Did the Marketing VP Just Say "I Love Recruiting!"?

I've been asked a lot recently about my recruitment philosophy.  I'm sorry to say that the genesis of this question lies in the reality that many senior executives do not perceive that their in-house recruitment teams create value.  They see them as administrative and compliance arms of the HR department; junior people who manage too many open requisitions and are simply not instrumental in the identification, attraction and acquisition of talent.

This question has re-surfaced for me a memory of a hiring VP at Cisco who said, "I've never once hired a candidate brought to me by our recruiting department." I also recall, from years ago, a hiring manager at IBM complimenting our recruiting organization for the manner in which the paperwork was processed.

So, what does it take to get the Marketing VP or any hiring manager to say "I love our company's recruitment team!" ? My philosophy is that it takes a recruitment team that can teach them to fish, stock the pond, and prepare the meal.

Teach Them to Fish

It is absolutely essential that hiring managers are taught "to fish".  First, and perhaps most importantly, in-house recruitment teams need to assure that hiring managers understand that recruitment is a continuous, critical, exciting aspect of their job as a manager.  A hiring manager who views recruitment as a process only to be engaged to fill an open position will be grossly disappointed with the performance of that process.  All managers need to scout for talent as a daily aspect of their duties - they need to be ambassadors of the company's product or service and employment brand.  Company recruiters need to be an ever-present reminder to their managers of the need to be cultivating relationships with candidates.

Question:  Do your recruiters ever speak to managers who do NOT have an open requisition?

Filling an open position does require execution of a process and managers should be taught how that process works. It is the role of the recruitment team to do this.  The major process elements I see include:.

1. The job needs to be described and how it fits with the team defined; 
2. The job needs to be advertised creatively;
3. Candidates need to be identified, screened and presented;
4. A finalist slate of candidates needs to be developed;
5. Slated candidates need to be interviewed;
6. Interviewed candidates need to be evaluated and stack ranked;
7. An offer needs to be developed, presented and negotiated;
8. The selected candidate needs to be closed and "managed" until start; and
9. A plan needs to be built to maximize assimilation and minimize time to productivity.

It should be acknowledged that there are opportunities for learning in each and every one of the process elements listed above.  How do you construct a job? What does creative advertising look like?  What is a robust screening methodology?  How does one interview effectively? How does an effective selection process work?  This is another area where the recruitment team can and should create value.

Question:  Do your recruitment teams teach?  What would they represent as their subject matter expertise? Interviewing skills?  Selection practices?  Offer negotiation?  Great company recruiters see a never ending opportunity to teach their hiring managers.

Stock the Pond

In the days prior to social media and the introduction of Gen Y to the workplace, a company recruiter who taught a manager to fish might earn the "I love our company recruiter!" badge. Today, company recruitment teams need to do more.  They need to stock the pond.

In the world of sales and services, one might think of client or customer relationship management.  Think salesforce.com. In the world of recruitment, we must think of candidate relationship management. Great in-house recruitment teams know what are their company's key skills, critical roles, or growth areas and look to associate a robust pool of candidates with each.  They leverage some form of candidate relationship management tool to account for their candidates, and engage with the best of the lots they are cultivating not unlike a sales executive engages with key accounts.  Check in notes.  Status updating. Birthday wishes.  Company news and notes.  Great recruitment teams have an engagement strategy and they execute it religiously.

Question:  Can your recruiters define for you their key roles? Can they describe for you the health of the pipeline they associate with each?  Are they asking you for budget to engage the best of their candidate lots?  What is their engagement strategy?

Prepare the Meal

In preparing a meal, you want to feel great about what you are about to eat (interview and selection), you want to believe that you got a fair deal (offer), and you want the meal to fortify you and keep you healthy in the long term (time to productivity).

Great company recruitment teams make their hiring managers better at talent assessment and selection.  They understand competency (i.e., knowledge, skills, experiences and behaviors that predict success in a role) and they help managers assess it in the interview process.  They have insights into the company's employee value proposition, and enable managers to negotiate offers that honor that value proposition and, in parallel, position new hires equitably among peers.  And, they don't rest at offer acceptance; they realize that the ultimate goal is new employee ramp to productivity and they influence and persuade until they experience the impact of their new hire on organizational performance.

Question:  Can your recruiters explain your competency model?  Can they excite you with their description of your company's value proposition?  Can they tell you about the hire they made in the past six months that has them most excited?  Can they tell you about the one who got away and why they haven't quit trying to get her back into the fold?

Take a moment to ask one of your company recruiters any of these questions, plan your HR investments in such a manner that allows them to answer each in a positive manner and, over time, you'll see your team's performance elevate to the point where that Marketing VP says, "I love our company's recruitment team!"

Paul E. DuCharme October 2013