This is a guest post from Freddie Chirgwin-Bell. Working as Marketing & Communications Executive at Morgan Jones, as part of our Recruiting Weekly Series. Freddie shares his thoughts on starting 2022 right with these solid recruitment resolutions.
HAPPY NEW YEAR! The mince pies have gone, the turkey sandwiches have finally been finished, the hangovers have been overcome and now it is back to the office.
It’s a brand new year and with that comes the swarms of people hitting the gym, starting Veganuary, and a whole host of resolutions to be better, healthier, or fitter than last year.
Yet people spend a third of their lives at work, and rarely make professional resolutions. In this vein I propose these recruiters resolutions for 2022.
List the salary!s
It’s 2022 and this is important. The salary is vital. It’s the first thing we look for as job seekers.
The salary is what matters to people. It’s what helps pay their bills and feed their families. By not putting the salary on the advert you’re basically saying “I don’t care about you”.
Why not just look at Emily Buckley’s article here?
For some unknown reason people still don’t state the salary, but by putting it in the job advert you are giving a clear message of who you are looking for.
If you work for an agency you will probably have little control over if you’re allowed to write the salary or not.
But talk to your clients and really emphasise the importance of including the salary (even if it’s a band or a range). That way they’re likely to actually get applications worth your time and (quite literally) money.
If you want something to help you overcome the common objections, I highly recommend you read Emily’s article.
Always give feedback
It doesn’t matter how busy you are, it doesn’t matter what’s going on; GIVE FEEDBACK.
Good news and they got the job? Let them know. Bad news and they haven’t got the job? Let them know. Just giving professional advice to stack the odds in their favour? Let them know!
It’s immensely frustrating not hearing back from an application or job interview.
What’s worse is when everyone goes radio silent and you can’t get an answer from anybody.
Aside from everything this is the polite thing to do. It’s also vital to amazing customer service.
You should also be giving feedback throughout the whole process. Not just after an interview (although I know this is the most common time).
Even if it’s bad news, people will appreciate knowing where they stand, where they can improve for next time and what they need to do next.
Don’t over sell and under deliver
We’ve all done this at some point. This is great business advice but when it comes to us we need to focus on both candidates and clients.
Don’t over promise anything. This past year has been an incredibly tough year for us all and yes we want to get clients back through the doors but over promising results will be a sure way to lose them forever.
Be honest and downplay things a little to then over deliver will always be the best approach.
Abolish targets
This is a biggie but hear me out before you write furious comments below. We recruiters are matchmakers, and we are paid based on making sure we find the right person for the right role. Therefore it should be about quality and quantity.
Yes, we have to make sure that we are earning money, and targets can help motivate people, but it can backfire.
But think about the nature of what we do and you’ll realise that a sniper like, dedicated approach is much more effective and cost efficient than a shotgun en-mass style.
CVs should be sent because they are suitable, not because you’re hitting a quota.
Again quality over quantity, that should be the goal.
A people focused approach is something that will be a key to a successful agency for years to come.
It also makes you better at your craft. That way you will be able to consistently find tactics and strategies that will elevate your game and therefore make you more money.
This also leads to lots of happy candidates and clients. It’s a win win across the board.
Be honest
I have a personal theory about problems. I have found that nearly all problems could have been dealt with and resolved through clear honest communication from the start.
Yes it can feel embarrassing, yes it can feel awkward, but communicating honestly and clearly from the very beginning will spare everyone a lot of headaches and heartaches in the future.
Communication is so important to our work.
Honesty is so much more appreciated by clients in the long run.
When you speak to clients and candidates you might be tempted to fib a little to spare feelings or to try and get a foot in the door. However, being honest from the start will actually save you a lot of headaches and genuinely make your business easier to control.
This ties into the over selling point from earlier, but this is much broader and applies to more areas of our work as recruiters.
Check in
I’ve always likened recruitment to being like professional matchmakers.
A business relationship isn’t just about the placement. It’s about the relationship you build. It’s all about relationships.
I’ve kept this particular resolution towards the end because it builds on the previous points about communication.
Keeping in touch and providing your clients and candidates with a professional relationship they can rely on is very important. Communication is an important of this but relationships better business all round.
It allows you to personalise your approach to better place people as well as likely to keep that relationship going after placement.
You can support your candidates and clients in other areas such as interview techniques, benchmarking, job descriptions and more. This opens up the avenues for more check ins and relationship building that will only better serve your customer service and business.
Give more advice
If you are struggling on a role, find out why candidates aren’t interested and communicate this to your clients. This obviously is similar to the feedback resolution from earlier but this one felt needed more specificity.
At the end of the day you are the expert hired for a job. Part of that is using your experience and knowledge to do the best possible job. With that consulting and advising your candidates and clients should be part of that service.
You should advise and act as the deal maker that benefits everyone.
When all is said and done these resolutions, like all great new years resolutions are made with good intentions. They all exist to better ourselves professionally. Resolutions will help your career and your business, they will improve and better our industry and even better the craft of recruitment as a whole.
Author Bio:
Freddie is the Marketing & Communications Executive at Morgan Jones. He is dedicated to creating informative, clear, and actionable content that truly adds value and helps people. You can connect with him on LinkedIn
