Recruiting In 3D
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Counteroffers In The Candidate-Driven Market

In what has shifted to a very clear candidate-driven market, candidates have more opportunity for choice among the offers they are fielding. At a quick glance, this is great news for those who have been slogging through a difficult last few years. Since the recession took hold, the market has been largely employer-driven, giving companies the opportunity to be selective about who they bring on board.

A deeper look uncovers a much more unwelcome trend. As with any candidate-driven market, the incidence of candidates accepting counteroffers and/or reneging on offers tends to increase. This is detrimental to both the company hiring and the candidate who experiencing second thoughts. On the company side, there are costs associated with advertising and recruiting for a position. In addition, there is the cost of time spent on interviewing. The interviewing cycle takes time away from completing company initiatives. For those companies, this process needs to begin all over again. Read More

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 Posted on August 21, 2014 by

 candidate relations, Job Hunting, The Hiring Process, Uncategorized

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How Recruiters Can Pay It Forward

Ask a recruiter why they do what they do, and you’re likely to get a wide variety of answers. Among them may be:

  • “I sort of just fell into recruitment”
  • “I’m an extrovert, this was a good fit”
  • “I didn’t want to do sales”
  • “I like helping people”

The fact is, most of us got into this business because deep down we love helping people, just as much if not more than making money. Yes this is true. Fortunately, we’ve picked a profession that allows for both. Career choice FTW! Read More

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 Posted on March 1, 2014 by

 candidate relations, Job Hunting, networking, Recruiting, Recruiting Life

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Just Do The Application. Please?

There are fewer things in this world that irritate me more than when someone can’t follow simple directions. For example, fill out the application (at the time after we’ve scheduled an interview of course – I wouldn’t want to enrage any of the candidate experience gods by asking for legal paperwork too early on when I should be offering a Frappa Mocha Someshit so that I can make them feel right at home.  (I kid, candidate experience is important. Just bear with me here.) Read More

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 Posted on February 26, 2014 by

 candidate relations, legal, Recruiting, Recruiting Life, References

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Counteroffers – Come Together, Right Now…..

I had been thinking alot about how the job market has been rather competitive as of late, and started thinking about counteroffers, as I began to hear more about them. As I was perusing Twitter the other day, I found a gold nugget that brought me back a few years.  Seriously, what did we do before Twitter? I think we waited overnight for news and trends about our respective industries or something like that.

I happened to stumble on a great blog post from Kristina McDougall (I highly recommend the follow on Twitter), about how we’re starting to see the return of the counteroffers and “tire-kickers” in their full glory, a la the great tech boom of the late 90’s and early 2000’s. I suspect that it’s like the infamous killer animals, the Poison Dart Frog and the Box Jellyfish, where people tend to shiver when they hear about these. I digress…..I think Kristina did a great job of walking through the things you should talk to the “tire-kickers” about to vet them out, and do the heavy lifting early on to avoid being window shopped.

And in reality at the end of the day, I think counteroffers will only ebb and flow,  but never disappear. So what’s the fix? The burden of responsibility probably lies with both the recruiter and the candidate. But what can each side do to reduce the chances that a counteroffer will interfere with things?  For starters, both sides need to work together in a relationship-driven, and not a transaction-driven model.  Everyone will feel more engaged. With engagement comes trust.

Here are a few ideas:

Recruiters

  • Be upfront. Talk about the potential pain areas of the role or company, while still accentuating the positive aspects of the organization. Trying to sell everyone sunshine and butterflies only ends up making you look silly, and your candidates know it.
  • Discuss early on the potential that there could be a counteroffer, and discuss this with your candidate. Don’t dance around it. It is an uncomfortable situation, without a doubt. However, it’s not quite as uncomfortable as having to tell a manger or client that the candidate that was hired is suddenly not going to be there for Death By Powerpoint orientation.
  • Don’t badmouth the current company that the candidate works for. It’s cheap and doesn’t make you look any better.

Candidates:

  • Be upfront. Talk to me about why you are really looking. Tell me what you make, and what you want to make going forward.  The more I know about your motivations and what you are looking for, the more I can do in working with managers to get that for you. Skip this, and we’re all just gambling.
  • If you are unhappy now, it’s probably not just about money.  So, more money isn’t going to solve whatever is making want to leave there.
  • Know that if you accept a counteroffer, you are wielding irreparable damage on your relationship with this recruiter. The chances that they will work with you in the future are very slim. If it is a successful and well-networked recruiter, remember that word travels fast.
  • If you accept a counteroffer, know that it is something that will forever be linked with you at your company. Companies rarely give out unexpected sums of money under duress without it being followed by some type of angst.

At the end of the day, if both candidates and recruiters get on the same page with one another from the beginning, we will see fewer  “tire-kickers” and counteroffers accepted.

Feel free to comment on what other things each side can do to reduce the potential for an 11th hour fiasco.

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 Posted on November 17, 2011 by

 candidate relations, Closing the Deal, Job Hunting, Recruiting Life, The Hiring Process, Uncategorized

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Thanks, But No ^#$%&* Thanks!

When you are a recruiter, you get to see all sides of human nature, and all the accompanying emotions. When people get the job, there is elation. When they don’t dejection. You get to see kindness, competitiveness, nervousness and aloofness. While all these things are great and each have their own place, I feel the need to highlight my favorite….stupidity.

I devote a short bit of time (and catharsis) occasionally here at RI3D to the absurd, amazing and usually unbelievable snippets of things recruiters hear. As comedian Ron White says, “You Can’t Fix Stupid”.

Maybe we should have hired that guy after all?
Some of the things that fall into the YCFS category are the things that people write back after being rejected for a job. Look, I get it…..the job market is tough, and you’ve applied to 200 jobs (of which you are qualified for all of them, I know) and I’m just the next recruiter to stand in your way. But there is a graceful way to reply to a rejection, if you feel so compelled to respond to it. Below are two examples of how NOT to respond. Recruiters get hours of entertainment out of these. I hope you get a laugh or two.

  • “LOL I am more than qualified good luck to u”
  • F$ck off – Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

I’d put each of these in context, but, well this is all they wrote. At least I don’t know which cell phone company the first person uses.

Yes friends, the old saying goes, “you can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can’t pick your friend’s nose”. But, you can pick your choice of words.  Aside from the obvious lack of salutations that most professional e-mails tend to contain (what? I embraced my geekdom long ago) and the “sentences” written in “Textglish”, these are pretty funny. I mean, unless you are the angry person who wrote it.

So, if you need to respond, then do so with a little dignity and tact. And maybe one or two less F-bombs.

But then again, those are funny.

If you look close, you can see the Medulla Expletive

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 Posted on November 15, 2011 by

 Bizarre But True, Can't Fix Stupid, candidate relations, Recruiting, Recruiting Life, Uncategorized

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Recruiting In 3D

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