Just couldn’t help myself – I was so giddy after watching our tax dollars hard at work “interviewing” baseball players (imagine if candidates answered questions the way they were answered – or if we asked questions the way they were asked) that I tried to imagine the Peter Finch soliloquy as a recruiter…
I don’t have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It’s a talent-laden depression. There are heads of HR scared of losing their job because they can?t get a handle on recruiting costs. 25% buys five percent?s work nowadays, recruiting is being outsourced, hiring managers are doing their own thing and keep passwords to job boards in their desk drawers. Salesmen who couldn?t sell snow to Eskimos are running wild up and down Wall Street waving resumes at open windows and there’s no end to what they?ll do to sell a candidate. Some corporate recruiters say that only they know about their company?s business environment and that resumes from TPRs are inferior, and candidates sit back and check their inboxes while some Midwest-based outplacement guru tells us that today that the national unemployment rate has dropped one-tenth of a percent, as if that’s supposed to make everyone feel better. We know things are bad – worse than bad, they’re crazy. Every manager wants the needle in a haystack but don?t want to do what it takes to do it. It’s like everything everywhere is going crazy, so much so that it seems that no one cares about directly sourcing anymore. So many just sit by their computer, add boring posts to national job boards, check their ATS? several times each day, wait for candidates to click down eighteen levels to find the career page, and slowly, little by little, recruiting is becoming insignificant, being replaced in the HR chain of importance by 5500 reports, mutual fund education programs, and facilities planning initiatives, while all recruiters who truly care are left to say, “Please, at least let us directly source from our competitors without the need to hire a torts expert. Let me have my company directory and my list of supercharged Google hacks and I won’t say anything. Just leave us alone.” Well, I’m not gonna leave you alone. I want you to get mad! I don’t want you to just protest or leave another wah-wah post on ERE. I don’t want you to riot – I don’t want you to write the President of your SHRM chapter because I wouldn’t know what to tell you to write. I don’t know what to do about steroids in baseball and drilling in Alaska and the loss of Andy Sipowicz on Tuesday nights and Social Security solvency and oil prices and the crimes committed in Neverland. All I know is that first you’ve got to get mad. [shouting] You’ve got to say, ?I’m a RECRUITER, Goddamnit! My work has VALUE! I?m a CIB!? So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs, go into your wallets, take out the SHRM card, tear it up, and throw it into the trash. I want you to go to the window. Open it, stick your head out, and yell, [shouting] “I’M AS STRATEGIC AS HELL, AND I’M NOT GOING TO JUST USE JOB BOARDS ANYMORE!” I want all of you to get up out of your chairs, go into your wallets, take out the SHRM card, tear it up, and throw it into the trash. I want you get out of you cubicle, go to your windows, open them and stick your head out and yell – ‘I’m as strategic as hell and I’m not going to just use job boards anymore!’ Things have got to change. But first, you’ve gotta get strategic! You’ve got to say, ?I’m as strategic as hell, and I’m not going to just use job boards anymore!? Then we’ll figure out what to do about baseball and drilling and the depression and the inflation and the oil crisis. But first get up out of your chairs, open the window, stick your head out, and yell, and say it: [screaming at the top your lungs] “OK HR – I’M AS STRATEGIC AS HELL, AND I’M NOT GOING TO JUST USE JOB BOARDS ANYMORE!”
Things have been getting spicy on several ERE Groups. For instance, there’s been a wonderfully intelligent discussion in Carl Braun’s Diversity Recruiting group – one of my favorites as a lurker – where one can read (followed by my thoughts):
I don’t know of any recruiter who seeks to discriminate; perhaps but I don’t know many recruiters who’ll volunteer to their customer that their requirements are discriminatory and/or downright stupid.
Bottom line – diversity will work itself out naturally for most companies.; hmmm, imagine how long the Civil Rights movement would have taken if progress were left to natural selection?
Without a concentrated diversity recruiting effort the market effectively “conspired” against them through sheer numbers. I suppose a market forces model can be used to describe discrimination but it misses the sociological element.
I doubt a white woman would discriminate against you because you were white. No, but it might occur because many men are jerks and believe that women have no business in the Board room and have no compunction against saying this aloud.
Just because an institution is headed up by people of color, don’t ever assume they have folks of there own color best interests in mind. Same color does not always equate to same mentality. Some, certainly not all have reached an acme of socio-economic status and may not wish to rock the boat, because the man may be watching. Some of my best friends are Black, but not all of them are…sometimes I have to watch my BLACK… Wow, did this ever take my breath away!
Solving discrimination will never be done at the corporate level or within the workplace for that matter. It is a socio-economic and education issue that needs to be dealt with in elementary and high school, and in the community, and in the home. It is a parental issue. As with any problem, I think the focus should be on fixing the problem at the root, rather than the symptom. Workplace discrimination is the by product, if you want corporate America to make an impact on discrimination, ask them to donate money or support community initiatives that promote multiculturalism. Eureka! But we can still examine where barriers have been created within organizations because no diversity effort will be successful if barriers to personal and professional growth exist. No barrier is a good barrier.
Bravo to Carl and the group – this is great stuff that for many isn’t easy to discuss privately let alone in a public forum. This is just one of the strategic issues that is necessary to continue to mold recruiting and it’s especially challenging when so many others are concerned with the more tactical elements of our craft.
Which brings me to my point. I truly enjoyed reading Jeremy Eskenazi’s article on the marriage of HR and recruiting. In it he offered So that’s why I can’t decide if the relationship between recruiter and HR generalist is like husband and wife or brother and sister. Either way, it’s all in the same family, and as we know from Darwin and Tony Soprano, it’s all about “the survival of the family. I couldn’t help thinking the adage that incest is only relative – you know what this can bring. As far as the Mafia connection, I can?t help but think of bloody horses heads. I certainly don’t want to be a part of this! Personally, I believe we’re a different family.
Whereas HR is like a trip to the zoo – a place for everything, everything in its place – no entropy allowed, recruiting is more like a Galapagos expedition in search of Organizational Darwinism where recruiters are Organizational Anthropologists and Geneticists (I suppose this makes HR folks zookeepers). We go by the names Watson and Crick (perhaps Adler, Crispin, Sullivan, and Wheeler can fight over who plays Linus Pauling and Louis Leakey) and our plans, techniques, and tools are accountable for uncovering the triggering mechanisms that enable the organizational entropy that is required for ongoing growth and productivity. The HR programs are great but it is talent that drives everything. We need to intimately understand what the organization’s current DNA looks like in order to effectively search for new material that is to be combined into the new double helix.
Realistically, it isn’t easy being HR especially when they are rightly concerned about escalating benefit costs, SOX 404, violence in the workplace, executive compensation, and ongoing government intervention in – well, heck, everything. But with so many heads of HR still believing that cost-per-hire is the ultimate recruiting metric, it has become apparent that recruiters need to separate themselves from the family they were once comfortably part of and take a different approach.
I know HR wants to be a strategic business partner in business (every Conference Board survey for the past umpteen years says this); it’s time that recruiters show that they already are strategic business partners. Are you?
As far as tortuous interference of direct recruiting – well, the number of cases filed has little to do with the death notice of recruiting. Yes, Reeves v. Hanlon 95 P.3d 513 (2004) did result in the California Supreme Court ruling that an employer – a law firm (surprise!) – whose workers were solicited away by a former employee can, in some cases, sue the former employee for associated damages, including the costs of recruiting replacements.
The details of the case are unique so let’s focus on these for the time being. Daniel Hanlon, a law partner of Robert Reeves, and Colin Greene, an associate in the firm, resigned without notice on June 30, 1999 and formed their own law firm, Hanlon & Greene. For up to five months prior, Hanlon and Greene had accessed their former firm’s data base and printed out information on 2200 clients, created a great sense of dissatisfaction among the firm’s staff, and left without providing status reports or upcoming deadlines.
[no reason for Reeves to angry, eh?]
Just before leaving, Hanlon and Greene intentionally erased extensive computer files containing client documents and forms and personally solicited the firm’s key personnel. Over the next sixty days, the firm lost 9 employees, 6 of whom joined Hanlon & Greene; the new firm solicited and picked up more than 100 of Reeves’ clients in the first year of business.
[sounds ethical to me]
Plaintiff Reeves sued, claiming intentional interference with contractual relationship, interference with prospective economic advantage, misappropriation of confidential information in violation of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, destruction of company property, and losses attributable to the defendants’ solicitations because clients failed to pay Reeves fees that they owed. The trial court found that the plaintiff had been damaged, and awarded damages.
On appeal, the California Supreme Court rejected an earlier ruling of a lower court that an employer may never sue a competitor for intentional interference with its at-will employee where the employer enjoys the probability of a future economic benefit from that relationship. The
Hanlon Court noted long-standing precedents holding that a business may lawfully solicit a competitor?s employees as long as the inducement to leave is not accompanied by any unlawful conduct (this is key). Citing its earlier decision in Korea Supply Company v. Lockheed Martin Corporation, 63 P.3d 937 (2003), the Hanlon Court held that where a plaintiff proves the defendant engaged in an “independently wrongful act”, damages may be awarded for intentional interference. Accordingly, it upheld the trial court’s award of damages and costs.
Under the Hanlon standard, an employer is not subject to liability merely because it has extended a job offer that induces an employee to terminate the at-will relationship. Immunity from liability is lost if an employer or ex-employee uses unfair methods to interfere with such advantageous relations. To obtain damages, the former employer must prove that the competitor/defendant who hired its former employee had knowledge of the relationship and that the defendant intentionally acted to disrupt the relationship.
So here we have the bottom-line: Hanlon was an attorney who engaged in unlawful activity both prior to and subsequent to leaving Reeves that negatively impacted the business of his former employer. Had Hanlon and Greene been hired by another firm which later employed their former coworkers, that firm would have had no liability. The take home lesson IMHO is that when hiring higher-level executives who bring staff with them, employers in California may need to take steps to ensure that the competitive advantage gained is not denuded by the potential of litigation that might result from independently illegal conduct that accompanied the executives? departure.
So much for playing taps for recruiting?
One day while walking down the street a highly successful executive woman was tragically hit by a bus and she died. Her soul arrived up in heaven where she was met at the Pearly Gates by St. Peter himself.
“Welcome to Heaven,” said St. Peter. “Before you get settled in though, it seems we have a problem. You see, strangely enough, we’ve never once had an executive make it this far and we’re not really sure what to do with you.”
“No problem, just let me in“, said the woman.
“Well, I’d like to, but I have higher orders. What we’re going to do is let you have a day in Hell and a day in Heaven and then you can choose whichever one you want to spend an eternity in.”
“Actually, I think I’ve made up my mind…I prefer to stay in Heaven”, said the woman. “Sorry, we have rules…”
And with that St. Peter put the executive in an elevator and it went down-down-down to Hell. The doors opened and she found herself stepping out onto the putting green of a beautiful golf course. In the distance was a country club and standing in front of her were all her friends – fellow executives that she had worked with and they were all dressed in evening gowns and cheering for her.
They ran up and kissed her on both cheeks and they talked about old times. They played an excellent round of golf and at night went to the country club where she enjoyed an excellent steak and lobster dinner. She met the Devil who was actually a really nice guy (and kinda cute) and she had a great time telling jokes and dancing. She was having such a good time that before she knew it, it was time to leave. Everybody shook her hand and waved good-bye as she got on the elevator.
The elevator went up-up-up and opened back up at the Pearly Gates and found St. Peter waiting for her.
“Now it’s time to spend a day in heaven,” he said.
So she spent the next 24 hours lounging around on clouds and playing the harp and singing. She had a great time and before she knew it her 24 hours were up and St. Peter came and got her.
“So, you’ve spent a day in hell and you’ve spent a day in heaven. Now you must choose your eternity,” he said.
The woman paused for a second and then replied, “Well, I never thought I’d say this, I mean, Heaven has been really great and all, but I think I had a better time in Hell.”
So St. Peter escorted her to the elevator and again she went down-down-down back to Hell. When the doors of the elevator opened she found herself standing in a desolate wasteland covered in garbage and filth. She saw her friends were dressed in rags and were picking up the garbage and putting it in sacks. The Devil came up to her and put his arm around her.
“I don’t understand,” stammered the woman, “Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and a country club and we ate lobster and we danced and had a great time. Now all there is a wasteland of garbage and all my friends look miserable.”
The Devil looked at her and smiled.
“Yesterday we were recruiting you; today you’re staff.”
“If I had a bulldog with a face like yours, I’d shave it’s a– and teach it to walk backwards.”
Yes, the organization was ugly and many of the managers were ugly – especially this particular manager. But there are many times when ugliness doesn’t seep deep into the nooks and crannies of the Internet waiting to be found. So who knows the truth in these instances?
Yes, your friendly neighborhood TPR. How many corporate recruiters out there regularly huddle with TPRs to identify the location of organizational quicksand? Realistically, conversations like these should be part of your strategic planning process where you can simultaneously assess external and internal factors that may be hindering success.
You never know until you ask.
Airlines 96
Distributors 96
Retail – Auto 96
Retail – Grocery And Pharmacy 96
Oil And Gas 94
Retailers – General 94
Utilities – Natural 94
Computer Systems And Peripherals 92
Insurance – Health And Medical 92
Retail – Specialty 92
Automotive Parts 91
Insurance – Property And Casualty 91
Metals And Mining 91
Shipping And Transportation 91
Construction 90
Furnishing And Appliance 90
Professional Services 90
Retail – Apparel And Footwear 90
Factory Equipment And Machinery 89
Paper And Paper Products 89
Aerospace And Defense 88
Apparel And Footwear Manufacturing 88
Auto And Transportation Manufacturing 88
Chemicals 88
Diversified Manufacturing 88
Electronics And Semiconductors 88
Healthcare Services 88
Household And Food Products 88
Median Of 53 Industries 88
Building Materials 87
Electrical Equipment And Components 86
Restaurants 86
Containers And Packaging 85
Insurance – Life 85
Beverages 84
Investment Advisors 83
Business Services 81
Medical Devices And Scientific Equipment 81
Printing And Publishing 81
Computer Software And Services 80
Hotels 79
Entertainment And Gaming 78
Media 76
Telecommunication Services 73
Utilities – Diversified 72
Biotech 71
Consumer Services 71
Credit Institutions 71
Utilities – Electric 71
Pharmaceutical 70
Oil And Gas ? Drilling 68
Tobacco 59
Commercial Banks 57
Real Estate 55
Thanks Rob – getting far too many emails from folks wanting to know how to find the name of your dog. It’s definitely more challenging than it was finding the names of your kids – that was easy (the person who asked me wasn’t hired by BillCo).
But your challenge got me thinking and I’d like to share some thoughts with those looking for bowser’s name…
Are you absolutely certain Rob isn’t throwing a curveball? Afterall, he doesn’t know Christmas from Bourke Street. I mean, he is a crazy Aussie (who believes that Seattle reminds him of Sydney, meat pies are superior to Filet Mignon, and well, he probably drinks too much beer so you know where his judgment lies) and being that recruiters need to be aware of cultural issues, are you certain that he’s using the word “dog” in the same sense that us Americans would?
Are you certain he didn’t change his name from Macintosh to McIntosh when he crossed the border to the states because he found that the former was trademarked by Apple (as well as the Apple Growers of America)?
He’s playing you people, he’s playing you… wait until the ad agency in California takes down the mathematically inclined Google billboard and replaces it with the mug of our favorite crazy Aussie. “Don’t be a dog, find my dog” it’ll say…on the very same day he’ll wind up on Geraldo, Oprah, and the newsletter for the RNC as demonstration that our economy is growing.
That Rob is a sly one – remember, use your time wisely.
lol
Have two recruiting planning pieces I’m completing – one healthcare related, the other technology based. They’ll demonstrate some key strategic planning processes I go through, albeit in my head at this point – when I receive a new search. For you strategic planning junkies out there (that’s probably just you Russ – lol) , I’ll be referring to Michael Porter’s Five Forces Model as well as the venerable SWOT and PEST analyses. I know this sounds horribly academic but once you’re able to inculcate it into your recruiting brain, it will become second nature. The greatest benefit is that you’ll never run out of sourcing and hiring ideas – a bold statement but a truism.
In the interim, received a call from a friend who is sourcing those ever-vexing auditor positions (I’m being coy here because I promised the person I would not use their name). Discovered that that nearly 100 people were sourced by email and phone yet none took the bait. My RECRUITDAR was going wild.
Hmmm. let’s take a look at the email. Mind you, this recruiter has a tremendous track record in both boon and bust times and is a wildly successful recruiter. Nonetheless, my RECRUITDAR was telling me that this time of the year is hell for auditors – and she knew this, so any communication with them must be “special” (actually, communication needs to be special all the time). At the same time, received my friend Ari Galper’s monthly sales newsletter with an article about how most emails sent as intro are tediously boring and are almost instantaneously deleted. By the way, I strongly believe anyone out there who sells for a living (that would be recruiters) should subscribe (no monetary benefit for me) to both Ari’s newsletter as well as Jeff Gitomer’s monthly Sales Caffeine.
So my friend sends me the following email (I’ve changed some things to protect the innocent):
Subject: Internal Audit Role in NYC
Jack:
My company, GreatRecruiters, has been retained to fill a senior level Auditor role in NYC. I have taken the liberty of attaching a brief position description for this newly created role that reports directly to the head of Audit for the entire company. I am sure you are contacted daily about these roles in the current climate. But in any event, any networking assistance is sincerely appreciated. This is a great role for someone wanting to be a “bigger fish in a smaller pond” taking. Please feel free to pass this along and contact me with any questions.
Kind regards,
Anita Job
etc.
Wake me up please! As if auditing isn’t somnambulant enough (jk), I’ll bet “Jack” read this, took one look at the audit software in front of him, another look back at the email, and decided that audit was better where he already was.
So let’s add some life to the audit email (reminds me of a currently running TV commercial about making accounts payable exciting again):
Subject: Jack – Please stop the audit for just one moment. Thanks!
Jack-
Not sure if you can help me, but thought you could possibly point me in the right direction.
Would you happen to know someone within Beloitte & Old who would be interested in talking about a larger full-service audit role reporting to the Head of Audit?. Something like a “bigger fish in a smaller pond” but with less travel, more responsibility, and undoubtedly, greater compensation. Still in New York but at least the person will be able to enjoy the spoils of the city.
I’m with GreatRecruiters, a retained search firm comprised of former Big 6 (5,4,..) leaders and any help you can provide me would be graciously appreciated.
Warmest regards,
Anita, etc.
Better? More personal? A bit less sales-y? I’ll report back ASAP with results of how well the new sales-less emails do. Until then, think a bit more outside the box, ok?
Another original ERE oldie – this one about the Workforce Planning…my, oh, my how slowly change marches on.
Is it LinkedIn? Don’t think so (although some people who read this might have an online recruiting coronary – considering I like these folks, that would be a bad thing).
Is it blog recruiting? Nah, although at a recent interview I was asked whether – or more accurately told, that blog recruiting is IT. Oh, really?
Is it a user friendly ATS that makes it easy – and quick – for people to apply for a job? Not yet although taking a page from Amazon’s ‘one click’ system would clearly be a paradigm shift in my mind.
How about an email system that screens out Nigerian scam artists (although I’m still waiting to hear from Barrister Donatus Okobi with some notification as to when I can expect $20 Million to be deposited into my account; after all, I did faithfully send him my Social Security Number and checking account number)? Nah, why destroy the national economy of Nigeria.
How about a new more intelligent browser from Google (again, cool stuff, but it will not radically change the way recruiters source and recruit)?
All of these might make it easier to find talent but only one thing can substantially ensure that will find talent – success all begins with planning (and sadly, often ends by NOT planning). Planning is not something that I’ve recently discovered – my experience includes high level enterprise planning (that changed the strategic direction of a Fortune 150 company), technology planning (completely revamped the technical focus while fueling a 100% increased in R&D funding), HR planning (pretty much from a personnel to human capital investment focus as well as within the functional elements of HR), and of course, recruiting (overall as well as on a search by search basis).
What all strategic planning processes have in common are most of the following steps (major steps are in bold; supporting steps are not):
Do you plan your attack before leaping into a search? Is it a formal document – perhaps a one pager – that can be used to evaluate the strategy after the search is finished? Or is your plan to leap before you look with results that occur more by chance than by calculated action.
The way I see it, it’s much harder to create an overall recruiting strategy if you haven’t created a search strategy for a single position.
I’m curious as to how many ERE people actually put together a formal search document – I’m not talking about a full-fledged position assessment like those developed by executive search consultants (I’m not forgetting those on the contingent side who do this too – they’re just too few and far between) – before diving into Google or posting on a job board?
If you’d like, email me a job that you may be having a challenging time with and I’ll post what I would consider to be a strategic recruiting plan for the position. It just may help you get past whatever roadblock you’re hitting.
The Recruiting Inferno 