Hiring you is good for me
I want to hire you. Seriously, my only job is to find the most awesome people and hire them. The more awesome people I can find and hire, the easier my job is. The easier my job is the more time I have for the million and one other things I’d love to do for my company. So why is it that every day there are rants out there from disgruntled candidates screaming and yelling about how awful us recruiters are?
We’re not all great, some don’t respect the candidate or the time or the process. Let’s take those out of the equation for the moment, we will leave their companies to deal with them. Let’s instead focus on good recruiters (I am self selecting into this category) and you, the candidate, the job hunter, the talent.
So back to my original statement, I want you to be successful, I need you to be successful, BUT I cannot make you successful, only you can do that.
I can debrief with you on the job description but I can’t give you deep examples of every specific thing my hiring manager is looking for. Why? Well two good reasons. One is that I don’t do that job so I am likely not the best at giving you the most coherent response, and two this is an interview. We need to see what you know and don’t know, if you can research everything beforehand. How do I figure out what’s real and what’s memorized? Did the teacher give you the questions before the exam? No they wanted to get an actual overview of your knowledge and areas that need support or growth.
So now it’s up to you. Every single hiring manager and team you meet wants you to be successful, they don’t want to interview 15 people, they have a job to do. They are exhausted, they need the help, they want to come out of the meeting with you and be dying to hire you. They are frustrated and unhappy when they don’t. But that’s not their fault. They are looking for a skill set, or an attitude, or an ability that lets candidate make a convincing pitch as to why they are right for this role. Yes, some hiring teams have unrealistic expectations of what they want but there’s nothing an outsider can really do about that other than put their best foot forward.
Here are my top things to do/not do:
Don’t expect me to figure out the right job for you, if that’s your strategy I am only going to place you in a role you already have. I can’t be a mind reader, so tell me what you want and why you can make that transition.
Put some effort into your applications. Yes, it’s frustrating to put work into an application and get zero in return, but I promise you if you put effort in you’ll likely get something back. If there are interesting questions at the bottom of an application fill those out…I read those before I read the resume!
Stop applying for jobs you’re wildly unqualified to do. That doesn’t mean only apply for lateral moves, but if you are two years out of school and you’re applying for a managing director role at the bank the only thing you’re doing is frustrating the company.
Don’t apply for every job on a company’s site. Resumes tend to all go to the same person or into an ATS system which lists them under your name, so you’re not tricking anyone and you look unfocused.
Sell yourself! I saw an article the other day about it being a “candidates market” and how employers should just be happy to get your application. That attitude won’t get you anywhere. People want to hire people who want to be there, so show them that by having real solid reasons for having applied.
Research the company. More often than not I’ll get on the phone or meet with candidates that have done zero research on our company, or only read Glassdoor reviews. They genuinely have no idea what we do, how we do it, or why we do it.
Spend more time applying for the right jobs versus throwing everything out there in hopes of something sticking and you’ll likely see a better response rate.
Finally. go into every job as if it’s “the one” and we will go in as if you’re “the one” and let’s try to live happily ever after!