A few months back we posted on an article from CareerBuilder.com titled Top 10 Interview No No’s. One of the top 10 “no-no’s” is a topic that we discuss with our clients regularly. It is: 2. No Opening Monologue – It is often tempting to have a monologue at the beginning of your time with a candidate. Giving too much information about the type of candidate you are seeking, or providing a substantial amount of information about the position and responsibilities can be detrimental. Giving too many details upfront leads a candidate to tell you what you want to hear, instead of what he/she actually thinks. Do simple introductions and… Read More
Continue ReadingTalent Shortage
According to a recent SHRM article, …approximately 60% of the 3,100 human resource executives surveyed by Novations Group (a Boston-based consulting firm) said they see signs of a talent shortage, while nearly 10 percent said they have seen no shortage but expect to before the end of the decade. That leaves 30 percent that see no or few signs of the shortage. About 20 percent of respondents said they see no signs of a talent shortage but will remain cautious on new hiring in the year ahead and ten percent said they do not even anticipate a shortage of workers in the next decade. More than half of those seeing… Read More
Continue ReadingHow to Explain Natural Talents
Let’s keep this talent vs. experience riff rolling into a Monday. This battle is near and dear to our hearts, as you know. Here is an experience we had recently involving a final candidate who had a strong networking ability. He has the ability to network within his industry effectively. He even networked with people incidentally – at a restaurant, in retail environment, etc. This ability was revealed throughout his assessments. He was a strong people reader, had high empathy, was people-oriented, etc. Unfortunately during the in-person interview, the candidate wasn’t able to tactically explain his networking ability. The ability came naturally to him so he was not overtly aware… Read More
Continue ReadingKnow Your Competition
Just over 10 years ago, I was a Regional Sales Manager for a high-tech company in a competitive market. There were 5 major players in this market and each of us incorporated different technology in our capital equipment. The Internet was a fledgling concept in the business world at the time. We needed to know what our competition was developing since they all had different technology. We had admin people call in to our competitors, pretend that they were prospects and request information packets. Our competitors obliged. We then passed the information around to the team and filed it in a huge lateral file for future reference. Outside of trade… Read More
Continue ReadingA Hiring Riddle
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. -Albert Einstein Here is a riddle we constantly encounter yet have difficulty solving. Let’s say you are the sales manager for a somewhat complex product sale and you have an underperforming salesperson. The salesperson is well below quota, has an ethereal forecast and is not making enough prospect connects to turn it around. What do you do as a sales manager? My solution – pull them from their territory for 1 week of intense product training. I’m talking deep training down to the part production, software coding, product assembly nether regions of operations. If you can pump… Read More
Continue ReadingClosing a Candidate
The job market is tight and sourcing periods are extended due to the scarcity of strong candidates. Articles abound on the Internet about this topic. We have a saying we tell our clients – “If we know they are a strong salesperson, other companies with other opportunities know it too.” In the current hiring environment, it is mission critical to keep a hiring process moving. Once a strong candidate is identified, time is of the essence. The longer you wait, the more competition you invite. We are moving on top candidates within 24 hours of the interview stage. Some of our customers are scheduling second interviews at the conclusion of… Read More
Continue ReadingPhone Screening Tip
We use phone screens extensively in our sourcing activities. The first advantage to this approach is that it removes some biases from the interviewer. Second, it neutralizes a candidates ability to pour on their rapport-building skills. Thirdly, it is a much shorter time commitment than an in-person interview. I could go on, but you get the point. CareerJournal has reposted this article – Four Tips for Acing Interviews by Phone – which made me think about the candidate side of the phone screen. Tip #3 starts with this point: 3. Prepare in advance. If you’ve scheduled or are anticipating a phone interview, keep notes and your resume at hand, says… Read More
Continue ReadingJob Titles Attract Workers
I read a recent newsletter article from Ragan’s Management Resources titled “Use job titles to attract and reward workers” (sorry, no link available). The president of a service company ran an experiement. He offered job candidates a choice between having the title of “sales manager” or the title of “salesperson” with an additional $2,000 added to their salary. Interesting enough, most of the candidates took the “manager” title over the pay. I would have liked this article to go a little deeper by sharing the ad or providing their insight into why they thought the title was chosen over the pay. I would venture a guess that the ad unintentionally… Read More
Continue ReadingProperly Using Pre-Employment Tests
CareerJournal posted this article – Six Things You Should Know About Pre-Employment Tests – earlier this week. The article is an excellent story for executive-level candidates to read closely. First, an interesting stat: Pre-employment testing is on the rise. In the past five years, 60% of companies have increased their use of workplace-behavior assessments, according to a survey of more than 500 human-resources professionals at U.S. companies… Second, a good point: “If you answer honestly and don’t get the job, it means the position wasn’t a good match for you in the first place,” he says. Third, something we can confirm in our activities: Senior executives are not exempt. In… Read More
Continue ReadingWhen Sales Ads Don’t Work
I’m reading posts in recruiter message boards that are discussing low salesperson response rates to employment ads placed on monster, local newspapers and publications. From the amount of responses to this subject, it appears many other recruiters are having similar difficulties. I then read the opening paragraph from this article that states: Seventy-six percent of employees are looking for new employment opportunities, according to the 2005 U.S. Job Recovery and Retention Survey released today by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) and CareerJournal.com. Sixty-five percent of HR professionals indicated they were concerned about the voluntary resignations at their organizations. To prevent a mass exodus, almost half of the organizations… Read More
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