The Challenge for External Recruiters

I'm being interviewed at Follow Us this week, which is part of the Australasian Talent Conference (ATC), the session is around recruitment and how it is evolving with the use of social media. I read an article yesterday which got me to thinking about the challenges external recruiters will face in the future and it's not just about social media.

Recruitment more than ever before is becoming about networks, and utilising the reach of existing employees, social media allows for this effect to be amplified and reach a larger group of people. When you consider an organisation which has 5,000 people, who might have an average of 200 online connections each, the reach of your internal network is staggering (that's 1,000,000 people by the way). If people enjoy what they're doing they'll refer friends and contacts regardless and if you add an incentive (such as a referral bonus) they'll be even more likely to do so.

We are no longer in a market where a company will contact a recruitment agency first, and if they are to survive agencies are going to have to adapt. Greg Savage the CEO of Firebrand recently spoke about this and said, "There was, in the glory years, a period where a company's default action was to go to a recruiter, and I don't think that's the case anymore. Their default action now is to build in-house recruiting teams or technology or go to job boards, so we've got to offer something different". 

The challenge for recruiters is going to be how to stay relevant, this will involve creating close relationships with candidates and gaining an in depth knowledge of client needs so that when a role arises they understand what type of person a client is looking for. When I worked within the HR team recruiting for specialist nursing positions I would receive calls from agencies presenting candidates that were not qualified and it was clear that the caller did not understand the roles I was recruiting for. This wasted my time (and theirs) and did not encourage me to contact them when I needed assistance with recruitment in the future.

It's not just about resumes, there must be a compelling argument to use an agency, 'external recruitment companies have to offer insights, specialisation and access to hard-to-find talent'. Where an agency takes the time to get to know their client and can offer this specialist service they will be able to maintain these relationships and continue to be relevant.

A further challenge is that candidates are also changing how they approach roles and where they see that going through an agency is not going to be successful they are going directly to the source. This is really where social media becomes invaluable, LinkedIn is the bare minimum; but with Facebook pages for organisations and many people in decision making positions on twitter there is more access than ever before to the companies you want to work at.

The candidate experience is powerful and this is what I will be talking about this week at #ATCSM. You can follow the twitter stream for updates throughout the afternoon and to find out how candidates are turning the recruitment process on its head.

Why Self Selection is Important

I'm half way through my Masters of HR and OD, and a couple of weeks into trimester 3 this year I realised that it wasn't the right time for me to be undertaking my chosen subject. The subject was 'Leading and Managing People' and was mostly about self-reflection and determining what my leadership plan is for the next three years.

It is a subject and topic I would usually be very passionate about, because well - it's all about me. But I just wasn't in the right frame of mind for it, and thirteen weeks of it turned out to be a real drain. I'm not sure if I learnt anything from the subject but I did learn something else important. I learnt how important self-selection is.

I had the opportunity to defer from the subject and either choose another one or just have a break from study for a little while, but instead I kept going with something I wasn't interested in.

That was a mistake.

I slacked off, I didn't spend the time I should have on my assignments or contribute properly to the online forum. I did the bare minimum, and yeah I still got decent marks, but I didn't enjoy it and certainly didn't get what I should have out of the subject.

Continuing my studies is something I choose to do, it's not mandatory for my job and is completely driven by self-selection which is generally a good thing (except for this subject). When we self select something, whether it's a task or study or a project we're usually going to get better results, we'll put in more discretionary effort and we'll get more satisfaction from it because it's something we have chosen to be accountable for. When we're forced to do something or placed in a role because other people believe it's what we're good at or interested in we'll often see the opposite results and the outcomes won't be as positive.

In my work life I have self-selected the work I do in social media, whether it's twitter or our blog, I do these things not because they are part of my job but because I enjoy them, I get satisfaction from them and they feel natural to me. If blogging was made to be part of someone's role but they weren't interested in it, I can guarantee you it would fail.

So back to study, what did I learn this trimester? Sometimes, it's best to choose to opt out and wait until the timing is right. Forcing myself to do something because I think I should and it's the right thing to do isn't actually rewarding or satisfying.

Study is enough of a chore as it is why make it harder on myself?

The Other C Word

I've been trying to get real with myself lately, which involves getting past all of the 'stuff' I tell myself, or distract myself with and actually getting down to how I feel, why I feel that way and what I'm actually about. It has not been fun, it's about as pleasant as punching myself repeatedly in the face. But it's necessary, how can I expect my life to change if I continue to do the same things I've always done.

What I've found isn't nice, it's not too great to realise that you've been behaving in ways contrary to your terminal values. It's even worse to realise on reflection that I would, if given the opportunity change many of the choices I have recently made. The reason many of these choices have been flawed is because they have been compromises.

We talk all of the time about having to compromise so that 'everyone will be happy' but in reality a compromise is a lose/lose situation. You only have to look at the definition of compromise to see this; a settlement of differences by mutual concessions; an agreement reached by adjustment of conflicting or opposing claims, principles, etc., by reciprocal modification of demands.

In essence when we are compromising we're taking disparate needs or views and mashing them together, hoping that they will work; each party must give something up in order to reach an agreement. The result of this is that no one's needs will be met, whether it is in a personal relationship or for a business project it's likely that the outcome will mediocre at best.

Often I'm compromising because I think that it's better to have something than nothing. But when I'm really honest with myself I know that it would be far better not to compromise and to wait until I can get what I actually need without everybody losing.

So while it's not nice to get real, it is necessary and I'm not going to compromise on that.

Stand In Your Own Power

I recently attended a pamper session at the Yoga centre my sister attends, it was a lovely morning filled with massages, facials, making mandalas, and after lunch we were told we would be in an 'interactive session'.

We grabbed our chairs and sat down, totally zen and blissing out from our morning of pampering and the facilitator opened with, 'how often do you apologise for things?' Sorry, what was that? Oh there I go again. At the time I didn't think that much about it, because I say sorry to be polite or because I'm sincerely sorry for something.

But a few days down the track and I've really started to notice how much I'm saying sorry, I apologise if I haven't replied to an email for 24 hours, I apologise when trying to get out of the tram and someone won't move out of the way, I apologise for things which either aren't in my control or have nothing to do with me, I apologise for saying something that I believe because it might have hurt someone else's feelings. I apologise for apologising. I'm sorry I've written apologise more than half a dozen times in this post already.

I'm almost apologising for my existence sometimes. That's not to say that apologising when you are actually sorry about something is bad (and to be sincere and vulnerable and apologise is a great thing), but what I'm talking about here is just being sorry because it's habit or conditioning. Now, there is the 'gender issue' here, because women and men are raised differently, and the behaviours that are accepted or corrected in each gender as we're growing up and ongoing do vary.

As a woman, if we are steadfast we're seen as a 'ball breaker' or a 'man eater', to ask for what you want and not apologise for it can be confronting. I was recently told by someone that when they first met me they thought that I was, 'an arrogant bitch' and here is the kicker: the person that told me that was a woman. If you're a woman I want you to think about when you've been criticised for something and then think about who it is coming from. I'm ashamed that you'll probably realise like me that more often than not it is from other women. I'm the first to say that I'm guilty of this, and I think we've all been on both sides of it.

Why do we behave like this? One theory was that back in our cave dwelling days we needed to compete for the best caveman to look after us and protect us and that behaviour continues on (even if we don't have to fight for the best caveman anymore). 

Regardless of why we do it, the question remains, how can we ever expect to be empowered or able to (and I hate this turn of phrase), 'break through the glass ceiling' if all we're ever doing is stabbing each other in the back?

We should feel that we can be confident to ask for what we want and need, that we can have satisfaction in life across all areas and that we'll have each other's back when we do this. Each of us, male or female should be able to be our true selves and to stand in our power and not be belittled because of it.

I am sorry that I have been one of these backstabbing women, but that's it for apologising. 

Next time you're about to apologise, take a breath and ask yourself, 'what am I saying sorry for?' Are you representing who you really are by apologising and standing in your own power or are you apologising for your existence?