You and I know that people make a business. It’s still true, but the workforce is evolving and yesterday’s human capital strategies don’t appeal to today’s youngest professionals. The once-golden management philosophies we’ve relied on for generations have tarnished with age.

Recruiters everywhere are growing increasingly frustrated with the Millennials (born between 1980 and 2000). I recently had a veteran recruiter tell me he’s given up on the entire generation. After one too many mis-hires, he plans to ignore them and solely recruit Boomers and Gen Xers. While that may sound tempting to those of us who’ve been burned by the inconsistent Millennials, it is a short-sighted business plan. Millennials are a generation roughly the size of the Boomers -and will be just as influential. Very soon there will be no large-scale recruiting success without them.

Like all recruiters, we deal with generational issues on a regular basis at JSI. We’ve come a long way, but we still experience the occasional failure. We recently had a young candidate interview-ing with a major hospital for a healthcare IT position. He was two years out of college with solid experience within the hospital’s area of focus. We received an offer of 80K annual salary for him, which was a jump of 28K. Imagine that leap in your early career!

Relocation was required but it incurred no cost of living adjustment and the hospital agreed to cover all moving costs. Throughout the interview process, we’d had positive feedback from our candidate so we thought we had a done deal. But after agonizing for two weeks, the candidate still couldn’t make up his mind. Not surprisingly, the hiring manager got fed up and pulled the offer. When the candidate found out, he seemed relieved. It turned out he was still living at home with his parents, and he didn’t want to leave the comforts provided by mommy and daddy. Lesson learned.

Millennials are young. In some ways, thanks to societal forces, they’re younger than any other adults have ever been. But with a thorough understanding of their unique generational identity, recruiters can manage Millennials to achieve great success. Are you ready?

Meet the Millennials

The oldest Millennial is just 28 years old. They’re very different from their older co-workers. They come into any organization with exceptionally high expectations. Our national obsession with children, which resurfaced in a big way in the 1990s, has endowed them with a very strong sense of self. They grew up confident that they were the center of their parents’ world and they bring that assurance to the workplace. They have been highly valued all their lives and they expect it to continue – even from their employers.

These are not people who will remain in unpleasant or disappointing surroundings for long. They demand much from their workplace and their boss. Work is a means to an end. That’s it. Whereas Boomers define themselves by work and Gen X values work-life balance, Millennials see work and life as inseparable. The two are intertwined, meaning they bring life to work. It’s not uncommon for a Millennial to be texting a friend while on the phone with a client or even during a meeting. They are accomplished multi-taskers, having spent their lives perfecting it, and they see it as an asset.

This is the first generation to grow up with digital media. They prefer to communicate via texting, instant messaging, and email, not chatting on a traditional phone. They understand and use technology. They are the driving force behind the surge in social networking tools.

They are notoriously indecisive – thanks to their parents. Millennials have never had to make any major decisions thus far in life. Doting, well-meaning parents have called the shots until now. The result is that even the most assertive Millennial will have trouble making a final decision on anything.

How to Recruit and Work with Millennials

Become their trusted advisor – help guide and mentor them

As recruiters, it’s essential that we establish the right relationship with Millennials. They need our guidance to set and meet career goals. Although they look like adults, they can be child-like in their decision-making. Position yourself from the beginning of your relationship as a lesson instructor or a coach/mentor. They’ve had a lot of those growing up and they implicitly trust those roles. Make it clear that you’re there for them long term, and your goal is to help them achieve their goals.

Set professional expectations early

They’re used to older adults calling the shots. Don’t be afraid to outline rules up front for your recruiter/client relationship. Define how you will work together: “As a recruiter, I have a role and responsibilities, just as you as a candidate have a role and responsibilities. We both need to live up to these to be successful.”

Make sure they have a clear understanding of things like realistic compensation, decision time frames, returned call times, interview processes, etc. They need your guidance here. Set expectations early to avoid unpleasant surprises later.

Establish preferred communication methods

This can be a big adjustment for experienced recruiters. We’re used to phone time, but you can’t count on traditional landlines when working with Millennials. Most prefer using email or cell phones. Save yourself time and worry by establishing right away how they’ll stay in touch. Even after that conversation, always use multiple contacts to reach a Millennial candidate. Every time you call them, also send an email, call their cell phone, and send a text message. Don’t worry about overkill, they’re so accustomed to hovering parents they’ll think nothing of it.

Understand their dream job

It’s not about you… it’s about them. These are kids used to their elders helping them get what they want. Listen to their dreams. Ask them to describe their perfect job. Yes, they often have unrealistic advancement and salary expectations. But that’s where you, as a trusted advisor, earn your money. It doesn’t help you or your candidate to nurture false hopes. Be honest: tell them what is realistic and what is not. Coach them, using the right game plan to make it happen.

Don’t underestimate the importance of environment and culture

These are not people used to being bored. They’ve grown up constantly entertained. Whether it was playing Nintendo or heading to football practice, they’re used to doing something every waking minute. No generation in history has had less downtime. Millennials thrive in a vibrant, active work environment. Boredom is the enemy and they won’t tolerate it for long. At JSI, flat-screen TVs tuned to 24-hour news can be viewed from every desk. We have XM radio pumping. There’s a putting green in the corner, the occasional football in the air, and bells to ring when placements are inked. I do all I can to create an energetic culture, one that fosters group participation and multi-tasking.

As a recruiter, make sure you understand the culture of an organization before sending in a Millennial. The right environment can be a great selling point to attract a candidate. Conversely, if you know a firm is set in its dreary ways, don’t even bother. It isn’t a match with a Millennial.

Cater to their social leanings

Millennials are products of the group project. They are adept at working with others to accomplish a goal because it was a huge part of their education. They appreciate diversity and will make allowances for all types of differences. This is a social generation that truly enjoys professional back-and-forth. They derive satisfaction from making an impact while working in a group. One thing to keep in mind: their loyalty to the group can supersede any allegiance to a company.

Don’t be tempted to whitewash

If you want to avoid mis-hires, don’t exaggerate or minimize to cater to a Millennial. Give a truthful description of both the position and the organization. Millennials are not afraid to leave a disappointing work environment. Quickly. They want to be paid well and I don’t mean in the future, so it’s important that you give them realistic expectations about things like compensation, raises, new responsibilities, and promotions. It will benefit you both in the long run.

Obey the platinum rule

In today’s workforce, the golden rule is no longer the standard. You can’t treat Millennials the way in which you would like to be treated and expect great results. Millennials are an entirely new generation, born into the lap of convenience and fed from the spoon of immediate gratification. They’ve never had to roll down a car window or hear a busy signal on a phone. They were raised by parents who provided all they needed and more. They are, as much as it makes me feel old to say it, very different from Boomers and Gen Xers.

To achieve success in a multigenerational workforce that will one day be dominated by Millennials, adhere to the platinum rule. Treat Millennials the way they want to be treated, not the way you think they should be treated. Agree to their communication methods and styles. Understand what they’re trying to achieve and help them get there.

This is a unique generation, with new values and expectations. But recruiters who can successfully develop professional relationships with Millennials today are laying the groundwork for tomorrow’s success. Because it is to this youngest generation that much responsibility – and profitability – will eventually come. And the recruiters who have helped them along the way will be richly rewarded.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker, writer, and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who bill on average over $1 million annually. Since 1999, he has achieved over $9 million in cash-in on his personal desk performance. Jon has also established JSI as a top 10% executive search firm. The office has won 15 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program for recruiters and recruiting managers called “Magnum Program.” He also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, “Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach.” Are you ready to take your company or career to the next level? Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910, jon@jonathanscott.com, or www.talentwinsonline.com.

Have you ever heard of sweat equity? I have a friend who talked about it constantly while he was building his business. If a coworker was in the office (or in this case, the car dealership) until 9 p.m. five nights a week, my friend had to be there until 11 p.m. seven nights a week. I have to admit, he made a decent living. In fact, he went on to run his own dealerships and to demand this same time commitment from his top employees. But when I look at his life, his divorce, the kids’ activities he missed, the friends he ignored because he didn’t have time for them, I wonder if he still believes it was all worth it.

Recently I interviewed Sam Carpenter, author of Work the System (www.workthesystem.com), on “Talent Wins,” my human capital-focused radio show (www.talentwinsonline.com). Work the System, due to be released this month, details how Sam found himself working 100 hours a week at his service business. But the hours weren’t turning into dollars. He was on the verge of bankruptcy. He could barely make payroll. He was sleeping on a cot at his office. His business owned him.

Fast-forward two years. Sam’s business is profitable, and his workweek is down from 100 hours to – are you ready for this – two hours per week! Sam turned his business and his life around by solving one problem at a time. He put into place systems that worked. And he wrote a book about it. It’s a compelling story, and it made me think. Wouldn’t it be nice to spend more time with your kids, your spouse, and your friends without feeling guilty? Is it possible to do more of the things we enjoy instead of feeling obligated to live at the office because we never accomplish enough?

The good news is that in executive recruiting, we can. You can get done what needs to be done in your professional life and still have time for a rewarding private life. I’m not going to tell you that, like Sam, you’ll be working two hours a week. But by doing things much the same way Sam did, by solving a few problems and enacting effective systems, recruiters can attain more success in less time. Here’s how.

Identify your time-wasters

Time-wasters are productivity killers. If you’re struggling with a task, it can invade your workday and steal precious time. Maybe you’re having trouble with your recruiting software. That could mean you’re spending a lot more time than you should on this process. Or maybe you avoid this essential part of your job completely. Both can lead to failure.

Successful recruiters must be courageous enough to name their weaknesses. Whether it is learning the technology tools, marketing, closing, qualifying . . . identify your problem area. Then determine whether you can improve your performance through increased training or focus. If so, do what it takes to get better. If you can’t figure out a way to substantially improve your skills, it may be time to consider outsourcing the task. Is there someone in the office who is strong in your weakest area? Can you pay or trade, partner, or barter with a colleague to handle the time-waster for you so you can focus on that which you do well – and thereby increase your own productivity?

Identify high-value activities and spend more time on them

What are the high-value activities you perform every day? In recruiting, these usually involve client or candidate communication. Period. All the rest are low-value activities.

During selling time – which is typically 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. with a noon lunch-break – successful recruiters are completely focused on high-value activities. They are not emailing friends, checking their voice mail every five minutes, talking about sports with their cubicle partner, or going to the break room 15 times a day. They are only concerned with high-value recruiting activities. To avoid the nonproductivity trap, identify necessary low-value activities and schedule them for anytime prior to 8:30 a.m., after 5 p.m., or during your lunch break. Don’t let them eat away at your recruiting day.

Speaking of schedules . . .

The reason why successful people like schedules is because they work. An efficient schedule is how the world operates efficiently. In recruiting it’s no different. An unplanned and unscheduled day is an unproductive day. An efficient, scheduled day yields gold. My office is run by the following basic schedule:

8:00 a.m. Arrive and check email and plan for the day
8:15 a.m. Morning meeting – entire office
8:45 a.m. Team meeting – individual markets
9:00 a.m. Hot calls – closes, interview debriefs, candidate presentations, search assignments, etc.
9:30 a.m. Uninterrupted A-Player marketing calls
11:30 a.m. Return voice mails, read, send emails, get fee agreements sent to office support
Noon Lunch
1:00 p.m. Hot calls that have developed from morning
1:30 p.m. Uninterrupted recruiting calls on job #1
3:00 p.m. Uninterrupted recruiting calls on job #2
4:00 p.m. Return phone calls, check email, afternoon debriefs and preps
4:30 p.m. Plan for next day

Note the uninterrupted call periods – your ticket to efficiency. They are essential to getting more done in less time. Safeguard them by putting your phone on “do not disturb” or having the office manager hold your calls during these periods.

Don’t be afraid to experiment with your schedule, customizing it for maximum results. Whether you use our office’s plan or develop your own, when you stick to a daily schedule, you’ll be amazed at the increase in your productivity.

Hold yourself accountable for every minute

There are only so many hours in the day, and if you don’t want to live at the office, you need to make the most of every minute. That means you need to make some tough decisions. To get more accomplished in less time, prioritize. Identify that which is worth your time each day and that which is not. Throughout the day, evaluate whether or not you’re staying true to your high-value activities. Hold yourself accountable by asking, “Is this the best use of my time right now?” You may be surprised by how much time you waste on low-value activities and how easy it is to turn that around quickly.

Realize what your time is worth

Time is money. When you waste an hour of selling time during the day, you are literally cheating yourself out of cash. Would you drive down the street throwing $20 bills out the car window? A recruiter with a yearly income of $50,000 who loses an hour a day to low-value activities might as well climb into his car and start throwing. At $50K a year, your time is worth $24 per hour, at $100K it’s $48 per hour, and at $150K it’s $72 per hour. The next time you find yourself tempted to call a buddy during selling time, picture yourself throwing away your hard-earned cash. It can keep you focused.

Make technology work for you – not against you

The last five years have seen an explosion in technology that makes our job so much easier. Today’s recruiter has the potential to get more daily information faster than ever. Job aggregators, job alerts, news alerts, they are all readily available. Remember, every piece of knowledge about developments, trends, and people in your market sets you apart. Make technology work for you. Here’s how:

1. Get the latest industry news. If you don’t have one, open a Google or Yahoo email account to receive news alerts based on target accounts, industries, and key words.

2. Uncover potential job leads at the job aggregators, which are spider engines that go to all of the job boards (www.simplyhired.com, www.indeed.com, www.just-posted.com, www.jobster.com). If you haven’t, subscribe to them and sign up for job alerts. To research available jobs from company websites, try www.hound.com.

3. Let candidates come to you automatically by setting up candidate alerts on the job boards. The candidate-alert brand for www.monster.com can be found under SmartFind. They will come to your email as often as once per day.

4. Use the social network sites to your advantage. Sites such as www.linkedin.com, www.myspace.com, and www.facebook.com are social network sites that can help you find the hidden talent in a specific market. There are social network aggregators that can search multiple sites at once – www.wink.com is a good example. The new sites can give a recruiter an edge in finding the hidden talent in the marketplace.

By taking advantage of these systems, you allow technology to work for you, saving you valuable time and resources. Once a day – during nonselling time – check the results of these systems.

Being a great recruiter is all about making the most of every minute. Yet many in our profession won’t take the initiative to read this article, much less to enact these basic, but essential, timesavers and problem-solvers. These very simple systems of accountability can bring great rewards. Like my guest Sam, those of us who choose to adhere to a strict schedule and focus on high-value activities will find that it is possible to get more results in less time.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker, writer, and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who bill on average over $1 million annually. Since 1999, he has achieved over $9 million in cash-in on his personal desk performance. Jon has also established JSI as a top 10% executive search firm. The office has won 15 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program for recruiters and recruiting managers called “Magnum Program.” He also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, “Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach.” Are you ready to take your company or career to the next level? Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910, jon@jonathanscott.com, or www.talentwinsonline.com.

It’s a New Year, and there is resolution in the air. With a new year comes a fresh start and new opportunities. Many people will set lofty personal and professional goals in these first weeks of 2008 in hopes of changing their lives and careers in significant ways. Unfortunately, very few of us will actually manage to achieve these goals, or to even remember what goals were set come February 1.

Hopes and dreams can disappear all too quickly. Life gets busy, work gets harder, problems arise, and you are left feeling further away than ever from meeting your goals and resolutions. Does this sound familiar? Do you begin every year full of anticipation, only to surrender to the daily hustle? Ask yourself: are you content to live the same life, to perform at the same level, day after day, year after year? Or are you really ready and determined to make a change?

This is your year, the year to make it happen. Now is the perfect time to set and actually begin to meet personal and professional goals. And I’ve got the secret. I know how top achievers attain their goals, no matter how big or bold they are. It’s simple. They pay the price of success!

What does it mean to pay the price of success? It means you know what to do. You have the desire to do it. You are willing to do it. You are able to do it. And finally, you get in there and do it!

In the search business, the four-hour phone day is an undisputed universal truth. If you can connect with candidates and clients for four hours every day, you’ve got a very good chance of being successful in our industry. But do we do it?

At a speech recently, I asked about 350 account executives, “Can we all agree that four hours per day of phone time is critical to our success?” Three hundred and fifty hands shot into the air. I followed with “How many of you actually hit four hours of phone time per day?” Just three hands went up. Three people out of 350, yet every single person in that room knew what they needed to do. They just didn’t do it.

It can be tempting to take shortcuts, to ignore your instincts about success. A personal example: a few years ago my office was hovering around 3.5 hours average daily phone time. My goal for each individual was four hours per day, and two people were hitting it regularly, two phone-time heroes. But the majority of my team was just getting by with the minimum. A new recruiting manager came to me and suggested that we lower the phone-time goal to 3.5 hours per day to make everyone feel better. Against my better judgment (remember know what to do and do it?), I agreed. Two months into this idea and our pair of phone-time heroes continued to perform well. Everyone else in the office dropped to an average of just three hours per day. I admitted my mistake, and realized that people tend to perform at or below minimum expectations for success in all areas of their lives.

As a business owner, someone who is dedicated to training and delivering top achievers, I’ve thought long and hard about why this is. The answers I’ve found can serve as a road map to success.

1. Society Has Begun to Accept, and Expect, Underperformance

This is the era of participation awards. Sports, schools, jobs . . . they all reward participation versus real achievement. Just showing up should not be cause for celebration. Yet today, parties are thrown for graduating from the fifth grade. Trophies are handed out to every member of the team instead of honoring top performers. Society seems to value mediocrity. At soccer games at our local junior high school, they don’t display the true final score of a soccer game if one team won by more than five goals. School officials don’t want players and their parents to feel bad. Are you outraged? You should be. Because it isn’t just kids’ soccer we’re talking about. It’s establishing the false premise that “average is acceptable.” The truth is, there are winners and losers in life. In the real world, we don’t get to choose to acknowledge only the scores we like. We aren’t rewarded for simply participating. It’s all about getting the job done better. Don’t ever let it be okay for you or your office to be just average.

2. We Don’t Know What to Do

You can’t win the game if you don’t know the rules. To be successful in business – and recruiting – you’ve got to know what you’re doing. If you don’t understand how to make an effective marketing call, or how to set up a metrics system to manage your recruiting office, you’d better find out. It isn’t enough to just say you want to succeed. You need to learn everything there is to know about recruiting. I often wonder if people studied more in high school or college than they do when learning their profession. You need to take every day in the office as seriously as final exams in college. If you are primed with in-depth professional knowledge, you can’t fail. You need to be a student of the game, obtaining all the information you can to help you be more successful at what you do.

As recruiters, we have so many great resources. “The Fordyce Letter,” wonderful training programs, and fantastic coaches are available to you that can give you valuable, continuing education and mentoring. Don’t let lack of knowledge stop you from achieving your goals.

3. We Know What to Do, Know How to Do It, But Don’t

Many people know exactly what to do, and exactly how to do it. Yet they simply choose not to. It’s always surprising to me to see great recruiters show up to work with no plan for the day. I guess that’s why we have superstars. Because they are in the minority, they always get the job done, no matter what. The average performer knows very well he should plan for the next day before leaving the office. But there’s always a reason why it’s more important to walk out the door at 5 p.m. today than to plan to be successful for the next.

It’s sort of like grabbing that second doughnut in the office break room. Everyone says they want to be healthy. Everyone knows they shouldn’t eat junk and sit around playing video games instead of going to the gym. But many, many of us are unwilling to apply what we know and execute it by working out and eating right.

Unfortunately, the cost of failure in life is much bigger than whether or not you look fit in your suit. When you fail to achieve career success, it affects not only you, but also your kids, your spouse, and your friends. If you choose not to pay the price of success, you fail, and it can quickly become a habit. Repeated over and over, dreams become distant prayers, and your true potential never materializes. A lot of things can happen along with habitual failure, and none of it is good.

One in 10 new account executives and search consultants make it to their one-year anniversary in recruiting. That means 90% of the people fail in this business. Staggering, isn’t it? It sounds like the odds are against you, but the good news is, there is a way to dramatically increase your chance of success for every new recruiter or struggling veteran.

Define Success and Set Your Goals

Before you can succeed, you need to define exactly what that means to you. At the beginning of each year, my entire team and I write our personal scorecards. We reassess all areas of our lives, including personal, financial, career, material possessions, spirituality, and giving. We set or adjust goals based on what we hope to make happen in the new year. Being a great leader isn’t about what I want my employees to achieve; what matters is how I help them achieve their own goals.

Remember, success cannot be defined by a manager, your wife, or your buddies. That is up to you and you alone. Start putting your personal scorecard together today to help define what you want to accomplish. If you need an example of a personal scorecard, go to www.talentwinsonline.com/news.htm.

Identify Your Weaknesses

You know the adage “Nobody’s perfect.” Take a look at yourself in an objective way. Make a list. Identify your weaknesses and develop an action plan detailing how you will attain the skills and information you need to improve and get to the top of your game. How is your planning? Are you meeting your goals for calls per day and phone time? Do you have an in-depth knowledge of your niche? How are your selling and closing skills? Are you managing your employees well? Never let yourself get too satisfied. Be a seeker: keep abreast of the latest professional trends and pertinent information to make sure you are constantly getting better at what you do.

Measure Your Progress

It’s essential to evaluate your performance every day, week, month, and quarter. Measuring your activity and results allows you to determine whether you are on track to hit your goals. If your stated objective is to deliver four hours of daily phone time, don’t leave the office until you achieve that. Often you can get that extra job order or send-out just by making a few more calls. Success doesn’t fall into the laps of clock-watchers. It is earned by people who know they need to work until they meet their goals, not walk out the door because it’s 5 o’clock. I believe it’s a good habit to stay in the office until 5:30 or 6 p.m. every night. That extra time could be the difference between achieving and missing your goals.

Once you’ve achieved your goals one day, focus on hitting them for two days in a row. Then three days. Pretty soon you will be conditioned to do what you need to do to achieve your activity numbers on a daily and weekly basis.

Learn from Your Mistakes

Sometimes the worst times are the best times to ask yourself the hard questions. If you’ve gone the entire day, week, or even month without achieving a specific goal, ask yourself why. What was I doing between calls? Why didn’t I get that send-out? Why didn’t the candidate accept the offer? How could I have avoided that? How can I make sure it never happens again? Be willing to evaluate your performance and make changes. It is the fastest way to achieve your goals.

Redefine Your Comfort Zone

People tend to hang out in their comfort zone. If a recruiter is uncomfortable marketing and not seeing a lot of success, it is natural to begin to do less marketing, with the result being little to no improvement. Recruiters who are uncomfortable qualifying and preclosing candidates need to force themselves to go through these steps repeatedly to improve their skills. Every one of us needs to push ourselves to reach new professional comfort levels so that we see measurable improvement in our performance. When we get comfortable with that which once made us uncomfortable, we get stronger.

Get Personal Leverage

What is leverage? It’s any constraint that makes backing away much more difficult. You may think it sounds foolish to put unnecessary constraints on your actions, but in reality it can give you new professional freedom. Leverage may be the best way to overcome psychological barriers that prevent you from staying focused. There are many different ways you can create leverage. Start by defining your motivation for achieving your goals. My friend Kent Burns from MRI wrote a great book entitled “What’s Your Why?” His premise: if you can define the reason to achieve a goal, you will be much more committed to it. Is it your career, your family, your kids? You need to know what is driving you to make it happen.

A few tips to create personal leverage:

- Make a written commitment, establishing exactly what you will do on a daily basis. Put in writing the specific number of calls you will make a day, or your daily phone-time goals. When things are in writing, instead of just mental notes, they tend to happen.

- Tell a friend or find a goal partner. Now that you’ve written your objectives down and created a good why, enlist others to help you stay on track. This person must be someone who will be supportive and who has an understanding of the business, but also someone who won’t let you off the hook if you start to waver.

- Establish short-term commitments. These can be much stronger than long-term goals. They allow you to focus your efforts and get great momentum early on. Short-term commitments could include calls per day, marketing presentations per day, or job orders per week. It is about establishing a new pattern of behavior, and that can be very powerful.

- Reward yourself for small victories and achievements. When you find yourself meeting daily or weekly commitments, treat yourself to something special. You need to start feeling good about your successes, to condition your body and mind to winning. Repeated small success will end in big successes. Reward yourself. Then get right back into the game and achieve more.

- By the same token, punish yourself for not achieving results. Yes, it’s the pain-and-pleasure principle. Wiser men than I have put forth that human beings are far more motivated by pain than pleasure because it is linked more closely to survival. While getting a big check in or placing a senior executive is exciting and motivating, a loaded gun pointed at your head is even more so. Think of some small negative rewards for not achieving results. “If I don’t hit my send-outs for the week, I will run an extra five miles over the weekend.” Or “If I don’t meet my phone-time today, I will go to work an hour early the next day.” Punishment can be a very effective way to keep you on track.

Believe That Failure Is Not an Option

When you don’t accept failure as a possibility, you can’t lose. This is a powerful rule to live by. Napoleon Bonaparte used this to his advantage. When sending his soldiers into war, he instructed them to burn their ships upon arrival. They were left with no option but to attack the enemy and win because there could be no retreat. Apply this to your life and you will be amazed. When failure is not an option, people will do whatever it takes to succeed.

The difference between a life well lived and a life half lived is as simple as a decision. Whether or not you choose to pay the price of success can determine whether at the end of the day you look back on your life with joy or regret.

This is a new year, a great time to make it happen. You know what to do. You’re willing to do it. Now get in there and do it. I guarantee that a year from now, you’ll thank me.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker, writer, and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who bill on average over $1 million annually. Since 1999, he has achieved over $9 million in cash-in on his personal desk performance. Jon has also established JSI as a top 10% executive search firm. The office has won 15 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program for recruiters and recruiting managers called “Magnum Program.” He also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, “Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach.” Are you ready to take your company or career to the next level? Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910, jon@jonathanscott.com, or www.talentwinsonline.com.

Today it’s a candidate’s market, full of bountiful opportunities and lots of choices. The best candidates know exactly how valuable they are, and that isn’t good news for our industry.

Candidates are often so intoxicated with their own worth that they do not see the need for outside advice or help. They’ve got the power, and they aren’t afraid to use it. Exceptional offers are being turned down at record levels. Candidates are growing increasingly selective. It’s becoming more and more difficult to keep control of our candidates and the hiring process.

I don’t know about you, but I have experienced a growing sense of entitlement within the talent market, at all levels.

If you’re frustrated, you’re not alone. I recently talked to a colleague who has billed over $400K annually for two decades in pharmaceutical recruiting. He said the past 10 months have been the least rewarding of his entire career. “Candidates aren’t returning my calls,” he said. “They’re accepting counteroffers and falling off in huge numbers.”

This is a conversation I’m having with recruiters all around the country. We’re losing our influence with candidates, and we need to reestablish our relevance in a very real way. But how? What do we do on our end to remain vital in a high-demand, low-supply market?

This trend requires a new approach. It is time to move from the tactical recruiter to the valued career coach and trusted business adviser. And how is this accomplished?

By developing a thorough and true understanding of our candidates. By recognizing their hot buttons, the reasons they are considering a change, their likes and dislikes concerning their current positions. By getting a handle on their dream jobs. But this is not new. This is what being a good recruiter is all about.

Don’t be fooled. There are new variables in this familiar equation. They are Generations X and Y, and along with the baby boomers, they make up a volatile generational mix. To attain success today, recruiters must acknowledge and understand the unique values, needs, and desires of these distinct generations.

A one-size-fits-all approach to recruiting is no longer viable. We must now consider candidates’ generational profiles to ensure success in changing professional relationships and work environments. Not just typical characteristics, but what drives them and motivates them. What is behind their decision-making processes?

With three generations in the workforce, each with unique world views and varied work styles, it becomes increasingly difficult to completely understand a candidate’s true individual needs. It is our job to make sure there is harmony and under-standing between the recruiter and the candidate, despite potentially very real differences. Our goal is to avoid fall-offs and turn-downs, to make solid placements that are successful for both client and candidate. To do this, it is imperative to have strategies in place that make it easier to navigate this generational mine-field.

Three generations make up over 90 percent of our workforce: baby boomers, born between 1946 and1964; Generation X, born between 1965 and 1981; and Generation Y, born between 1982 and 2002. As recruiters, we must take the time to learn about each generation’s likes and dislikes, strengths and weaknesses, and work and communication styles in order to make successful placements.

A short overview of the generations can be used as a helpful guideline:

Baby boomers are hardworking, competitive team players with a youthful self-image. They tend to be more optimistic than their younger counterparts. They are often stereotyped as old-fashioned, rigid, and averse to change. Boomers have a get-it-done attitude in the workplace. They respect authority and value accomplishment. They communicate best through a structured network. They crave rewards and career advancement and are motivated by others’ recognition of their hard work. They are highly loyal employees, and for them, work comes first.

Recruiters can influence boomers by appealing to these characteristics. Tell them exactly what impact they will have on an organization. Share the company’s vision and how the candidate is well suited to help them accomplish it. Appeal to the boomer’s natural love of a challenge by bringing positions to them that will help them shine.

Generation Xers value work/ life balance, so when presenting a position to them, make sure to outline the ways in which it is congruent with this philosophy. Gen Xers have a self-reliant and practical approach to the workplace. But they are often seen by others as slackers, selfish, and cynical. They can be casual and direct in their approach to coworkers and managers, but they have the potential to contribute great things to the right team.

Gen Xers enjoy a flexible workplace where rules aren’t too rigid and the atmosphere is collaborative. They thrive in a job that offers a balance of fair compensation and ample time off. Gen Xers most definitely don’t possess the employer loyalty of the boomers and can be job hoppers. To successfully work with this inwardly focused generation, appeal to their individual career goals. Tell them why the position you are presenting is the best next step in their careers. Explain precisely what’s in it for them. Xers really want to continue to grow professionally, so make sure you inform them of any training and development they would receive in the opportunity.

Generation Yers are the team builders. They are the ultimate at multitasking. They are technologically savvy and ready for fun. They are perceived by the older generations as disrespectful, lacking focus, and too dependent on technology, but these youngest workers are highly desirable team players. They are eager to please and respond very well to public praise. They will work hard to get the job done, but they are deadline, not schedule, focused. When presenting a position to Gen Y, keep in mind that they value their autonomy. When polled, Gen Yers cited their number one priority as a good salary followed by advancement opportunities. When recruiting them, make sure your client companies understand they may have to pay more for this rising generation.

Gen Y is less inclined to pursue formal leadership positions, so you may need to do some fast talking to get them to see the value of taking on more responsibility. They seek varied experiences in life and in work. Explain how the opportunity will give them the chance to broaden their skills and vision. To successfully recruit them to an organization, show them how it will help them to achieve their personal and professional goals.

You will find that Gen Years do not hesitate to bring their personal life to work. Make client companies aware of this. Gen Yers tend to be more loyal than Gen Xers, but their ties are to the people they work with. Remember, they will get the job done, but they aren’t going to hang around the office just to put in old-fashioned “sweat equity.” Terms that appeal to this generation are: job sharing, tele-commuting, and compressed workweeks. Don’t try to force an old-fashioned, 9-to-5 opportunity on a Gen Yer. You’re setting yourself, your candidate, and your client up for failure.

The key to success in this changing market is to recognize and address the two critical issues. The multigenerational workforce lends a new twist to traditional methods. You must work to become as familiar with your candidates and their unique generational traits as you are with any position and client company. It is no longer enough to treat people the way you would like to be treated. Chances are they will have very different preferences. It’s up to you to understand each profile, and to honor it with every individual and every interaction.

Second, the talent shortage gives increased value and power to candidates. Now is the time to establish a career-coach relation-ship with your candidates. Make sure you are seen as knowledgeable and trustworthy. Bring value to the process – develop a true understanding of what their needs are and how you can influence and assist their decisions. Work to build solid relationships in which you are seen as a vital part of the process, giving you influence in decision-making. Don’t waste your time and your credibility by presenting the wrong opportunities – because in today’s brutal market, you probably won’t get a second chance.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker, writer, and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who bill on average over $1 million annually. Since 1999, he has achieved over $9 million in cash-in on his personal desk performance. Jon has also established JSI as a top 10% executive search firm. The office has won 15 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program for recruiters and recruiting managers called “Magnum Program.” He also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, “Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach.” Are you ready to take your company or career to the next level? Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910, jon@jonathanscott.com, or www.talentwinsonline.com.

The climate is changing, and I’m not talking about global warming. Our business climate is undergoing significant shifts. The talent pool is evolving, and businesses and individuals everywhere must adapt or face professional extinction.

What we’re experiencing is the cusp of a talent crisis, and we’re already seeing some major changes. And there are more ahead. It’s time for businesses – and recruiters – to deal with this new reality.

At its heart, the talent crisis means that organizations will not be able to find, attract, hire, and retain talent. This is due to five trends: more jobs than qualified people to fill them; the increasingly multigenerational work-force; the end of retirement as we know it; stronger demands for employer flexibility; and a big drop in average employee tenure. Taken separately, each of these trends presents a challenge. But now, as at no time before in our history, these trends are converging and strengthening.

I feel so strongly that the talent crisis is the single most important problem businesses face today that I’ve written a series of articles on this topic. This month, I examine the people – and skill set – shortage and what it means to our clients, to us, and to both of our bottom lines.

A Severe Skill-Set Shortage

We’ve all heard that according to government statistics, there will be more positions than people in the near future. Estimates vary, but experts agree there will be between 3 and10 million more jobs than people by 2010. Those are daunting statistics, but as a recruiter you know we’re already facing a shortage in 2007: a lack of qualified individuals for specific positions. A skill-set shortage is preceding the people shortage.

If you’ve spent a day recruiting in the healthcare or IT fields, you know what I’m talking about. We’re experiencing a severe skill-set shortage. Last month, I took a look at the job aggregators to gauge the demand for IT talent. There were over 38,000 openings for SAP FI/CO consultants on jobster.com alone. But this problem is not unique to healthcare and IT. Many other industries are facing this same issue. Your market is in the midst of a skill-set shortage if:

1. Time to fill for some critical jobs lengthens to six months, a year, or more.
2. Companies start lowering their standards to fill positions, refusing to hold out for top talent.
3. Salaries are moving up. What was once the high end of a pay range will become the median income for hard-to-find skill sets.

The skill-set shortage is wide ranging. If it isn’t affecting you and your clients yet, it will, no matter the industry. For example, it’s estimated that 56% of unskilled laborers need to have the skills necessary to use some type of automated technology. This isn’t your father’s workplace: most ware-house laborers on the shipping dock today use wireless hand-held computers to process transactions. Statistics indicate that to keep up with the jobs generated by current economic growth, the United States will need 18 million new college graduates. That’s 12 million more than we’re currently graduating.

Clearly, this dilemma isn’t going away anytime soon. But as a recruiter, you’re uniquely positioned to use this trend to your advantage. It’s Recruiting 101, but it’s more important to our industry now than ever.

Become your clients’ trusted business adviser.

This is a problem that you can turn into a huge opportunity: clients need us now more than ever. Function as their guide, getting them on the right path in this marketplace. As a professional search consultant, you must shift from being just a tactical recruiter who finds talent to a business adviser who develops successful talent strategies.

Most important, work with your clients to streamline their hiring methods. In this talent-starved market, the entire interview process should take from one to four weeks. No longer. No exceptions. The longer the process takes, the greater the chances of top talent accepting another position. They’re in high demand and they know it.

Help your clients create a win-win interview process. They should ask thorough questions to establish whether or not a candidate has the right stuff to join their team, while at the same time selling candidates on their organization via the all-important Employee Value Proposition.

Developing a strong EVP is a critical part of the business-adviser relationship. The EVP clearly states all the reasons why a candidate would choose to work for a company as opposed to any alternative. If a client cannot articulate an EVP, it is essential that you help them to construct one, and quickly. Culture, benefits, work environment, compensation, office location, management flexibility, and much more can go into a winning EVP. And in this tight market, it can mean the difference between top talent choosing your client – or their competitor.

As a business adviser, try to ease your clients into a new way of thinking about job openings. If your client has an ongoing need for specific skill sets within their organization, propose a “continual opening.” This is a great way for you to deepen your professional ties to a client. Establish an agreement stating that anytime you encounter clearly defined skill sets in a candidate, you will bring that talent to the table. This is a symbiotic relationship, benefiting both client and recruiter. Your client will no longer be able to just hire when there is an opening. They need to hire when the talent is available.

Flexibility is increasingly the name of the game in hiring. Educate your clients on the virtues of flexibility in areas such as compensation, benefits, vacation, work schedule, and work location. This isn’t a market in which it’s wise to dismiss a candidate if she falls outside a given salary range, or wants an additional week of vacation. Encourage clients not to lose candidates over relatively minor negotiation snafus.

I recently began a global procurement search for a Fortune 100 company by sitting down with the client and determining how much money they’d lost by letting this critical position remain unfilled for two years. The hard costs and missed opportunity costs they’d incurred were staggering – millions of dollars. Once I’d helped my client see this clearly, it was amazing how flexible they became.

Bring only impact players to the market.

In a talent- and skill-set-starved market, trying to fill those needle-in-a-haystack searches will inevitably lead to frustration and few placements. It can feel like you’re pushing a boulder uphill all day, every day. But you can make your job easier by returning to the talent-agent mentality. That’s right, the old “MPC” approach. In today’s competitive market, it’s the best bet to make placements.

Impact players are most important to a team and a recruiter when a defined market-place requires a specific skill set. My preference is to go to the market with three impact players whom I present in distinct ways. One is the main focus, another is one level above, and the third is one level below. If the organization has a need for that type of talent, chances are good I will get send-outs based on a quick conversation.

Develop your paper route, but on a larger scale.

Define a marketplace of 500 to 3,000 potential clients, and take your impact players to them. Not just once, but routinely. Develop a “paper route:” share the top talent in your specialty with them over and over again. Think of a hometown newspaper route. The paperboy delivers papers to the same houses every day. His customers get to know him, and most become fond of him. You need to develop that same relationship with your potential clients.

Touch every one of them every 60 to 90 days. Not all of your prospects will have a need for the talent you present in your first call. Don’t let that discourage you. As you get to know them, you’ll have a better idea of what they want so you can bring value to the table the next time you talk. By the second, third, or fourth “delivery,” you’ll be amazed at the send-outs you get and the placements that follow. Never get too busy to give personal attention – it pays big dividends.

Don’t forget your candidates!

Establish regular contact with your candidate database. Think of it as a paper route for 2007. It’s a new concept to many, but it’s an exciting frontier for recruiters to explore, another way to add value to your candidate pool so when they’re ready to make a change, they automatically think of you.

Top candidates need to be touched once every 60 to 90 days by you or your firm. Many recruiters are getting creative in their approach to this, sending out mass emails, newsletters, or announcements, and making direct calls. Remember, it will always be the recruiter who can deliver the best talent who will win. Market to your candidate database, build your brand identity with them, and show them how you can help them achieve their career goals.

The best recruiters in this tight market succeed through a combination of time-tested recruiting truths and innovative solutions that benefit both client and candidate. Yes, we’re faced with a talent crisis, but who is better positioned to capitalize on it than talent agents – people with a real understanding of the market? Success is ours for the taking as long as we’ve put into place real strategies for dealing with talent-pool trends.

Next Month: The second in Jon Bartos’s series of articles focusing on the five major trends affecting business today, and how to turn them to your advantage: “The Talent Crisis, Part Two: The Multigenerational Workforce and the Unique Challenges (and Opportunities) It Presents for Recruiters Everywhere.”

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker, writer, and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who bill on average over $1 million annually. Since 1999, he has achieved over $9 million in cash-in on his personal desk performance. Jon has also established JSI as a top 10% executive search firm. The office has won 15 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program for recruiters and recruiting managers called “Magnum Program.” He also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach. Are you ready to take your company or career to the next level? Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910, jon@jonathan scott.com, or www.talentwinsonline.com.

The global marketplace is buzzing. We are living in the greatest economic boom in modern history. Across the globe, experts are going on record with great news about the current worldwide expansion. “This is far and away the strongest global economy I’ve seen in my business lifetime,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson observed recently. John Chambers, chairman and CEO of Cisco, echoes Paulson, calling it “the strongest global trend” of his career.

With global GDPs soaring to historic levels, $36 trillion today as compared to $13 trillion in the 1970s, world markets are dev-eloping faster than ever. It truly is an exciting time to be an executive recruiter. As executives everywhere seek to grow their organizations globally, they will be forced to face upcoming talent shortages. They will struggle more every year to find the top talent that can lead them to new successes in this unique marketplace. It is in times like these that some search consultants will achieve the careers of their dreams and others will be content to wallow in mediocrity.

There is a familiar adage: Make hay while the sun shines. And that day is upon us, my friends. Recruiters everywhere have an unprecedented opportunity to take advantage of an economy that is growing exponentially, because it is also one that is experiencing a significant skill and talent shortage. In the next few paragraphs, I’ve laid out the essential steps to exceptional recruiting success in this new era of prosperity.

Pick a niche and dominate it

Take a market that you are excited about, one that’s growing, and dominate it. In this economy, being a generalist can work but won’t pay huge dividends. Why? It’s going to be extremely difficult to find talent. If every search requires you to start from scratch in a fresh market and for a new position, it will be very difficult to build momentum. By selecting a niche within a market, you’ll have synergy in your searches. With similar candidates and job orders, you will be much more productive because your efforts can be used again and again. Synergy creates placements and puts money in your pocket.

Not sure how to pick a niche market? It must be an industry you know and one about which you’re passionate. Right now, thanks to emerging global markets, a smart choice may be companies and positions with international operations. Re-search your markets, limiting your choices to those that will be hot for the next five years. And then research more. Learn everything you can about those potential markets. Take a look at which positions within the industry are high-demand. Decide on geographical boundaries based on the market size. Your market should possess a solid 500 potential client companies. Much more than 500, and you need to narrow your initial marketplace. Any less, and your chosen market may not be big enough for you to get the financial results you want. Many recruiters use DIG -Discipline, Industry, and Geography – when defining markets.

Develop high and wide relationships with all client companies

When working with client companies, never be satisfied with one main point of contact. Things change, power shifts, and people come and go. If your only contact leaves the organization for any reason, your business is in jeopardy. Develop relationships that are high and wide, a broad spectrum of professional contacts at all levels within your client companies. Salesperson, VP of Sales, CEO, VP of Engineering, they should all know your name and take your calls. By working within every level and department of a company, you’ll not only get more business, but you’ll also gain a better understanding of its corporate goals and objectives, enabling you to help achieve them. With the high and wide approach, you establish yourself as a trusted talent adviser versus a tactical recruiter.

The best recruiters will equip their clients to navigate the rapidly approaching talent-shortage maze. You should educate them, showing them how to structure their hiring processes for this marketplace, helping them to be adaptable so they can meet top-talent demands. Building multiple relationships within an organization gives you credibility, and the power to deliver success in this tight market.

Build and maintain a strong brand identity in your clients’ eyes

The only way to build a positive brand identity is to deliver. Our clients’ perception of our professional worth is completely dependent on the talent we bring to them. Recruiters who consistently deliver quality talent, the impact players who make a significant difference in their organizations, have a strong brand identity. Your clients will want to partner with you again and again. Those who regularly schlep in with poor to average candidates will also achieve poor to average results. They’ll have a brand identity, though: that of a résumé pusher only interested in a fee.

Because talent will be so hard to come by in this market, some recruiters will be tempted to settle for less than perfect talent. Don’t. By lowering your standards, you also lower your brand identity in your clients’ eyes. Remember, in this business, perception is reality. Your brand must be that of an exceptional business adviser who brings great talent to the table. Always!

Develop partnerships in international emerging markets

This is all about vision. Don’t overlook the rest of the world. It’s not just the United States experiencing an unprecedented economic boom. A significant part of the growth of the world’s GDP is happening in four countries: Brazil, Russia, India, and China. Some of these countries will double the expansion of the United States. Many corporate executives are doing whatever they can to take advantage of those emerging markets. Chances are, many of the companies you do business with today are looking overseas to grow and prosper as these foreign markets heat up. But whether they’re in China or Kansas, what do they need? Talent. It’s the one constant in all countries, across all industries. And that is why executive recruiting is the greatest career in the world today.

Specifically here in our country, we need talented people who have the skills and experience to grow business internationally, as well as to attract talent in those markets. As search consultants, we must anticipate some of these needs for our clients, working with the executive team to fulfill them. Propose strategic or long-term planning meetings to gain a thorough understanding of a client’s direction internationally in order to be ready to present solutions to talent issues before they’re a problem.

Developing partnerships with other offices across the globe is a great way to add value to your current clients. Many recruiting organizations have international business offices or partners. These people have feet on the street in the local markets across the globe. MRI has an exceptional international business unit that provides talent worldwide. If you don’t have access to a network of international business partners, get on Google and find them. Many will work with you to help find the local talent you need. However, be prepared to give a percentage of your fee away. Many will only work on splits starting at 25/75. But an international recruiting contact gives you the ability to recruit in emerging foreign markets. That kind of global vision pays off in the long run.

Take more impact players to the market

To succeed in this high-demand, low-supply talent market, it isn’t enough to fill jobs. You must also go back to bringing the “Impact Player” to the market. Your “time to fill” metric on positions will continue to increase as this talent shortfall trend grows stronger. Although it’s a new era in the global marketplace, an old recruiting tool has never been more reliable. The old MPC call, the presenting of a solid A player, is delivering better results today in recruiting than ever. Companies are starved for great talent. By feeding them a steady diet of A players within their industry, you will build your brand identity and credibility. You will prove you are the search consultant who is in contact daily with the top talent in their industry. If you have an A player, get on the phone. Chances are you’ll make just as many placements with basic marketing calls with an MPC as by filling those needle-in-the-haystack searches you have piled on your desk.

Recruiting in this market environment does have its challenges. With the demand for talent high worldwide and the supply low, our job won’t be easy. The good news is, if you are able to make a few changes in your focus, your client relationships, and your approach, you will have the opportunity of a lifetime – the greatest worldwide economic expansion in history! Make the most of it.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker, writer, and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who bill on average over $1 million annually. Since 1999, he has achieved over $9 million in cash in on his personal desk performance. Jon has also established JSI as a top 10% executive search firm. The office has won 15 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program for recruiters and recruiting managers called “Magnum Program.” He also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, “Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach.” Are you ready to take your company or career to the next level? Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910, jon@jonathanscott.com, or www.talentwinsonline.com

They are the enemies of every recruiter: turndowns and falloffs. And they’re on the rise everywhere. I hear about them so frequently from other recruiters that I think it’s time to take a serious look at these dreaded deal breakers.

We’ve all been there. Your star candidate accepts a counteroffer, or that sure thing turns out to be anything but when your candidate suddenly says yes to another position. We’re often left scratching our heads asking, “How could this happen?” The turndown and the falloff are the dirty words any recruiter or recruiting manager would like to live without.

Why are they happening so often now? It’s basic supply and demand. The unemployment rate is hovering around 4.5% (0% for the niche A players), and the economy is picking up steam. The demand for talent has increased substantially over the last 12 months. And they know it. Top talent can afford to be picky about their teams. Added to the mix is the growing commitment that employers have to protecting and retaining their best employees. Hiring managers know how difficult (and expensive) it is to find and train replacements for top performers, so they’re willing to do whatever it takes to keep them. It’s a tough market for recruiters, and it’s getting harder and harder to shake loose firmly embedded talent from their comfortable positions.

We make it harder on ourselves, too. Most turndowns and falloffs happen thanks to our own professional carelessness. Let’s face it: recruiters aren’t perfect. No matter how professional or experienced we are, we sometimes miss critical steps in the process. Things fall through the cracks. And when we take shortcuts in the placement process – simple mistakes such as failing to cover the counteroffer early and often, or not following up after a placement is made – the likelihood of a turndown or falloff increases dramatically.

My firm recently placed a financial adviser at a major national brokerage firm. We thought it was the deal of a lifetime for the candidate. He was recruited from a small Midwestern bank, and the signing bonus alone matched his previous year’s W-2 of $175,000. When the offer was made, the whole office celebrated. Based on his income, it was the largest signing bonus we had ever negotiated on behalf of a candidate. A perfect deal. The candidate would make a ton of money, we would receive a handsome fee, and the national brokerage firm was thrilled with the candidate. But the party was short-lived. When the candidate submitted his resignation, his employer counteroffered and matched the signing bonus plus added a few incentives of stock options. The candidate who was offered so much is still working at that small bank in Cleveland.

Unfortunate situations like these will continue to occur. It’s a candidate’s market, and it’s going to stay that way for the foreseeable future. But don’t throw in the towel just yet. Fortunately, there are steps we can take to minimize, if not completely prevent, turndowns and falloffs.

10 Steps You Must Take to Make a High-Demand Talent Market Work for You

1. Truly get to know your candidate

Don’t be in such a rush to fill a job order that you skip the crucial step of getting to know your candidate. Instead of completing a rough candidate data sheet and quickly submitting him or her for a position, slow down. Take the time to understand what your candidates like and dislike about their current job and employer. Ask what they would change about their situation. Gain an understanding of their personal life: hobbies, recreational activities, their spouse and children, what they would like to do more of. Try to find out everything you can about their personal and professional priorities because a career move is not just about the candidate – it’s about anyone in their circle that will be impacted by the change. Today’s candidates value work-life balance, and you need to understand how a career move can affect that balance.

Dig in. Find out the real reason behind the desire for a change; it’s usually not money. Finally, understand your candidates’ dream job. What is their ideal job … the perfect next move in their career? Only then can you be more than just a recruiter. You’re a talent scout, looking out for the best interest of your clients. You’ll know what makes them tick, why they’re ready for a job change, and what they want next in their careers. When you develop this level of professional relationship with candidates, you increase your odds of a successful placement, and decrease the chances of turndowns and falloffs.

2. Encourage candidates to ask current employers for changes

It may sound like you’re helping the opposing team, but it works. Once you understand a candidate’s motivation for a job change, encourage them to ask their employer to accommodate their needs. The vast majority of the time, our candidates won’t do this. But it’s a great way to flush out other areas of professional dissatisfaction to help the candidate really commit to the idea of a job change. “Since you’re unhappy with the overtime hours and all the excessive travel, why don’t you just ask your boss to be flexible and give you more time to be at your daughter’s softball practice?”

The best time to get the candidate out of the process is in the first conversation. Once the candidate actually attempts to resign, the hiring manager will likely make an effort to change the situation that’s causing the employee to look for another job. Never go forward with a candidate unless they have a good reason for considering a new position or they go to their employer to ask for changes in their current situation. Let them know that you don’t want to waste your time searching for the ideal position unless they’re really ready to make a change. Make them prove it to you.

3. Get a verbal agreement about a potential job change

Eliminate gray areas by attaining a verbal agreement from any candidate about their commitment to a career move. Get confirmation that once you’ve found the right position, one that fills the void their current position does not, one that is a desirable next step on their career path, they will act. Candidates need to say it. By verbalizing this commitment to change, it becomes a reality. Avoid working with candidates who are too unrealistic. If they say, “If you find me the perfect job that fits every criteria I am looking for, then I’ll make a job change.” Perfect will never come. The key to getting a verbal commitment is to take a few of the major motivating points for making a change and fulfill them. Once you have it, it’s time to discuss roles in the process and set expectations.

4. Establish roles and set expectations

One of the most important steps in the recruiting process is to establish roles and set expectations. Like any relationship, the recruiter/ candidate one needs ground rules to thrive. Clearly define how you will work together. Many recruiters don’t. And then they wonder why phone calls are never returned and feedback isn’t given. A great way to begin a relationship is to explain your role in the recruiting process: a professional job description. It is a powerful tool for a recruiter.

“My role is to become your talent agent. I will present you to new teams that have opportunities that are a potential fit to your background. I will find companies that meet your requirements for the next best step in your career. I will present you in a positive manner, work to get interviews set up, and take care of all the details in between. I will also prepare you before interviews. I’ll discuss with you the hiring manager, the company, and the job description, including what is expected of a successful candidate. I will debrief you after interviews, and openly and honestly address any concerns the company might have. Before the final interview, I will help to negotiate a strong compensation and benefits package so it will be a win-win situation. I will walk you through the resignation process and cover the counteroffer. After you join the new team, I will follow up with you on your first day, after two weeks, and after 30 days. If at any time you have any issue, no matter how small, we will work together to resolve it. I want to be a partner in your success – your talent agent for the rest of your career.

“You have a significant role in this process as well. You need to be as flexible as possible with your schedule for interviews and time to talk with me. You have my total commitment to openness and honesty at every stage of this process, and I need nothing less from you. If you have any questions or concerns, it is imperative that you bring them to my attention immediately. If at any time in this process your interest level wanes, let me know. If you are considering another opportunity, let me know. In order for us to reach a successful conclusion, we need to be able to work closely together and to trust one another completely.”

It’s also important to set expectations on preferred communication methods and times as well as an expected timeframe to return calls. Be firm. Discuss the ramifications of not honoring the ground rules. Let candidates know that they can and will be dropped from the process if they don’t play fair.

5. Get their skin in the game

The more skin in the game, the better chance you have of winning. It all starts by getting the candidate’s commitment up front to a new opportunity. From being flexible in scheduling time to talk with you, to sending a résumé on time, to updating a résumé to highlight the most recent relevant experience, it all amounts to skin in the game. I like to have candidates send me an email explaining why they are a perfect fit professionally and personally for the opportunity. I try to have candidates do something for the hiring manager or me all through the process – from providing a list of re-searched competitors to a 90-day business plan of what they would do if they got the job. This keeps the candidate deeply involved in the process and encourages their commitment going forward.

6. Requalify at every contact

Every time you talk to your candidate, make sure you have a handle on their commitment level. Ask, “Has anything changed in your work or personal life since the last time we spoke?” Be a great listener. If something has changed, make sure you really understand the impact it may have on the process or job search. Requalify: “On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being you are ready to take the new job, where are you in the decision-making process today?” Follow up with “What do we need to do to get you to a 10?” Life comes at you fast. Things can change in an instant. Make sure you’re in your candidate’s head, daily.

7. Accept the offer on their behalf

Know where the candidate needs to be financially. Many candidates hate this, but if you are truly working closely, there are no issues with discussing this up front. Ascertain what an offer needs to be financially in order for the opportunity to make sense for the candidate. Don’t accept “I want to evaluate the opportunity first to determine that.” That is a losing pro-position. What many candidates want is to take a job based on its requirements. This is invalid in the eyes of hiring managers. They consider a position pay range and what a candidate currently earns and come up with a figure that usually doesn’t go much beyond the midpoint. Inject a dose of reality here. Candidates need to understand that at max they’ll be looking at a 10-15% raise. If a candidate has a problem with these figures, it’s time to remove him from the process.

Once you’ve agreed upon a number that the candidate can live with from an earning perspective, get a further commitment of acceptance. Ask, “If things go well in the interview and you like what you see and the hiring manager likes what he sees, can I accept an offer at $X on your behalf after the final interview?” Many times candidates don’t like this question. But a good recruiter maintains control of the process at all times. If the candidate raises any objections – I need to see the benefits, vacation policy, etc. – simply say, “Let’s assume all the data is in line and meets expectations in the final inter-view; can I accept the offer on your behalf?” If there is any answer other than yes, there’s more going on than the candidate is telling you. There may be another issue pending, or a hidden objection. It’s time to start digging for the real issues.

8. Cover the counteroffer – both emotional and financial

Because companies won’t let their best talent walk out the door without a fight, it’s hugely important for recruiters to give candidates a thorough explanation of the counteroffer and a strategy to deal with it. Cover this early in the process. Make sure candidates understand that it is a certainty.

There are two types of counteroffers that come when a good employee resigns. The emotional counteroffer appeals to an employee’s sense of honor, loyalty, or guilt. It may sound like “We built this together!” or “You are a critical part of our team!” or “You’re like a daughter to me!” Prepare your candidate for an emotional roller coaster and help them ride it out.

Financial counteroffers are becoming more and more aggressive, thanks to the costs associated with losing a productive employee. Make sure your candidate knows it’s coming. This is the time to explain the reality of working for a firm once they’re on notice that an employee has considered another job. From the firm’s perspective, the employee’s loyalty is gone, and they’re the first to go if cuts need to be made. From a candidate’s perspective, point out that things haven’t changed, and it’s still the same job, company, and people they were dissatisfied with. Rejecting counteroffers, both emotional and financial, is in the long-term interest of the candidate, no matter what the circumstances.

9. Role-play through the counteroffer

Handle the counteroffer by equipping a candidate with confidence. Role-playing is a great way to prepare for this eventuality. It gives the candidate the chance to address in advance any emotional and financial counteroffers. You can be of great help here. Encourage the candidate to focus on the transition plan, explaining that it’s not about the company, it’s about the candidate’s future, family, and career. Make sure they understand the importance of keeping a friendly relationship with their current employers. Entertaining a counteroffer and then rejecting it completely destroys that relationship; burning bridges is not the way to walk out the door.

10. Don’t forget about a placed candidate

Starting a new job is tough. Many companies really struggle with the onboarding process, and have trouble ensuring that the new employee gets off to a good start. It’s an uncomfortable first 30 days for most new employees. And this is when they’re most vulnerable to a call from their past employers. Recruiters should touch base often with any placed candidates for the first 90 days in a new position. I usually contact candidates on their first day, after two weeks, on the one-month anniversary of their hire, and after 90 days. If, in your conversations, you detect a problem, address it immediately with the hiring manager and the candidate. Ask the hiring manager to help resolve the issue and to help with bonding and onboarding. Your goal is to make sure that your candidate and the hiring manager have the best chance of successfully working together.

Turndowns and falloffs are professional hazards for any recruiter. They can be damaging to your reputation, to your confidence, and to your relationship with your client that you have worked so hard to attain. That’s why the best recruiters are proactive. They work with their clients to develop a win-win hiring process, educate them on the marketplace, and get them involved in helping to sell candidates on opportunities to head off these deal breakers.

Minimizing turndowns and falloffs is all about the details. Don’t take shortcuts that cause you to miss critical information. Take the time to implement these 10 steps into your process now to maximize your recruiting success in the challenging market ahead.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott Inter-national in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who year after year have billed over $1 million annually. Jon has also established JSI as a top executive search and contract-staffing firm. The office has won 14 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program called “Magnum Program” and also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach, every Sunday at 2 p.m. EST. Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910 or jon@jonathanscott.com as well as jon@talentwinsonline.com.

As recruiters, we pride our-selves on our ability to under-stand our clients’ talent needs. We partner with them to find, attract, and hire the hidden A players in any industry. But today, we – recruiters everywhere – are facing a new challenge. What happens when the playing field shifts in favor of the talent?

Executive recruiters and our clients are feeling the pinch of the low-supply, high-demand candidate market. We’ve experienced market shifts before, but this one is going to bring dramatic change to our profession. It’s a candidate’s world out there. And it’s only going to get worse.

Over the next five to seven years, 73 million baby boomers will retire. That’s a huge chunk of movers and shakers, people who’ve traditionally set the rules, hired the talent, and defined success. The playing field to which we’ve all grown accustomed will never be the same again. As professional recruiters, we must have a game plan in place today to face tomorrow’s talent shortage. If you thought recruiting was tough in previous candidate-driven markets, I’ve got bad news. You ain’t seen nothing yet! In the very near future, there is simply not going to be enough talent in the marketplace to satisfy the demand. A players are going to be harder to find, and they will be able to choose their teams as well as write their own contracts. Now more than ever, it’s critical that recruiters develop a strategy to win in this market.

Don’t just fill jobs; bring top talent to the table

As the time-to-fill metric continues to lengthen because of demographic shifts, placing candidates will become tougher and tougher. The most successful recruiters will have anticipated this and be prepared to deal with it proactively. They will spend more time bringing the impact player or most placeable candidate (MPC) to clients. In this tightening market, recruiters will find themselves with more job orders than they can handle. However, the placements will come more frequently from the MPC marketing call. Your mission is still to find that exceptional A player. But now you must spend the time necessary to truly market them to targeted companies. It is hard work that will pay big dividends.

Find all available opportunities for top talent

Once you’ve found top talent, be prepared to wow them. Don’t be content to simply take an A player to the market. Be as thorough as possible, finding all available opportunities for him or her. In a sense, you’re selling yourself to the candidates to get exclusivity. You can bring an extremely strong value proposition as a recruiter when you can say to your industry’s top talent, “I’m going to go out there and market you to all the prospective companies that make sense. I will bring to you all the available opportunities that fit your background. I can help you decide what is best for you and your career.”

Stop relying on job boards: employ alternate networking tools

Like last year’s favorite birthday gift, the job boards have lost their novelty. You are not going to find the A players on the job boards anymore. The top 10% of the talent pool are gain-fully employed and knocking the cover off the ball for their employers and not looking for another job. Job boards today are populated with B and C players who are looking to make a change. Every recruiter across the country has access to the job boards and thus to these candidates. You aren’t going to find anything special there. The last words of a recruiter about to go out of business are “But that is the way we’ve always done it.”

The truth is, A players are invisible to the job boards. They don’t have their résumés posted and they don’t look at job postings. You’ve got to come up with new ways to find them. The best recruiters are direct recruiting and using the alternate networking tools. I like LinkedIn, Xing, Jigsaw, ZoomInfo, and university alumni associations. These kinds of alternate tools will replace the job boards in effectiveness very quickly in this shifting market. Conveniently, some of them are free, with additional feature upgrades available for a nominal fee.

Coach your team of A players

Once you have identified the A players in your industry, you need to become a trusted career coach to your talent. Like a great coach who talks with and mentors his athletes every day, you need to touch your most valuable talent on a monthly basis. Keep yourself in front of them so they are reminded of your value. Keep them abreast of market trends. Don’t let them forget for a moment who you are and the value you bring. Always inform your talent inventory about great opportunities and make it a point to provide information that will help them in their careers. In the end, the game will be won by the recruiter with the best talent pool. Develop yours, communicate with them monthly, illustrate your value, and you will have clients knocking down your door to get at your talent.

Only work with clients who want a close partner

We’ve all heard it. “I need you to search for this position, but we will have our internal recruiting or HR staff working on the job as well.” While we may have been willing to work under these conditions in a client-friendly market, these are the clients we need to lose in a candidate-driven one. Winning recruiters should make it a firm rule to only work with clients who are 100% committed to you and your efforts on their behalf. Recruiting should never be a race against a client’s internal HR department or against another recruiter they have engaged. That is a losing proposition. A team approach where the client and a sole recruiter work together will deliver the best results for everyone involved: an efficient hiring process and a successful hire.

Work with clients on multiple openings

Recruiters in this market need to be choosy. If a client will only give you one job to fill while handing others to their internal staff or competing recruiters, you may want to discontinue the relationship. The clients we want are the ones that give us multiple openings of the same kind of search, allowing us to benefit from the synergy that comes naturally from the similar opportunities.

Set expectations up front

Part of being a good recruiter is being a great communicator. Set expectations up front with clients and candidates. Explain your strategy clearly; it will be crucial to your success. Discuss with hiring managers how you work, your role in the search, your responsibilities, and your hiring time frame. Make sure you define right now the types of situations and clients you will work with tomorrow and those you will not.

When dealing with candidates, it’s even more important to establish ground rules immediately. Explain your approach, agree on communication methods and expectations, and make sure they understand your role and their own role in the search. Stress open and honest feedback. Always keep your eye on the prize: the exclusivity to work with them on multiple opportunities.

It’s a New Playing Field

We’ve all faced challenges in our professional lives. The impending demographic change will redefine our workplace. This highly competitive climate can defeat us or energize us to new success. Whether you’re a baby boomer who has seen our industry evolve from head-hunters to professional talent consultants, or a 22-year-old recruiter for whom the profession is bursting with potential, now is the time to develop a game plan for a new playing field. Recruiters who are agile and prepared will continue to build winning teams – one player at a time – and to achieve prosperity in a rewarding career.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who year after year have billed over $1 million annually. Jon has also established JSI as a top executive search and contract-staffing firm. The office has won 14 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. Jon runs an executive-coaching program called “Magnum Program” and also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach, every Sunday at 2 p.m. EST. Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910 or at jon@jonathanscott.com as well as at jon@talentwinsonline.com.

How top recruiters win by educating their clients

Recruiting today is experiencing a significant market shift. As talent demand continues to increase and the talent pool shrinks, it becomes much more difficult to locate and persuade A players to take a look at new opportunities. We hear from clients across the country that job boards aren’t working anymore and that recruiters are not successfully identifying and delivering top talent. While the problem starts with the clients themselves – they have not changed their belief systems and hiring cultures to accommodate this new paradigm – the solution lies with us.

As professional executive search consultants, it is our responsibility to educate our clients about the best ways to achieve success in 2007 and beyond. A high-demand, low-supply market means that clients must whip themselves into fighting form to win the battle for top talent. That is where we come in. We must make sure our clients are the winning teams, the ones who can beat not only competitors in their industry but also local companies vying for the same A players.

Playing the Field is a Losing Strategy

Many hiring authorities believe that more is better. As in, the more recruiters a company works with, the more candidates they will be able to choose from. But the reality is that clients who partner with a single recruiting firm will net the best results overall. Do you want three recruiting firms giving you 30% of their time or one giving you 100%?

When companies turn a search into a race by working with multiple contingency firms, they lose. Because as with any race, the participants are focused on one thing: speed. Most contingency recruiters will try to cut corners to be the first to present a candidate. Many times, basic and essential steps in the process are ignored. Something as fundamental as making a phone call to a candidate to present the opportunity doesn’t happen. Recruiters shoot over database candidates to a client and if there is interest, then the recruiters – the ones who give us all a bad name, by the way – belatedly make the effort to reach out to the candidate. No pre-qualification. No quality.

What clients must understand is this: in the end, quality control still happens. But in this type of search, the client, not the recruiter, is the QC Mgr. When 10 times more candidates are presented to a client, it is 10 times more work for the client. The hiring authority has to weed through the candidates and actually do the recruiters’ job for them. The result? Offer the job to the least offensive person from a lackluster pool of candidates and hope for the best. It is a process that simply doesn’t work in today’s marketplace.

The bad news is that one out of every two hires in this country today is a mishire, thanks in large part to outdated hiring practices. The good news is that this is where top recruiters break away from the pack. They educate their clients about the many benefits of partnering with one firm, as opposed to playing the field. It is a partnership you are selling. When a professional relationship is developed between a recruiter and a client, there is time to gain a complete understanding of exactly what the client is looking for. A targeted, detailed plan can be executed. The recruiter can develop a healthy brand identity for their clients in the talent marketplace, as opposed to sabotaging it by presenting the same opportunity to the same candidates in different ways. Michael Eisner said: “A brand is a living entity – and it is enriched or undermined cumulatively over time, the product of a thousand small gestures.” In no profession is this truer than ours.

The best recruiters pay attention to the many, many details that every search entails and deliver the best talent. The end result is higher-quality talent being hired, happier clients, and more successful business partnerships.

A Players Don’t Hang Around Forever

It’s a candidates’ market. With the high demand for good talent, A players can choose their team carefully. That is why our clients’ hiring processes must be reasonable. We live in an Internet world where information is at our fingertips and communication is instantaneous. Hiring processes that take six to eight weeks don’t cut it. Streamlined hiring processes do. To top talent, a bogged-down hiring process represents the decision-making process for everything else in the company. They see an organization not nimble enough to compete.

One of the most important things a good recruiter does is consult with clients to help develop a healthy hiring process. The goal is to trim the hiring process to a lean and efficient two weeks once the candidates have been submitted. Anything longer than four weeks and the A player will be gone. Only the B and C players will remain. Not a championship team in the making. It’s critical to streamline the hiring process to appeal to top talent and be ready to opt out of the game if the client clings to a drawn-out process.

Offers Should Not Go Out Without Knowing They Will Be Accepted

Recently I was asked by a major banking institution to help with a commercial lending VP search. In our discussion, I learned that the bank had sent out five offers, with not one being accepted. I was surprised but not shocked. Many companies are experiencing the same problems in today’s talent-driven market.

Still, most hiring managers think it is perfectly okay to send out an offer without knowing it will be accepted. One hiring manager said to me, “Let me give him something to think about.” Good idea. It did give him something to think about: which trash can to toss the paperwork in.

Candidates know whether they will accept the job before the final interview. As long as there are no surprises in that discussion, the decision should be a done deal. The candidate has already been thinking about it for up to four weeks based on the interview process. Good recruiters set expectations up front, addressing any concern, compensation, vacation, title, responsibilities . . . nothing is left to chance. Because the recruiter has qualified the candidate, there is no need for a candidate to think about it overnight or over the weekend or the next week. It is your job to help your clients understand why the commitment of acceptance should be in hand before any offer goes out. It saves a lot of time, aggravation, and wasted paperwork.

It’s True. You Get What You Pay For

I see this everywhere. Companies that are unwilling to pay for an A player struggle along with teams composed of B and C players. In a high-demand, low-supply market, companies like this really suffer. Candidates think if you are cheap with people, you will be cheap with everything else. Companies can’t afford this perception.

Statistics show that an A player (top 10%) candidate is five times more productive than the average B player. The Pareto Principle – 80% of the result will come from 20% of the people – is something you should discuss with every client. Put it to them this way: “Would it be worth that extra 10% to 20% more in compensation to add to that pool of 20% of the people who actually produce 80% of the results?” Sure, top talent costs more, but you don’t get a Mercedes for Taurus prices.

But your clients should also understand that this principle applies to their relationship with a trusted recruiter. When clients pressure recruiters to discount their fees, they do not value their services as they should. It will be a problem. If companies want the best people, they partner with the best recruiters and pay them a full fee. Many successful recruiters refuse to discount fees, and even if they did, would not spend any significant time on the search. How could they justify it? If you have 20 great search assignments on your desk, why make time to work on a discounted search? What your client needs to know is that the best recruiters don’t discount fees. They don’t have to. It is the individuals who are new to recruiting or without a strong value proposition in our industry who begrudgingly discount fees – the recruiters who have nothing else to work on.

In today’s business climate, it isn’t enough for us to be good at what we do. A great recruiter must focus on educating every client about the importance of developing the right belief system and hiring culture to be successful at hiring the top talent in today’s demand-driven market. This requires superior communication skills, a strong belief in your own professional worth, and the confidence that you – and you alone – will deliver the top talent available in the marketplace.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who year after year have billed over $1 million annually. Jon has also established JSI as a top executive search and contract-staffing firm. The office has won 14 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. He runs an executive-coaching program called Magnum Program and also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach, every Sunday at 2 p.m. EST. Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910 or jon@jonathanscott.com or jon@talentwinsonline.com.

When to Rescue Yourself from a No-Win Search
By Jon Bartos

“It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste.”
– Henry Ford

In recruiting, time should be a closely guarded ally, one that is treated respectfully and with care. Because wasting time is more than a productivity issue – it strikes at the very core of what we do. It can put a career in free fall.

We have all found ourselves engaged in uphill battles, attached to a bad job order. We can’t or won’t admit defeat, end the search, and move on to another assignment. This is not simply about our paychecks, because to undervalue this most precious commodity can cost much more than money. It can mean an end to a promising recruiter’s career.

Recently my office concluded a search that took nine months. Looking back, we should have declined the moment we heard the numerous, exacting search requirements, because things only got worse from there. The interview process was arduous and frustrating. The pay was sub-par. And gradually, as our best efforts yielded no viable candidates, we realized we were engaged in a losing battle. There were less than a handful of qualified candidates in the entire northeastern United States.

Since this was a retained search, we were committed to doing whatever it took to make it happen – no matter what. Life or death (and at times it seemed the latter was more likely).

By the end of the search – we did finally place an individual – the casualties were heavy. Two of my recruiters were so frustrated with the search that they resigned. They had earned no money and we had burned 1,000 hours – that’s 125 eight-hour workdays – on one search. For what? A $25,000 fee. I vowed that this was never going to happen on my watch again. As a manager, I let my people down. I didn’t parachute in to save them. The opportunity costs make me cringe just thinking about it. Taking bad search assignments and working too long on bad searches costs our industry hundreds of millions of dollars annually. But as an account executive, manager, or owner, how do you determine the parachute time or when to stop working on a bad search?

I heard the term parachute time from Lil Rushing Roy, a longtime MRI Network vice president who has helped some of the largest recruiting firms in the business reach their potential. Throughout modern history, paratroopers have parachuted in to assist ground forces struggling in battle. They are truly lifesavers. In recruiting, it is up to those in positions of authority to parachute in to rescue other recruiters. As Rushing Roy put it, parachute time is the time it takes a manager to realize that a recruiter is working on a bad search, and the time it then takes for the manager to parachute in to save a recruiter from the search itself. Parachute time is ideally within two to three weeks, but realistically, it is way too often months. Signs it may be parachute time:

- Candidates you submit are already in process.
- The candidate acquisition process is taking an abnormally long time.
- An internal candidate surfaces and is suddenly in process.
- You discover that other recruiters are engaged in the identical search.
- You aren’t working with the hiring manager directly, but HR.
- The interview process is too lengthy.
- Requirements are very specific, tough, and almost impossible to fill.
- Hiring managers are inflexible.
- The client is slow to return calls.
- The job specifications repeatedly change.
- The client experiences repeated fall-offs and turndowns.
- The client rejects candidates for less than sound reasons.
- There’s a change in the hiring manager or hiring process.
- A merger or acquisition is taking place.

These are some potential indicators that it could be time to make a very tough call. Any one of them may mean that you need to quickly stop working on the search and start working on a higher-priority position. Remember: value your time over everything else!

As difficult as it is to cut ties with a client, the costs of clinging to one can be higher. I lost two promising recruiters to my own nine-month IT search. However, I have implemented safeguards to substantially minimize the chances of anything like that happening again.

Have the client sign off on the search profile or search requirements

A good first step in any search is to get job specs in writing. A better step is to put down on paper exactly what the customer is looking for, including background, skill sets, track record of success, and work history. Have the client sign this detailed search profile to verify that both parties understand and agree on what you are looking for. This helps you prevent the scope or specification creep that cripples so many searches. If something changes after the client has signed off on a search profile, it really is a new search and should be treated that way. That means asking for more up-front money because the specs have changed and many times your work has to start all over again.

Test the job order

I like to evaluate the validity of a job order or search assignment right away. Once the customer has given you the job order or search assignment, try something like this: “You know, I think I may have the perfect candidate for you right now. I worked with an individual about a month ago that fits this profile almost perfectly. I don’t know if he/she is available, but I could call and find out quickly. Do you have time to interview this candidate on Thursday or Friday?”

I know of no better way to save time and effort than this simple statement. It quickly determines whether or not the client is truly motivated to hire. It establishes the real interest level and priority placed on the search. What you want to hear after that question is anything that sounds like he wants to expedite getting that candidate in for an interview. Like, “Absolutely! Let me see, let’s book a time right now.” What you don’t want to hear is any type of delays, excuses, or hoops they want you to jump through first.

Set interview dates up front

Getting interview dates on the calendar when you take the job order tells you the hiring manager is interested in moving this process along. She is putting some real skin in the game, and that increases your odds of success.

Agree on expectations at the onset of the search

Don’t allow confusion or misunderstanding to steal your precious time. Always set expectations up front. Agree on communication methods, time frames for returning calls, interview time lines, hiring processes, and the roles you each must play for a successful outcome.

Be real

Ask yourself this all-important question: Based on everything I know, can I successfully complete this search in the next two weeks? This is the average amount of time a typical recruiter should spend on a given search. If you can’t envision yourself, for whatever reason, getting the job done in a reasonable time frame, you may need to consider refusing the search. If you are in the midst of a lengthy search, reassess the situation. Are client constraints causing the delay? If so, perhaps a call to the client for clarification is needed.

Do a time line of recruiting (working backwards) and use it as a commitment

It’s always good to talk to the client about a time line of recruiting. Here is what that sounds like: “You would like the candidate on board by May 15? Let’s see if that follows our recruiting time line. From May 15, the candidate will have to give two weeks’ notice, which works back to May 2. We need to allow a couple days for the offer, which brings us to the end of April. The interview process we agreed on will take two weeks, which brings us to April 12. We need at least two weeks to do a comprehensive search, which brings us to April 1. In order for us to have a candidate start by May 15, we would have had to start on the search a few weeks ago. But we may be able to knock off a couple weeks if we work together on it. Can we agree to go forward in trying to speed up this process on both ends?”

Set a time in the future for a search assignment evaluation

Every office should set up a time in the future to do an evaluation on a new search assignment with a new company. This could be an arbitrary time, say, three weeks in the future. After that initial search period, a formal evaluation gives you a chance to look at the search to see if it makes sense for you to continue. This evaluation should be done with the individual(s) working on the assignment as well as someone who is not in the heat of battle with the search. Often, it takes an outsider to make you realize you are wasting time on a bad search. During that evaluation, the topics should include expectations being met, changes in search, time to close, customer communication, sense of urgency, and realistic forecasted close date. The bottom line question is “Based on what I know today, does it make sense to continue?”

Discuss any issues with a client – to agree on changes

If you begin to have conflict or issues with a client, call them on it. Immediately pick up the phone and address it. New clients are notorious for not telling you any less-than- positive information about a search – just to get you to work on it. They may “forget” to let you know there are other recruiters working on the same search. They may leave out the fact that the offered compensation is 25% below market value. Or you may not learn until too late that the position has remained unfilled for a year and a half.

If there are issues with compensation, hiring time line, unrealistic requirements, and so on, talk to the client about rectifying them. The result is a win-win recruiting situation. When you help a client create a successful hiring culture, you increase client loyalty and your own business. If a client disregards your advice or refuses to budge on an issue, you may need to start looking around for your parachute.

Recruiting can be like a battlefield, where integrity is prized, valor is rewarded, and time is an ally to be guarded. The best way to win in our industry is to value your time by spending it only on search assignments that will yield real placements and put dollars in your wallet.

Jon Bartos is a premier speaker and consultant on all aspects of human capital. As CEO of Jonathan Scott International in Mason, Ohio, he has achieved industry-leading success. He is one of an elite group of executive recruiters who year after year bill over $1 million annually. Jon has also established JSI as a top executive search and contract-staffing firm. The office has won 14 international awards in the MRI franchise system, including International Billing Manager of the Year and Top 10 SC Office. He runs an executive-coaching program called the Magnum Program and also hosts a career-focused talk show on Fox radio, Talent Wins with Jon Bartos, Your Personal Career Coach, every Sunday at 2 p.m. EST. Jon can be reached at (513) 701-5910 or jon@jonathanscott.com or jon@talentwinsonline.com.