Smarter Hires

Think back to the last time you were looking for a job. Chances are, you either were contacted by a recruiter or made direct contact yourself with the hiring company. And chances are, even if you got the job, you weren’t entirely happy with the recruitment experience.

Stories are legion about human resources professionals who not only fail to respond to unsolicited and solicited inquiries but also fail to follow up with candidates they’ve interviewed in person. And when it come to outside recruiters, well the story usually is worse.

I know the excuses: We’re too busy to follow up with everyone who responds to a job posting. Applicants should understand that if we don’t follow up with them, we’re not interested. And, if you’re an outside recruiter: We work for the hiring company, not the candidates, so they can’t expect service from us.

I also know the damage such behavior can do to the reputation of the hiring company and the recruiter it engages.

I have vowed never to do business with the bank that put my stepdaughter through a series of interviews and then left her in the lurch, never responding to her emails and calls about the status of her candidacy. And I have vowed never to refer a client or candidate to one of Manhattan’s best know media recruiters after she agreed to meet with an old friend about his career prospects and then brushed him off with a perfunctory and rude telephone call. (By the way, he’s an owner of one of the world’s most prestigious media companies, so her rudeness is all the more astonishing).

So how should a corporate or outside recruiter handle candidates to ensure that a hiring company’s reputation, and a recruiting firm’s reputation, isn’t compromised?

1) Make clear what a candidate can expect. If you are posting an ad online or in a newspaper, it’s entirely proper to state that applicants who do not meet the stated requirements for the position will not receive a response because of the volume of expected applications. If you are a recruiter, put together a standard email message explaining that the process of sourcing candidates is likely to take xx weeks and that a candidate should not expect a response from you until then. Send it after you receive a CV from someone you’ve contacted.

2) Release candidates as soon as it’s clear they aren’t going to make it to the next round. I periodically go through the list of candidates I have contacted for a position (a list that may number in the hundreds) and release those who don’t measure up against the top twenty or thirty. (I never release the last couple of dozen until the very end because the top three choices I present to a client might ultimately decline an offer).

3) Put together, if appropriate for the level of position you are filling, an update email that goes to all candidates. It can state briefly where you are in the process (“We continue to source candidates for this position.”), what the next step will be (“when we have completed the sourcing process we will reach out to those candidates whom we want to interview in more depth”), and give an estimated timeline (“we expect this process to take another month.”

A bit of work? Yes. But that’s what you’re paid for, isn’t it? And if you want to recruit employees who reflect well on the company, consider your role as the company’s initial contact.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 22nd, 2009 at 8:52 am and is filed under Executive Recruiters, Followup, Interviewing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.