Clients who drag out the process of hiring and making an offer to candidates are doing a tremendous disservice to themselves, the potential hire — and you!

I recently had a company take eleven business days to make an offer after a final interview. During the eleven days, the candidate had one on-site interview and two phone interviews with three other companies. This candidate I recruited for my customer didn’t have options when I first contacted him; then suddenly he had several. In the end, he had two offers on the table to consider and was beginning to wonder if he was my customer’s second choice.

Recruiting and hiring is a delicate emotional dance; if your date has to wait too long to be asked to the prom, they will simply go with someone else. In this case, if the company had been quicker with an offer he would have not interviewed with the other companies.

I tell all my clients that an offer needs to be made within 48 hours of the final interview– sooner if possible. So where does the process break down? What are the pitfalls that companies fall into which reduce their effectiveness in hiring decision-making? During a “lessons learned” debrief with the company, we determined the following common reasons for the slow offer process.

1. There Were Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen: When too many people are involved in the hiring decision, the process is going to be sluggish. One person has to be in charge and retain full authority. Seeking others’ input is important, but if multiple people are involved in a purely democratic process (in this case there were ten), it’s going to be next to impossible to get them to all reach the same conclusion in a timely manner.
2. The Offer Was Hijacked By Lawyers: Lawyers certainly serve a purpose, but a company attorney should not have to review each and every employment offer. Create a standardized offer template that has pre-approved legal language. Salary, benefits, etc. can then be simply plugged in and you’re on your way.
3. A Key Decision Maker Missed the Final Interview: First of all, this should just not happen. It reflects poorly on the company and makes candidates feel like they’re not being taken seriously. However, if unavoidable, have the missing person do a phone conversation prior to the final on-site interview. Or have them pick a trusted person to become the decision maker for this hire.
4. The offer approval process was serial; not parallel – If you cannot avoid multiple approvals of an offer, get them all at the same time [parallel], not in succession [serial]. Create efficient processes to ensure your offers get out the door in the minimum time.
5. Only a Slow Written Offer Was Extended:  If the decision has been made to extend an offer, make it over the phone as soon as possible. Don’t let preparation of contracts and 2-3 day mail delivery slow down the process. Follow up with written offers later the same day via email or overnight delivery.

Do any of these scenarios sound familiar? If so, it’s time to review and reform your hiring process. Don’t let news of the sluggish economy fool you into a false sense of security. Top talent will still have plenty of interested companies—especially in the technical areas. Get them off the market as quickly as you can and putting their skills to work for your company.

image source: Doug at deviantart

Dear Barb:

There is a problem in our office and I have no idea how to resolve it. We send resumes, get interview times, yet no offers. This has been going on for about four months and now my cash flow is running low. I can’t afford the team to continue like this. Can you help redirect me? I am completely lost and don’t know which way to go from here onward.

We have hot specs, we get interview times, but then our candidates are not offered, but some other recruitment companies do get the offers. I am trying to establish what on earth is wrong, what are we doing wrong, what do we need to improve? We need your advice.

Eva I., Johannesburg, S. Africa 

Dear Eva:

Sorry you’re facing this problem, but I believe my answers will help you resolve this situation. You need to backfill every screened out candidate. If you start out by sending three candidates on an interview and one is screened after the second interview, you send in someone else. If someone is screened out in a third interview, you submit a new candidate. You have to cover your Job Order until an offer is extended!

Your goal should be to get two to three candidates to the final interview. What you described is going on in the US as well. We solved it by continuing to submit candidates until we received an offer. When we get two to three people in final interviews, we do get offers and have the backup candidate as well.

Clients hire the most qualified candidates. Review your current sources for candidates. Your sales team needs to constantly network for new talent and find new resources for talent. Encourage your sales team to make networking calls daily to identify new top talent! Also develop a candidate referral program where you pay some sort of referral fee for candidates who are referred and placed. Most employers want to hire individuals who are currently employed and possess the required skills, stability, and experience.

If you want to double your candidate flow today, have your recruiters gather the application forms of all the candidates they have interviewed for the past six months. Call their past (not current place) of employment and ask for them. Obviously they are not there so they will be transferred to their replacement. This person has the same skills as your candidate. You can either recruit this individual or network with them to obtain additional referrals.

Make some of these subtle changes and you problem will be solved!

Barb Bruno, CPC, CTS

Would you like to Ask Barb a question? Email her at support@staffingandrecruiting.com. Each month in The Fordyce Letter print edition, Barbara Bruno answers questions from individuals in the Recruiting Profession. We will bring you some of these Q&A responses from Barb each week on FordyceLetter.com.

How did it come to this?

The resumé was great, the cover letter perfect. The interview went well. After the candidate was placed in front of the client, both sides raved to you about how well it went.

Really, the other candidates just seemed like they were going through the motions.

And so the offer is made. And rejected!

“But…but…but…” is your considered reply. “You love them. They love you. What’s wrong?”

At this point you slip into objection mode to be ready for the answer.

You’re getting an unexpected promotion? “Well, congratulations… if that’s really what you want.”

You’ve been made a counter-offer? “Well, let me give you some highly discredited statistics that have been floating around recruitment for years.”

You’ve decided you don’t like the extra ten minutes travel / puke-coloured company shirt / half hour lunch break / compulsory annual conference in Tahiti? “But we discussed this…”

Where did you go wrong?

Sometimes, it’s not your fault. It really can be something out of the blue.

A colleague of mine once had a candidate who, having verbally accepted a job offer on a Friday, won several million dollars in a lottery on Saturday. The candidate rescinded his acceptance on the following Monday. You could hear the champagne corks still popping in the background. (Of course, there was no second suitable candidate!)

I once made an offer on the day that the papers ran an article suggesting the company was closing down. The candidate decided a bird in the hand was preferable.

Of course, sometimes you have to deal with the client going off script. “They offered me $200K in the meeting and the offer says $192K, just like you told me, but now I want the $200K”.

Short of applying a quick, sharp jolt of electricity to your client via a taser in an effort to help them understand your point of view, you can never stop them from making unusual, contrary, illegal, unethical, or just plain wrong statements.

Often a line manager interviewing has virtually no idea about company policies (“I’m sure that the ‘no smoking’ policy in the building could be waived for you’) and so when the offer comes from you, it bears no relation to the offer that the line manager and the candidate have agreed on.

When this happens, it can easily lead to mistrust.

And sometimes, it’s your fault. Yes, yours!

So what can you do to make the chances of this happening to you as small as possible?

The obvious thing is to not oversell in the ad.. Sometimes, we can get carried away with our ability to market a role and to hit a candidate’s ‘hot buttons’ without considering if the role is actually as good as we are claiming. This is bound to lead to disappointment at some stage. In fact, I find I get better results by just telling the truth. (“Can you handle a role as Personal Assistant to two senior executives who barely know how to turn a laptop on?” is one of my more memorable efforts)

Secondly, if you are an external consultant, try to always get out on the ground where the position will be located for a spot of reconnaissance. Without sounding like an aging hippy, you need to pick up the vibe, man.

That way, you can test the candidate you are talking to against the vibe. Not what they say; not what the client says, but whether you can picture that person in that space.

If you can’t get a clear picture, tackle it early and directly. “John, after three jobs with multi-nationals, how in the world would you cope with being ten percent of the workforce in a tiny business?”

Why is this necessary? Because after the fact, people lie! Candidates don’t want to say, “I don’t want to join an organisation where the manager seems to be quite mad and the wallpaper is covered with risqué anime characters” so they say “my current employer offered me a raise, so I’m staying”.

Candidates are never comfortable suggesting that they just don’t like the people and/or the organisation and/or the view and/or the wallpaper, so they fall back on the old romantic standard – “it’s not you, it’s me”.

If you haven’t figured out by now that there’s virtually no difference between recruiting and romance…time to change careers.

In the same way as my sister-in-law refused to marry a man with a vaguely embarrassing surname until he changed it by deed poll; a job ad headed “Business Development Executive” that leads to a contract headed “Salesperson” might then lead to some mumbled excuse because the candidate doesn’t want to say “I want a better title on my business card”.

When I meet with candidates, I often tell them a little about the person they will meet. A bit of their background, or their personality. Of course, it’s hard to do that if you haven’t met them, as part of my “on the ground” remarks earlier.

So basically, my argument can be distilled to the following: know your client; know your candidate. Make sure that the candidate is your client’s “sort of people”. And vice versa.

Pay attention to the vibe, man.

Recruiting history was made this month. You may not be aware that last week marked the culmination of the most sophisticated recruiting effort executed in this century, one that will go down in history as a case study on how to recruit “game-changers.” The approaches used and the lessons to be learned are almost without comparison. If you want to recruit the best to your organization, don’t miss this opportunity to learn how “game changer” recruiting differs dramatically from typical recruiting.

“Game Changer Recruiting” Is Needed in All Organizations

You do not have to be a sports nut to realize that for the last two months numerous NBA teams have been pulling out all the stops and spending unlimited amounts of money to recruit basketball star LeBron James to their team. Simultaneously, almost-as-intensive recruiting efforts have targeted other game-changing stars including Dwyane Wade, Amar’e Stoudemire, and Chris Bosh.

Sports teams and corporations alike need all the game-changers (individuals who can change the entire direction of an organization) they can get. While you might think that sports recruiting is not comparable to corporate recruiting, that notion would be erroneous. This sports-superstar recruiting effort is ultimately an illustration of world-class “game-changer recruiting.”

If like most organizations, yours could use a few more “game-changers,” innovators, or exceptional performers, consider the lessons that can be gleaned from the events of the past eight weeks.

Lesson #1 — Calculate the Economic Value of a Game-changer

The first lesson to be learned is to calculate the dollar impact a game-changer can have on revenue. Most recruiting managers focus on the cost of recruiting individuals (i.e. cost per hire), ignoring the potential return or the economic impacts that recruiting a game-changer will have. The LeBron case study illustrates a superior approach, one focused on return on investment.

Historically the largest economic game-changing recruit was Michael Jordan. One study conducted by Fortune estimated that Michael Jordan had a $10 billion dollar impact on the NBA. LeBron will have a similar impact, not just on team revenues, but also on complimentary businesses in the greater metropolitan area. One economist recently estimated that impact could be as large as $3 billion.

Unfortunately, few corporations invest in calculating the dollar impact of recruiting a game-changer on their organization. Those that do, often find that focusing solely on cost to recruit is silly. Google for example has estimated that a top performer generates three hundred times more revenue than an average performer. What would be the dollar impact if Warren Buffett joined your investment firm or Steve Jobs joined your technology firm? On a less-grandiose scale, can you imagine the impact on your organization if the inventor of the iPod or the iPhone were to join the organization?

When doing calculations, remember that the economic impacts of acquiring a game-changer are not limited to their direct contributions, but also include the attraction of investors and other high-caliber recruits that will also impact the performance of the organization. In addition, recruiting a game-changer from a direct competitor may significantly impact their ability to compete. Once your executives understand the startling economic value, they will support the use of a game-changing recruiting approach.

Lesson #2 — Realize That Game-changers Are Different

The second lesson to learn from the LeBron case is that game-changers, innovators, and top performers truly are different and must be recruited in a unique manner. The traditional corporate recruiting and executive search models will not work when recruiting most game-changers because those models do not accommodate superstar personalities, unusual expectations, and an unbelievable array of decision-influencers. To get the attention of a game-changer, you must understand exactly how they are different. While game-changers are not all alike, in general, they exhibit the following characteristics.

• Not looking for a job — they are probably currently employed and they are almost always well treated where they currently work. As a result, they are not actively looking for a new job and if they did hear about an ordinary opportunity, they would not pursue it.
• Power — they fully understand their value and their importance and as a result, they expect to be treated differently than the average applicant. They know that they hold the power in any potential new relationship or recruiting opportunity, so they expect to be courted.
• Difficult to approach — they are incredibly busy and there is a constant demand on their time. As a result, most erupt numerous barriers that would prevent strangers from even approaching them with opportunities. In order to make an initial recruiting contact, you will probably need direct assistance from someone who influences them.
• Trust is required — experience has taught them to be cynical of strangers and promises. As a result, you will need a strong relationship built on trust before they will seriously consider any offer from you.
• A triggering event required — because they are successful and well treated at their current position, they are generally satisfied with their current situation. As a result, it will likely take a major negative career-impacting event at their current firm to shift them into job search mode. In the absence of a negative event, it will take a major “WOW” jaw-dropping positive opportunity before they would even look at a job opening.
• A game-changer recruiting approach is required — the final thing to understand about recruiting any individual who is in high demand is that they almost always have an intense dislike for standard recruiting processes. Instead, they expect and require a “tailored” or personalized recruiting process that requires little of their time, that meets all of their expectations, and that contains not a single turnoff or “dealbreaker” element.

Lesson #3 — Shift to a “Game-changing Recruiting Approach”

The primary differentiator between a game-changing recruiting process and all other recruiting processes is the level of effort that is put into truly understanding the candidate and their needs. Most recruiters would argue that they already understand the needs of their candidates; however, heavy workloads force most recruiters to generalize and make numerous assumptions about what candidates need and expect.

In direct contrast, the game-changer recruiting approach is tailored to the individual who is being targeted. It is a market research/sales-driven approach that puts together a sophisticated candidate profile that covers the candidate’s job search process, how best to contact them, and their job acceptance decision criteria. This in-depth profile takes a significant amount of time and resources but is necessary if you want to have a realistic chance of success. There are 10 activities involved in developing a deep understanding of your target and creating a candidate profile. They include:

1. Identify factors that trigger a job search — a job opportunity by itself will not be enough to trigger a game-changer into job search mode. Instead, a combination of a positive job opportunity and the simultaneous occurrence of a negative factor that makes the target uncomfortable in their current situation is needed. To time your recruiting effort precisely, you need to be aware of what negative triggering events could arise and when they are most likely to occur. You must conduct research and interviews with those who know your recruiting target extremely well in order to compile a list of the specific events likely to trigger a desired change. Such events might include a corporate merger, management turnover, corporate scandal, or a significant cut to their budget.
2. Map their job search process — whenever a game-changer does begin to consider change, you need to understand and map out the process they will use. If you fish using bait, you understand that to catch a trophy fish you need to understand how a trophy fish searches for food. Likewise, recruiters must find out how their target found opportunities in the past, how and where they research opportunities, and what factors get an opportunity on their “short list” of opportunities to consider. Once you fully understand how, when, and where they find opportunities, you need to customize your approach to mirror their activities. Additionally, there must be a process to reevaluate the quality of your recruiting process against world-class standards, because a game-changer will likely judge your entire organization based on the experience they receive. It is quite common for recruits to assume that their candidate experience is a direct reflection on how they will be treated when they become an employee.
3. Determine who must do the recruiting — in many cases, game-changers expect to bypass traditional recruiters and instead be contacted and recruited by professionals of similar stature (or even by senior executives). As a result, you must identify their expectations and shift the initial contact and much of the recruiting to individuals who they respect and trust. Leading off with the wrong person can result in your opportunity being filtered.
4. Identify the best way to communicate and to reach them — if you want prospects to respond to your messages, you need to understand their communication preferences. That means you must research their most-favored way to communicate (i.e. in person, telephone calls, text messages, e-mail, on Facebook, etc.) and what must be in a message for them to respond to it. You must also identify other opportunities to communicate with them, including events they attend, publications they read, and websites and blogs regularly visited. If you do not know precisely where they “lurk,” you dramatically reduce the chances on reaching them. It is also important to note that the sites game-changers frequently are likely to be learning on content sites related to their professional growth, rather than job or career-oriented sites.
5. Identify the factors that will grab their initial attention — due to the volume and level of competition for their attention, if you expect to get on their short list, you need to identify the factors that would cause them to initially consider your opportunity. Once you identify the factors that will get their initial attention, you must make sure that compelling information on those factors is clearly visible on the sites they routinely visit. You may also have to educate their friends and colleagues about your organization, so that they will know about you and as a result, may speak highly of your organization during their interactions with your recruiting target. If you are an unknown organization or if you have a weak employer brand image, this step is even more important in order to prevent them from immediately ignoring your opportunity.
6. Identify the decision criteria they will use to accept an interview — game-changers routinely turn down opportunities to interview for new positions, so understanding what it takes to excite them about a particular interview invitation is a critical factor in the game-changer recruiting process. Identifying interview acceptance criteria requires extensive research and benchmarking and some guesswork. In the end, you must develop a ranked list of the criteria that they will use when deciding whether to accept an invitation and make sure that you convincingly communicate each of them in all of your initial recruiting and interview-related communications.
7. Identify “deal breaker” or knockout factors — in addition to positive criteria that game-changers will use to filter opportunities, there are also negative factors that will influence their decisions. Your research must identify each of these “deal breakers” (i.e. a weak boss, no budget, restricted decision-making, a lack of control, etc.,) and ensure that there is not even a hint of one of them present within the organization.
8. Identify their decision criteria and the information they need to accept a job offer — this is without a doubt the most critical step in the overall process. Consider the recruiting process similar to the sales process for big-ticket item. In both cases, successfully making a sale requires understanding a customer’s buying criteria and a product that meets that criteria as closely as possible. Some identify a candidate’s job acceptance decision criteria by asking them directly at the beginning of the interview process, or by interviewing friends and colleagues. Typical decision criteria include their degree of independence, the extent of their authority, their ability to build their own team, their ability to select projects, and the availability of ample resources. The entire interview process must be geared toward convincing them that this job meets every one of their acceptance criteria. It is also important to periodically ask them during critical points in the interview process if you are successfully meeting their criteria.To ensure that the target candidate remains engaged in the process, give them some input into it, so that they do not view it as inflexible. Ask them what specific information they need and what questions they need answered before they can make an affirmative decision. You should also ask them who they must meet and talk with before they can make a final decision on your offer. The overall interview process should provide them with an excellent candidate experience and you should use it not just as an assessment tool but also as an opportunity to provide a comprehensive sales pitch.
9. Identify who will influence their decision — game-changers are much more apt to consult with and seek the advice of friends and colleagues than the average candidate. As a result, make an attempt to identify and then proactively “sell” those individuals who will influence the candidate’s final decision. Incidentally, the process of identifying and educating “influencers” on the powerful selling points of your firm needs to start at the very beginning of the interview process.
10. Develop a counteroffer strategy — it would be highly unusual for a game-changer not to get a compelling counteroffer from their current organization. Because the normal reaction of a game-changer is to “stay put in a known environment,” you need to proactively research what that counteroffer is likely to be and to prepare a compelling strategy to overcome it. In addition, you should anticipate that the game-changer will get several external offers, so you need to do your research and benchmarking to ensure that your initial offer is clearly superior and most closely aligns with your candidate’s dream job.

Final Thoughts

Some people viewed the recruiting process used to attract LeBron James as a circus. However, on closer examination, it was unique, targeted, and comprehensive. There were numerous WOW factors, including the city of New York crafting a customized video including a message from the mayor, and several cities organizing mass public recruiting parties to show their commitment. Teams used high profile individuals including Jay Z and even the President of the United States to influence the process. Numerous websites were created, blogs were written, and literally millions of tweets were shared on the topic.

To further highlight the importance of this recruiting effort, Lebron’s offer acceptance was televised in an hour-long TV special (a first). During the special, his decision criteria were disclosed, including the probability of winning a championship, a new coach, a choice of teammates, team chemistry, supportive owners, a large fan base, broader media exposure, and lifestyle considerations including the interests of his entourage, and of course hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation.

While millions were spent to recruit him and millions more will be spent to pay him, the economic return (likely to be in the billions) will far outweigh the costs. Believe it or not, the same dramatic results can be obtained by recruiting a single game-changer in the corporate world, although the fanfare would likely be less dramatic! If you are not landing your share of game-changers, the process that corporate executives must follow has been spelled out, all they need to add is … courage.

Editor’s note: Gary Stauble’s “2 Minute Coaching” gives you quick, easy-to-implement ideas on various subjects.

Topic #1: Should you start a search without a signed agreement?
We were all likely taught that you should never start a search without a signed agreement. This makes good sense for many obvious reasons.

However, what do you do if a hiring manager authorizes you to send people for a search but does not return your agreement promptly?

Hiring authorities (like all of us) only do things when it is obvious that it will benefit them in a tangible way. Reading a contract in detail before they receive a candidate is not always at the top of their priority list. Often it is your presentation of a star candidate that provides the motivation for the manager to sign your agreement.

Verbal agreements are theoretically binding but hard to prove. However, from my point of view, it’s ok to start a search with a verbal agreement on rare occasions as long as you follow a few rules. You definitely would want this practice to be the exception rather than the rule.

If you are going to start the search, make sure you have a verbal agreement on the terms. You can start the search with a verbal agreement but make sure you get the signed agreement before you schedule the first sendout. Also, be sure to present your candidate without revealing his name or current employer. Lastly, only send one candidate as a test to see how quickly your prospect responds before putting much effort into the search.

Topic #2: Don’t call it a slump
Have you ever thought about the importance of language and your chronic thoughts in terms of influencing your paycheck? Most people agree that we tend to become what we think about, what we focus on, and what we talk about. With that in mind, picture two veteran recruiters who haven’t made a placement in six weeks:

One’s inner dialogue goes something like this, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me, nothing seems to be working, I’m in a slump. I may never make another placement. I suck.”

The other recruiter sounds more like this, “I know I’m on my way to better production. I’ve had slow times before and I’ve always figured a way through. I know that if I stick to my process, the placements will come. What’s the fastest way to my next sendout?”

Pretty different tone, eh?

One is weak and impotent, the other strong and hopeful. Who do you think will get to their next placement first? As recruiters we need to be watchful of our focus and inner dialogue and make sure that it’s leading us toward the success we really want.

Topic #3: What if my client insists on presenting the offer?
As with everything, you need to show your client why it is in his interest to have you present the offer. Here are some ideas:

Other interviews:
“Candidates will tell me things about other offers and opportunities that they won’t tell you.”

Counter offers:
“They’ll talk to me about their susceptibility to counter-offers whereas they’ll likely tell you only what they think you want to hear.”

Uncover hidden objections:
“I can act as a confidant for the candidate to uncover other hidden objections such as his spouse’s resistance, changes in his reasons for leaving and the fear of change.”

Save Dollars:
“We test all offers before we extend them. We can help save you in payroll cost and in avoiding rejected offers.”

We act as a mediator:
“It’s more professional to have the offer come from a recruiter. We act as mediator. Then the candidate calls you (Mr. Client) after acceptance to formally accept with you.”

Last resort:
“Mr. Client, if you won’t change your mind about presenting the offer, at least let me test the offer amount first and coordinate the timing with you so we’re sure the candidate is ready to accept.”

Editor’s note: Gary Stauble’s “2 Minute Coaching” gives you quick, easy-to-implement ideas on various subjects. Here he offers advice on using an egg timer for personal productivity, orchestrating a “yes” within 24 hours, and how to streamline client meetings.

Topic #1: The Power of the Egg Timer

Some of the best ideas are also the most simple, low-tech, and easy-to-implement. With all the advice out there on personal productivity and time-management, it’s easy to overlook this simple tool: the egg timer.

One of the best ways I know to boost my productivity on workdays is to use a countdown timer during golden hours.

I define “golden hours” as my most important personal productivity time when I want to work without interruptions. It is that sacred time that gives me the freedom to focus on the critical activities that generate revenue and demand my intense focus.

A prime-time segment for me is 50 minutes in duration. I turn off my phone, shut down my email, and lock my office door to prevent all disruptions. I set my countdown timer to 50 minutes and then I get busy.

It’s important that the timer counts down (not up) so that there is a set deadline. This creates an intensity to the activity that you cannot get without the artificial deadline. Also, it is a “self-management” technique that high performers who want leverage on their own habits can use.

Here are some activities to focus on if you decide to set aside prime-time hours:

• Marketing calls
• Article writing
• Recruiting calls
• Planning
• Critical thinking
• Sourcing and name gathering
• Mind mapping and strategizing

Topic #2: How to get a “Yes” within 24 hours of the offer

It is critical that you pre-close how much time a candidate has to decide on an offer long before it is extended.

The time to do this is during your initial interview with the candidate. It is your job to orchestrate the offer and acceptance for both parties and to set expectations well in advance.

You might say something like this to your candidates:

“At the time that the offer is generated by the company, which is usually after several weeks of conversations, I’m going to ask you to make a decision on that offer within 24 hours. What I’m asking you to do here is to start your decision making at the very beginning of the process, rather than at the very end. It’s my job to make sure you have all of the information you need and all of your questions answered prior to receiving the offer. However, once you get it, I’m going to ask you to be decisive. Is this workable for you?”

Topic #3: Three Ideas for Starting a Client Meeting

1. Rehearse your presentation.

Rehearse a verbal and mental presentation of your meeting. Get to the point where you have memorized the key points that you want to cover. Nothing will add to your self-confidence like preparation and rehearsal.

2. Set the framework for the meeting.

Say something like this to your client:

“I’d like to ask you some specific questions to see if we can be of service, then I can answer any questions you have about us. We’re probably looking at about 30 minutes, does this work for you?”

3. Use intense listening.

The great thing about client meetings is that what the client really wants is simply to be heard and understood. You must be an intense listener, so follow this simple guideline: they talk 80% of the time.

Maximizing your use of time is the key to hiring more top performers. In a recent webinar with Jobs2Web, I described the sourcing sweet-spot. This is the point just before and just after a fully employed person decides to consider looking for another position. This time-frame represents the window of opportunity to hire the best passive candidates and early-birds with less effort and salary premiums than any other point.

If you get to these top people first, you’ll have no competition, and they’ll be much easier to recruit since they’ve already made the decision to pursue a new job. However, it’s what you do when you first connect that will determine whether you’re successful or not in hiring them. This involves a number of critical recruiting key skills. These are described below.

If you’re a recruiting manager, evaluate your current crop of recruiters and any new hires to determine whether they have these skills or the ability to learn them. If you’re a recruiter and you want to hire more top performers, you need to be exceptional in these areas. As you’ll see, hiring top performers without paying unnecessary compensation premiums requires great recruiters, great opportunities, and great hiring managers. Without these, it just becomes a numbers game. But as Chicken Little, or some other similar authority, once said, “the early bird catches the worm, as long as you have a good fishing pole.”

Passive candidates and those just entering the job market — the early-birds — are a different breed of prospect. For one thing, they’re not desperate. This changes the game entirely from those who have been looking for more extended periods of time. More important, if they’re good, they’ll be very choosy and they will get multiple offers. But since you’re first, and if you play your cards well, you should be able to reel in these top performers in greater numbers than those recruiters who find them after you do. In this case, your competition has to play catch-up. This is a great position to be in. But to pull it off you have to be an exceptional recruiter. Here are the key recruiting skills needed to turn these top candidates and prospects into great hires.

Recruiting Skills Required to Turn Hot Prospects Into Great Employees

1. You must be able to walk very slowly, not run. People who are fully employed and very strong always have options, even when you get to them first. Most important, they will not move fast. They want to evaluate the situation and compare it to others that will come along. They will give more value to the long-term career growth opportunities than the short-term issues. Good recruiters know they must move slowly, not selling the job, but selling the idea of a staged series of steps where information is mutually shared, all leading toward the best career move among competing alternatives. Moving too fast is a turn-off. It’s equivalent to making a passive candidate complete an application before you talk to the person.
2. You must be able to instantly convert your job into a career move. Passive candidates and early-birds don’t need another job; they want a better job, generally some type of significant career move. If you don’t know the job at a detailed level, you’ll sound like a used-car salesman selling smoke and mirrors. Knowing the job allows you to ask a few questions early in your conversation to see if there are any gaps or voids in the person’s background that your job fills. If you can fill enough of them, your job becomes a career move. For example, if the budget or team the person has managed in the past isn’t as big as your opening, you have a tremendous chance to excite the hot prospect. Doing this with flair, sophistication, and aplomb is essential, but it all starts by preparing a performance profile with the hiring manager. Without this, assume you won’t be hiring too many great people.
3. You must have exceptional verbal and written skills. Top people need to see the recruiter they’re using to advise them as someone credible. This means you need to speak well, have a complete understanding of the job (the performance profile), your company, and your industry including the competition. This includes preparing well-written emails and professional advertising copy. If you’re not comfortable speaking to people you don’t know who are more senior to you organizationally, you’ll not be able to influence them to consider what you have to offer.
4. You must understand human behavior. Candidates’ job requirements change depending on how long they’ve been looking and how desperate they are. You need to find this out right away. If a candidate is not looking, but open-minded, or has just started looking, you need to recognize that the person wants career-oriented information, not detailed job specific information. I wrote a few articles on Maslow a while back that provide some insight on how to adjust what you say and what you do based on where the person is in their job-hunting process. If you don’t modify your approach with this in mind, it’s comparable to selling a hammer to a plumber, or a laptop to someone who wants a smart phone.
5. You must be a partner with your hiring manager client. Good hiring managers — those who can attract and hire strong people to work for them — are an essential element in hiring more talented people. Good recruiters come next. Eliminating job descriptions is number three on the prerequisite list. Four is recruiters and managers working together, both having a completing understanding of real job needs, trusting each other to accurately assess candidates and jointly working through the recruiting process. If you don’t have all of these elements in place, you won’t be able to hire stronger people unless you have a great brand, an excess supply of top talent, and a willingness to spend more than necessary to convince people to accept your offers.
6. You must break some rules. If you want to hire top performers who you’ve found in the sourcing sweet-spot, expect to break from tradition and aggravate some people. For one thing, ignore the job description. For another, ask for forgiveness, not permission, from the comp department. Top people are not part of the average population. They make more money, have less experience, and won’t play by the rules. So you can’t either, if you want to hire them. If you’re uncomfortable with this, you need to only handle candidates who have responded to your ads. You won’t find many top people this way, but you’ll sleep better at night.
7. You must get the candidate to sell you. Selling isn’t recruiting. Paying salary premiums isn’t either, or playing hard-to-get with a person who’s desperate. Anyone can do this. Presenting a career move in a persuasive manner in order to get a top person who’s fully employed and/or has multiple offers excited enough to tell you why he or she is a perfect fit is recruiting. Being able to pull this off is the key to hiring more top performers. It requires that you know the job, use the interview to look for career gaps, and ask respectful, but challenging questions, that encourage candidates to present in-depth insight into what they’ve accomplished. By staying the buyer this way, you’re able to establish and maintain applicant control.
8. You must determine if you’re interested in the prospect, not the other way around. Most recruiters waste so much time calling up top people — both active and passive — making a bumbling pitch about a job opening, hoping for a statement of interest from the prospect. If not, they move to the next name on the list. If the person says yes, they then qualify the person and hope the person is reasonably good enough to send to the hiring manager for an interview. This is a very low yield and time-consuming process. By presenting your opening as a career move, you’ll be able to get the candidate to describe his/her background before you give too many details. Done properly, you’ll be in a position to determine if you’re interested in the candidate for the opening, rather than the candidate making this decision. This is one of a number of critical steps involved in maintaining applicant control.

You know you’re getting better at maximizing the use of time when top prospects tell you they just started looking or are not looking. If you’re determining interest, you can either then decide to move forward at a slow-but-steady pace, or obtain two to three great referrals if you decide they’re not qualified. Since you’re a partner with your hiring manager clients, 100% of your candidates will get interviewed. Since managers are using performance profiles, not job descriptions, to determine competency and fit, fewer candidates will be excluded for bad reasons or superficial interviews. Since you’re offering career moves, rather than non-descript jobs, fewer candidates will voluntarily opt-out of the process along the way.

On top of this, with a career move as the focus, fewer candidates will be screened out at the beginning and fewer offers will be rejected due to monetary reasons. Collectively, this is how you hire twice as many top performers in half the time. Of course, these are rules you must not break.