that different firms have different business models. The percentages vary between the house and the staff, and between the person owning the candidate and owning the order. The firm I worked for took more, for “overhead”. Obviously, it is better to fill your own orders.

So – thanks to Mr. Keleman for a great start to the conversation. He’s given me ideas for a few more monographs.

Tip: Maximize How You Use LinkedIn

Mike O’Neil gave a great talk on LinkedIn at the North CTRN meeting on Wednesday. O’Neil owns Integrated Alliances, a networking company, so providing LinkedIn training fits into his mission. He shared a few good points as a teaser. Mike said he’d try to schedule a class on the north side, and invite CTRN.

Some of the points he made were things I have already done, like changing my public profile URL from a string of digits to my name. He made a pitch for using “words that sell” in our profiles. (He used his as an example, see it at http://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeoneil). He also mentioned that LI has a lifetime maximum of 3000 invitations. I learned some useful tricks about their search engine, which will help with finding people. He also gave examples of the importance of upgrading the text when submitting invitations. We also discussed the ethics and etiquette of linking.

It was a great teaser. Check out Mike’s Training Page for details on his next class.

UPDATE 26 June: See Guy Kawasaki’s “Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn” suggestions. Actually, as he usually does, Guy gives you more. He has eleven ways.

How Not to Get A Job: Skip a Career Fair

A Career Fair is an ancient and honorable way to find a job. If you want to increase your chances of finding work, go to a Fair.

One service I intend to provide with this blog is an up-to-date list of Colorado Career Fairs. See my calendar in the lower part of the right-hand column. Any assistance, corrections or changes can be sent to notjobs -AT- bettingers.org.

Did you know that Career Fairs pre-date HR departments? In fact, after networking, the Career Fair (a.k.a. Job Fair, Hiring Fair or Employment Fair) is the oldest form of recruitment activity. Job Fairs started in the late Middle Ages as events called “Mop Fairs”. After the the Black Death ravaged Europe, the manor system suffered from a severe labor shortage. Employers needing to find workers would attend a Mop Fair held in the market town in their area. Some towns have been holding Mop Fairs for over 700 years.

Workers looking for a position would gather around the village green or market square. Since the mostly illiterate population had no way of printing a resume (this was also pre-Gutenberg), candidates would carry an item indicating their trade, or wear an item in their hat. A shepherd had wool, a cook had a spoon, a gardener had flowers, and a carter had a leather whip. The unskilled would carry a mop, indicating their willingness to clean up. The number of unskilled laborers gave the fairs their name.

Hiring was simple: Employers (often a steward, butler or chamberlain) walked around the square, looking for a particular sign in the hands of a likely candidate. The two would talk about the work and the benefits (generally, meals and housing, but stout castle walls could provide added life insurance and job security). After coming to an agreement, the employer gave the worker a few pence to seal the deal (a hiring bonus). The candidate would hide the sign of his or her job and don a bunch of colored ribbons to show they were off the market. Vendors of food and drink lined the edge of the square, ready to provide sustenance to the newly employed.

Today, some English villages still have a Mop Fair, but the emphasis is on rides, food and drink and not on employment. But the idea that candidate and company can gather together in one place is still working. Now, just as in 1351, if you want to find work you should go to the Fair.

For more, see: Wikipedia on Mop Fairs

How Not to Get A Job: Top 10 Ways to Blow Getting the Job

At the “Confessions of an Executive Restaurant Recruiter” blog, Carl Chapman has a great post on the Top 10 Ways to Blow Getting the Job. Carl explains his philosophy for the series:

I chose the title because I think it is easier to tell people how to not blow getting the job by avoiding some easily avoidable mistakes than it is to tell them how to get the job, since there may be thousands of things that contribute to the success of the total job seeking effort.

I agree entirely!

Go check out his list.

I’ve been speaking on the topic of “How Not To Get A Job” since 1994, in 45, 60 and 75 minute sessions. Over the years, I’ve refined my list of the Top 10 Ways, which is what prompted me to start this blog. Here are my Top 10 Ways, arranged it in Letterman order:

10. Forget about competition
9. Misuse available resources
8. Run an out-of-focus job hunt
7. Conduct a passive search
6. Ignore opportunities for practical experience
5. Use stupid resume tricks
4. Sabotage your interview
3. Forget the basics
2. Do not set a goal
1. Adopt a failing attitude

Like Carl, I plan to start a series on How Not to Get a Job. I’ll address one topic per day. Stand by for details.

Faking Your Credentials, and Disparate Impact

James Taranto at the Wall Street Journal has a great article referencing the Marilee Jones flap at MIT that I covered in my post titled How Not to Get a Job: Fake Your Credentials. I don’t usually look to Taranto as an expert in HR issues like disparate impact, but he does present an interesting view while referencing Griggs v. Duke Power Co.

Check it out on the Taste page: “Disparate but Not Serious – College is an expensive way of taking an IQ test.”

Tip: How to Leave a Voice Mail Message

Yesterday involved a game of what recruiters dread most: voice mail tag. Here are my begging and pleading requests for all who must leave a voice mail message:

1. Speak slowly and clearly
2. Mention your full name (please, don’t say, “This is Jennifer”. I have resumes from dozens of Jennifers!)
3. Mention the title of the position you are calling about.
4. Speak clearly
5. Don’t assume that I’ll be able to get your number from caller ID
6. Repeat your phone number
7. Speak slowly
8. Indicate a good time to reach you
9. A short message is a good message
10. Speak clearly and slowly

Thank you. Thank you. Please, thank you!

Tip: Do You Have a Reference Document?

Over on the “Connecting the World One Beverage at A Time” blog, G. Lane Cavalier has great advice about creating a reference list in Do You Have a Reference Document?

I wish I could get a complete list like this when I ask for references. About one half of the times I ask, Mr. Candidate pulls out his cell phone and asks to borrow a pencil. Prepared is better.

How Not to Get a Job: Lazy, Uneducated, Careless Persons Wanted

An old one found in my e-mail, here’s an actual job posting from Craig’s List New York from 2005. I know how the poster feels:

Growing profitable respected tech company seeks people without any sort of completed college degree (and who misspell bachelors), to arrive in the office not at scheduled times but rather when they see fit and after arrival to proceed to do as little as humanly possible and never learn anything.

We’re not picky on the completion thing here so if we ask for a university graduate, and you once attended a class or might possibly plan to at some point in time, please go right ahead and apply. Our specific needs/wants and especially our time is worthless. Only you matter.

Further, we ask that you send a totally irrelevant generic cover letter (possibly including a title for a different job or often a different company’s name) that mentions you possess a very special talent and can speak the language of the country you were born and raised in before you came here and that utterly ignores the topic you were asked to address in the cover letter.

We’ve only worked day and night for 5 years building this company to the point we need additional help, positively no need for you to waste 4 minutes of your precious time actually expressing the slightest bit of effort/interest. (In prior ridiculous ads we mentioned we were an internet firm and asked you to include a sentence of how you use the internet, roughly 90% of you couldn’t be bothered, please accept our apologies).

If you’re late, by all means blame public transportation not your failure to take an earlier subway/bus. And while we’re on the topic of your coming here, also by all means don’t dare show the initiative to locate somewhere as obscure as Wall Street all on your own (as miraculously do the thousands of tourists who don’t speak a word of English and yet somehow find their own way here daily), but instead do call us and ask repeatedly which train comes here and when.

This is important, I know you’re bored already, sorry, but ignore our URL where it shows who we are, tells what we do, our street address, etc… The mention of it in prior ads was merely more silly fodder from our prior juvenile advertisements, instead email or call us for both the address and directions, then arrive late for the hassle of an interview and halfway through ask the name of the company and what it is we do anyhow.

We don’t need programmers at the moment, this ad is for office administrators and event managers, but even if you have never opened a single “For Dummies” book much less seen a programming textbook and keeping in mind that you couldn’t be expected to type a single line of the simplest code for a million dollars, by all means include as skills on your resume a list of every programming language you’ve ever heard of or which could possibly be found on Google.

Also, we know you’re busy either being unemployed or stealing a paycheck somewhere else while you job search, so ALL CAPS, no caps, no punctuation, and spelling errors are all fine and emphasize our pointless request for detail-oriented people. It has been our lack of concern and shoddy work that has gained us so many clients, we’re happy to have them think less of us because you can’t be bothered to run spellcheck for your cover letter (if you even bothered including one and aren’t part of the horde just sending resumes alone). We know spellcheck, or worse being expected to be able to spell on your own, is a drag and once you’re here emailing documents to clients you’re sure to do better.

For event managers, when we send you to events we want you to show up late, dressed sloppily, make endless personal mobile phone calls, lose/damage/forget our equipment, elbow our hosts’ clients out of the way when they announce meals, leave the live event for as many smoke breaks as you wish, and complain about the food/entertainment to other onsite colleagues or anyone who will listen. Treat each event as your own personal social event, make dates, exchange personal phone numbers and email addresses, maybe even go out late at night and get drunk with your new “contacts.” It will provide you with something to distract your colleagues with the next day when you and they should be, ugh, working.

We begin early in the morning on event days, which are often, but you should feel free to be late and tell us we never mentioned it. We also work late and pay substantial bonuses, but nevertheless are really only seeking to exploit you. We also give healthcare after 90 days if you didn’t find a better job in the meantime. The fools who do learn and work and contribute earn more money based on, gasp, merit. But then they’re the same ones who check their grammar and who can be bothered?

Because it could easily be a virus you should certainly include your resume as an attachment if that’s easier for you and you should certainly not bring one to the interview. We’ll search through the hundreds of emails, locate yours under your AOL account, (I forget was that “alwaysawildpartyanimal @ aol” or “ilovedrugs @ msn” ?) and then print two copies, what the heck we’ll print three so you can take one to your next interview, which you actually mentioned twice that you’re runnng late for so could I please hurry it up.

We know email is not as convenient for you as instant messaging and a lot more complex than a fax, so call and ask if you can do either of those if that’s better for you.

If you’re a recruiter or jobsite, by all means do not email but instead call to tell us of candidates who aren’t available now for this immediate hire position, nor in any manner qualified, but who might be considering moving to NYC or better yet, just spam us.

None of the above was imagined or created but rather are all accurate specific repeated examples of what we’ve received. This is an ad of frustration, we have a great, respected, and growing tech company and we need good smart dedicated people to work hard for long hours at events around the country or in the office supporting those client events. We pay well and have generous bonuses.

Tip: See the "Secrets of the Job Hunt" Blog

CM Russell has a great blog for job seekers called “Secrets of the Job Hunt“. This project ties into his book “Ultimate Job Hunting Secrets“. I not only suggest checking out the blog, but also checking out Russell’s web page.

Oh yeah – take his poll on Does Job Hunting Suck?

Monty Python on Interviewing

“Get out! Mister Librarian Phipps, seeing as you’re not a gorilla, but only dressed up as one trying to deceive us in order to further your career!”