itzBig Blog comments on an age-old conundrum in the relationship between candidates and recruiters: "Why don't you call me anymore?"
Most of us have been there before. You know you’re right for the job, you’ve done the prep work, you’ve communicated with the recruiter every step of the way, and you even hit it off with the hiring manager. Then, as though you’ve become contagious, no one wants anything to do with you anymore.
Understandably, this leaves many candidates feeling baffled. It also goes a long way in furthering the “Us vs. Them” attitude that many candidates take on their searches. They accept the belief that recruiters and hiring managers are simply out to get them.
What happens? The post goes on to explain that it can be due to changes in the hiring company; or that they're just not ready to hire; or, more likely, another candidate walked through the door who was a better fit; or hey, maybe they're just not that into you.
But these explanations all beg the obvious question: what about basic professional courtesy? In our conversations with working consultants who deal with staffing firms, we hear the complaint all too often: "They were really hot on me, then suddenly I heard nothing from them." Recruiters and headhunters often remind candidates that the recruiter is working for the client, not the candidate and attention therefore goes to the client's priorities. If a particular client is hot on a candidate to fill an open requirement, then so is the recruiter. If the client decides to go in a different direction, or wants to pursue a different candidate the recruiter moves on. After all, time is money and who has time to handhold everyone? Nothing personal, just business, right?
It may be business, but it's a dysfunctional way of doing business that assumes the candidate (aka the "talent") has no intrinsinc worth outside of the immediate context of this particular requirement, and can be discarded like an old shoe if things don't work out. Aside from being just bad manners, it's also bad business, as the post in itzBig underscores:
We believe that this situation can be rectified. Instead of taking on the “silent treatment,” it would be effective for both recruiter and candidate to look into the resons why the company went a different way. This enables a candidate to see where they might have been lacking in experience or skills and it gives them the chance to focus on those areas. It also keeps recruiters in touch with candidates that have at least garnered the interest of employers. One missed opportunity shouldn’t bring the candidate/recruiter relationship to a close.
New Equities developed its consultant-centric staffing model precisely because of our philosophical belief that the value we bring to our clients is our relationship with the best talent. Even outstanding candidates are not going to be a fit for every requirement or project, and people who may be rejected in one context may be ideal in another. Why end that relationship prematurely? And why treat a fellow professional like a disposable component that no longer fits and has therefore outlived its usefulmess, when it takes only a few minutes to give some feedback?
As we move from a buyer's market in talent during the first half of this decade into a seller's market for what may well be the next few decades, that talent will simply refuse to do business with companies who treat them as commodities. Their first loyalty will be to themselves and their own professional development, but that loyalty will extend to the people in their network who help them further their careers. Successful staffing firms will need to start according candidates the same priority and courtesy as they would hiring managers. True, the hiring manager may be the paying customer, but it is the consultant who is actually the "product" that is being paid for and thus cannot be taken for granted. As the Baby Boom retires and the pool of available talent shrinks, organizations who deal in providing access to talent, whether permanent or contract, will find that they ignore that reality at their own peril.
New Equities has organized itself around the concept of "Talent Communities", targeting the specific skill sets (e.g. project managers, Java developers, business analysts) and industry expertise (banking/insurance, manufactuing, retail) important to our clients in specific geographies. Each Talent Community has a dedicated manager called a "Consultant Agent" who builds and maintain relationships with the consultants in the community and the client managers who hire that talent.
Conducting business within the New Equities framework and philsophy means taking a proactive approach to finding good people, rather than the typically reactive approach of filling a req and moving on. It means keeping community members in the loop through phone calls, emails, newsletters, events, and blogs and online discussions. It means understanding what consultants want -- what kinds of projects they prefer, what skills they want to develop, what kind of work experience they are looking for -- and finding ways to help them advance their career goals. It means working hard on behalf of consultants already on projects, getting ahead of the curve to find the next assignment before the current one winds down.
In short, it means looking at the staffing business as a network of relationships rather than a series of transactions. It is definitely more time-consuming than the traditional approach, but it results in a better fit between each consultant's capabilities and work style and the needs of a particular client or project. Viewed in conventional business terms, this equation is a no-brainer: taking the time to get the product right yields greater customer satisfaction. Ironic that so many in the "people business" seem reluctant to invest the time in getting to know the people who make or break that business.
