This is a continuation in the series started a couple months back here in The Fordyce Letter about buying/selling businesses. The first article was called “Thinking about Selling Your Recruiting Business?” and the author was pelted with calls to write more regarding this subject. Reluctantly, she agreed to. This segment is called Watch Out for These Jokers!

There was an article over on LinkedIn recently that caught my eye:

Anyone considering alternative employment opportunities for 2008? Buying a Business or a Franchise? A lot of folks have been telling me that they would love to build their own business as a hedge against future downsizing and workplace frustrations. Can this be an alternative?

As I began what I thought would be a witty and mostly casual comment, I began to feel the blood course into my fingers, circulating quickly in my body and flushing my cheeks. I had to do a push-away before I really got myself into trouble, but I thought I’d share my response with you here.

This is one of my pet peeves. Individuals who profess they “always wanted to/want to own their own business.” The only person I concluded most of these people were kidding after dealing with these “suspects” for 22 years was themselves. They’d call me about a business I was representing for sale and they’d want to know the most particular of information! Like they had a right to ask. They’d get all huffy when I’d slow them down and ask for their name. Their temperaments would reveal themselves when I insisted upon a telephone number so I could “call them back”. When I did call them back, and got through to the ones who had not lied to me about their names/telephone numbers, some of them would want to know why I wanted to know how much money they had. Imagine that. Me asking them how much money they had and if they passed this qualifier the next thing I’d demand to know was what did their spouse think of this hare-brained scheme of theirs?

By this time, the savvy among them understood where I was coming from but you’d be surprised how many flaked off up to this point. For those remaining, I’d invite them to my office and place a “Nondisclosure Form” in front of them to sign. “What’s this?” a few would blink.

“It’s a Nondisclosure Form. It says that anything you learn about this particular business in your inspection of it will not be disclosed to any third parties unless they have a need to know.”

“And it better be a really good need-to-know,” I’d think caustically to myself as the majority of them signed on the dotted line. Occasionally, though, one wouldn’t, for some or other tawdry reason and out my gilded doors they’d go, unrequited and unceremoniously. I always imagined them going to some other broker, or worse yet, some owner without representation, who wasn’t nearly as hard-boiled as I was.

I didn’t have time to sit and listen to their air-ball fantasies as they kidded themselves about being a “business owner.” I’d paid my dues – been there and had plenty of them waste my time before I learned this hard lesson. I had good businesses to sell and I owed it to my sellers to represent them in the most professional manner I could. I tried. I’m quite sure in the trying I made some enemies. Oh well.

Before I trotted out the business information and most importantly and always of interest to them, “the financials,” I’d “interview” them as to what their motivations were in buying a business. See, even at this point I had bozos to deal with. I had a philosophy at that time – you needed three things to own a business and run it successfully – money, knowledge and guts. You could get by with two of these things but one of them always had to be guts. I hold this same philosophy in my name sourcing business today.

There’d be clues as to their motivational misalignments. One would be that they would want to come into my office “at night” (after-work) or on weekends (off-work). I went along with these silly game plans early in my career but as the years wore on I learned that these “Lookie-Lous” were part-time aficionados looking for interesting cocktail party conversation. I imagined them sloshing back scotch-and-waters and blabbering on to their buddy how they’d just “looked at a manufacturing company grossing $25 million” and the wide-eyed impressed gaze of their companion back upon their puffed-out chests. “Banty roosters” I came to derisively refer to them and immediately dismissed their overtures as undedicated.

You see, finding a business is much like finding a job. You must dedicate yourself to the process for best results. Few people get this, and it may be one reason there is so much turnover in companies today, especially with new hires.

I maintain that if more companies could elicit proactive engagement with their interviewees, there would be more success in the hiring process. The more “engaged” a potential buyer was with my process, the more likely s/he was to become a successful purchaser of that business. By the time s/he had jumped through all the hoops and vaulted all the roadblocks I’d put in the path there was a steely determination soldered in the bone that can only be used to describe a true entrepreneur.

True business owners (those who have made a go at it for more than five years) are FEW AND FAR BETWEEN. In my estimate, I’d put them at (and this will surprise you) a fraction of 1% of the general population. That’s right – a miniscule number, and it’s a shame and a product of 50 years of corporate cradle-to-grave stewardship and an education system that does not value entrepreneurship.

I’m suggesting if more “employees” treated their jobs as their own businesses, there’d be far less attrition in the workplace. If more “employees” thought like entrepreneurs, many problems could be solved far more efficiently than what exists in business today. If more “employees” were more “invested” in their jobs, there would be more job satisfaction today.

What do you think?

COMING SOON: More tell-tale “banty rooster” signals.

Maureen Sharib (maureen at techtrak.com) is a telephone name sourcer, names sourcing since 1997. She and her husband Bob own the names-sourcing firm TechTrak.com, Inc. (www.techtrak.com) which helps companies fill their hard-to-place positions at a fraction of the cost of traditional recruiting venues. Maureen is the 2007-2008 Guild Guide for the newly formed Sourcers Guild, a professional organization for sourcers. Sourcers Guild: http:// finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/sourcersguild/ She is also the author of the only of its kind and very popular “Magic in the Method” telephone name sourcing training course and a continuous contributor to many online recruiting related sites. Maureen holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from the University of Cincinnati and lives in Morrow, Ohio, on a 12-acre paradise with her husband Bob, dog Buster and three barn cats that won’t stay out of her house. She is most grateful to be able to do what she does.

Retention in an ever-tightening labor market is one of the most challenging arenas for recruitment today. If a company’s employees are “engaged” in their work they’ll be less likely to listen to that siren call (when it comes – and it will come!) from a recruiter outside its own four walls.

Over the next decade, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects labor will become even scarcer than it is today. What can you do now to alleviate recruiter suffering within your own organization?

By helping your employees become engaged in the work they do, you can lessen the chances that your company will find itself in a serious staffing shortage down the road. Assisting your employees now with these 12 common-sense guidelines is one strategy you can implement to improve your company’s ability to preserve and develop what has become its most valuable asset – its people. Happy and satisfied employees accomplish amazing things.

Some of the advice that follows may appear contrary to a company’s objectives. Do you DARE to be so open-minded as to include this advice to your employees to help them grow strong? I suggest you do! Let the chips fall where they may. Your organization will grow stronger as a result. Remember, happy and satisfied employees accomplish amazing things.

12 Ways to Become an Engaged Employee

1. Evaluate what you’ve done right. Continue or increase your commitment to the positive ways you currently contribute as an employee.

2. Treat your employer right. In all likelihood, your employer pays you a competitive salary, some give you benefits, and training and many of them acknowledge your contributions. Give it back. Let them know you appreciate all that they do for you and the opportunity they have given you. Remember, much of this “opportunity” comes with great risk to them. Give them credit for their belief in you.

3. Get your financial information organized. If your finances are in disarray it’s a pretty good chance your work is too. Get organized and resolve to reduce and finally eliminate your debt. Check your credit reports periodically. Pay your bills on time.

4. If you’re customer-facing, increase your efforts with your employer’s best customers. If the economy turns sour in 2008, help your employer stay the course by not being one of the companies your customers “cut bait” with. Work with them, serve them well, and make sure your company is unforgettable!

5. Market yourself. In down-turns, one of the first things that get the sharp axe in most big companies is the employee roster. It’s a fact of life; stock prices drive corporate decisions. It’s nothing person-al but you need to be in a position that allows you to land on your feet. If you keep up with your own “marketing” your own market share will increase! Market, market, market (yourself)!

6. Diversify your income stream. If you’ve always wanted to own your own business, begin now. Nothing happens over-night. Just about every successful enterprise starts out small and grows daily. Begin now. Use your weekends/ evenings. Today will never come around again. (Use caution: Many people use the phrase “multiple streams of income” to lure you into bad investments or second businesses you know little about or don’t have time to manage. Don’t fall into this trap.)

7. Make friends with and network with recruiters. You never know when one might come in handy.

8. Save money. $50 a week will compound into a fortune over 40 years. A savings account in the lean times will give you courage and help you stay the course.

9. Develop an annual business plan for your enterprise (yes, that’s YOU!). Just like for a business, develop one for yourself. Start thinking of yourself as a business and learn to make decisions for one. It can be a simple plan, but do it!

10. Attend trade shows, conferences, seminars, take classes, and gather new skills, read things! Stay up-to-date in your industry. Create a blog, talk about what’s going on for You, Inc. Contribute something some-where. Bring more to the table than you take away. Do stuff! Lose the 9-to-5 mentality. That’s what some employees have. You’re not one of THOSE, are you?

11. Think of yourself as an asset because that’s what an engaged employee is. Your brain is your most important business commodity. Add to it – nobody can ever take away what’s in it.

12. Finally, remember what truly matters. Tell your loved ones what they mean to you. Become the person you always wanted to be.

Maureen Sharib is co-owner and co-founder of TechTrak, Inc., a name sourcing firm and author of “The Magic in the Method”, the only telephone names sourcing course available today. Read Maureen’s blog, NameSourcer, here: http://maureensharib.typepad.com/namesourcer/ Copyright Maureen Sharib 2008.

If you routinely call gatekeepers and get lines like “You need a name to be transferred to anyone,” it could be that you are routinely doing or saying something that is causing that gatekeeper to view you as a threat to her company’s infrastructure.

Effective communication skills allow you easy entrance to most any gatekeeper’s psyche. The first thing you must do to effectively communicate with anyone is put the other person at ease when you call.

This is not accomplished by demand. It is not accomplished by overenthusiastic and phony-sounding greetings. Nor is it accomplished by over-long explanations of why you’re calling.

Apply a Friendly, Forthright Attitude

Technology will continue to change the way we do things, but technology will never come close to the one simple thing that humans need most from each other, and that is approval.

If that gatekeeper gets just the slightest whiff of falsehood from you, she’s out of there faster than a scared rabbit. If she senses a genuine friendliness from you that signals approval (of your own self as well as of her), she is much more apt to listen and apply herself to your request.

“But I am genuine and friendly! you’re thinking.

Are you? Do people remark on your telephone voice? Do they compliment you on your affability on the telephone? On your telephone skills?

The first thing you do when that gatekeeper answers is listen. You listen to what she says. You hear what she’s conveying. “It’s a wonderful, sunny day here at ABC Corporation, Melissa speaking. May I help you?” is a mouthful for any gatekeeper to get out, and believe me, over time, the charm of it wears thin. Hesitating just slightly and acknowledging her dilemma before you blast her with your own agenda will go a long way toward making friends with her.

“Wow, Melissa, that’s a mouthful! It’s sunny here too, but we’re expecting rain later today!” will probably put her just a little off-guard and cause her to chuckle over the cross she bears so cheerfully.

Showing genuine empathy over her condition will make her just a bit more immediately comfortable with who you are and just might facilitate the communication between the two of you. Try it: I guarantee you’ll like the results.

But first, be sure you sound for real. Record your calls and listen to yourself. Get beyond the self-consciousness you feel listening to your own voice and actually listen to how you sound. What comes to mind as you listen to yourself? Do you sound real? Do you sound genuine? Do you sound sincere?

You’ll be surprised what you’ll hear in your own voice if you listen to it carefully. Take note of the thoughts that pass through your mind as you listen and heed them. It’s surprising how effectively critical we can be of ourselves when we really need to be.

If you don’t trust your own judgment, ask others. Choose people you trust to be forthright, and tell them what you’re trying to accomplish. Ask them for their opinion about your telephone voice. Encourage their frankness.

Many times I have counseled a caller to speak up. Many times I have called to someone’s attention that they mumble on the phone and are hard to understand. And more times than I care to recall, I have told someone they speak too fast. Critique yourself or have someone you trust do it, and work to correct your shortcomings.

If you don’t quite get how these things work at first, that’s okay. Just keep doing what you’re learning, and you’ll start to get a better feel for the whole thing.

Getting Past the Gatekeeper’s Resistance

There are gatekeepers you will encounter who seem humorless and cold. It’s very important not to let one of these initial resistances throw you off and cause you to quit. The key here is to listen. What does she say? What doesn’t she say? Follow her lead.

If she sounds brusque and to the point, it’s not necessary for you to reflect her mirror image back to her. She’s more likely to respond to you if you are to the point (leave the brusque out) yourself and don’t waste her time. In instances like these, use one of the names you’ve gathered before you made the call (you did do this, didn’t you?) to offer as your admission ticket.

She cannot deny you once you’ve paid the fare.

Sometimes a gatekeeper just needs to hear a little more about who you are before she gives out her information. She is the Keeper of the Gate, and some of them take their jobs very seriously, as well they should. The more you interact with gatekeepers, the better you’ll get at communicating with them. This skill will lead them to give you the information you want. Allow an older-sounding gatekeeper to assume command, and follow her instructions. Do not resist her or try to get her to bend to your will. She doesn’t have to and she usually won’t.

How old does the gatekeeper sound? Younger and less-experienced gatekeepers usually offer less resistance, whereas middle-aged and older gatekeepers sometimes require more subtlety and creativity.

Just being respectful and polite to these kingdom key holders can be enough to encourage her to help you. And that’s the key: ask for her help. When I encounter rigidity, I go soft. “Can you help me? I feel so silly, I know I should know this but I don’t. Can you please direct me to . . .” will often engage her to the point where she will direct you into the area you need to get into. Avoid direct questions like the unforgiving “Can you tell me who the civil engineers are there in your facility who do wastewater engineering?”

Rather, ask to be transferred to “the administrative assistant in the water group,” and this less-threatening request will probably be put through. Once there, the department administrative assistant is likely to be young (though there are some older types in this bunch as well), but the idea is to forestall your defeat.

The more times you come up to bat, the more likely it is you will hit a homerun. It’s a numbers game; never forget that.

Having Fun with the Gatekeeper

Very few gatekeepers are the humorless and cold garden variety. Many of them are friendly and vivacious types who enjoy the banter opportunity the telephone occasionally offers.

If you understand that the person on the other end of the line is a human being (nothing more, nothing less), you will have a leg up in this telephone names sourcing business. It isn’t rocket science.

So make it fun for her by setting yourself apart from the madding crowd. If you’re friendly, sincere will creep in along beside it. If she senses these two things in you, she will usually tell you just about anything.

There are male telephone sourcers who can give gatekeepers a hard time and get away with it. There are females who can extract the most amazing information out of a CEO himself. There are individuals of both sexes who understand the Albert Camus assertion that “Charm is a way of getting the answer yes without asking a clear question.”

The point here is that sometimes it’s necessary to get your questions answered by asking other questions that may not appear substantive to your mission. Do you know how to do that?

When I’m telephone names sourcing, I usually strive to sound like a 9-to-5 secretary who’s bored to tears with what I’m doing and just waiting for the whistle to blow so I can go home. I don’t say any of this stuff, mind you, but it comes across in my delivery. When I ask who the sales managers are for all the different U.S. territories and she wants to email the list, I will at first acquiesce to her suggestion. Then I ask, “How many are there?” After she responds, I’ll daringly suggest, “Oh, don’t bother emailing them. That’s not too many. Just list them out and if I need you to repeat, I’ll interrupt. I’m a fast typist!”

This quick camaraderie, along with the mind-numbing boredom cadence I attach to my request, usually gets the job accomplished. Not always, but usually. Remember, this is a numbers game.

There are several ways you can solicit someone’s help that make it feel comfortable and fun for her. The important thing is that you’re having fun and you’re comfortable. Here’s a fast tip from the music industry for making yourself physically comfortable when you’re working:

Lift your chest. Place your hand at the bottom of your sternum and use it as a guide to lift the chest. When the chest is lifted correctly, the stomach muscles will lie flat; without having to suck it in, the back will be arched and the shoulders will be in a more natural position. In body language, high shoulders indicate stress, while lower, relaxed shoulders indicate confidence and control.

Talk to Her Like She’s an Old Friend

The technique of acting like the gatekeeper is an old friend is powerful indeed. Once you master this relaxed state of thinking and behaving, you’ll find that most gatekeepers will respond to you positively.

However, this does not include accosting the gatekeeper with some false hypocritical interest that betrays your intentions. Don’t insult her intelligence by inquiring after her health or her feelings. Be respectful of her position and your relationship to her position. Introduce yourself politely and ask her for the information you seek.

Remember, you may be calling this person back numerous times, and if you become a professional telephone names sourcer, there’s a very real chance that she may become a friend as you call her repeatedly in the future. There will be many more opportunities for familiarity. Don’t blow your chances in the beginning by acting like a jerk.

When All This Advice Doesn’t Work

It happens. The fact is that sometimes you’re going to meet a gatekeeper, or an administrative assistant, or an executive assistant, or an individual contributor, a janitor, a mailroom clerk, or whoever, who just won’t give it up. It happens. Move on.

You can’t bake a cake without breaking a few eggs.

You have to accept the idea that when you’re learning how to use this material, you’re going to occasionally run into someone who may not get your humor, may not appreciate your inquiry, or may not respond to your best practices. Don’t worry about it.

My personal best practice here is to just get off the phone as quickly as possible. I like to think I do it with grace and aplomb, but I know for a fact there are sourcers who just hang up. I find this rude, and you may be eliminating the chance to try on another day. When I started telephone names sourcing, I remember fearfully asking, “Well, what do I do if . . .” and I was told, “If you get too freaked out, you can always just hang the phone up. It’s just a phone!” And in its own weird way, that advice is right on the money.

I don’t see any point in trying to reclaim a lost cause. Cut your losses and move on. Time is money in this business and there’s always another way in. Find it.

Maureen Sharib is a telephone names sourcer, names sourcing since 1997. She and her husband, Bob, own the names-sourcing firm TechTrak.com, Inc. (www.techtrak.com), which helps companies fill their hard-to-place positions at a fraction of the cost of traditional recruiting venues. Maureen is the 2007-2008 Guild Guide for the newly formed Sourcers Guild, a professional organization for sourcers. Sourcers Guild: http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/sourcersguild/. She is also the author of the only one of its kind and very popular “Magic in the Method” telephone names sourcing training course and a continuous contributor to many online recruiting-related sites. Maureen holds a bachelor of arts in economics from the University of Cincinnati and lives in Morrow, Ohio, on a 12-acre paradise with her husband, Bob, dog Buster, and three barn cats. She is most grateful to be able to do what she does.

Names sourcing is a means to an end. It creates a list of persons holding specific titles who are likely to possess specific skill-sets out of (usually) specific companies that can be used to fill your positions. Names sourcing can deliver a solution that links company recruiters with qualified candidates in a short amount of time – three to five business days being reasonable on a medium-sized job (50-100 names). A list of candidates is delivered in a few days, while traditional recruiting routes may take weeks and months to do!

There are a variety of techniques used by names sourcers to get this list assembled, and we’ll be discussing many of them in this learning series. But the first step in any names sourcing job is to understand your hiring manager’s, or the customer’s, needs. Understand them very completely because, without that grasp of the requirements, you’re sure to miss your mark! Names sourcing delivers to your customer a targeted list of persons he can sit down at his desk and call on the telephone the very next day and offer his job opportunity. It appears very simple, but the reality is that to get to this stage, a complicated, well-honed, disciplined process ensues that produces these results for your customer.

Names sourcing should be the starter activity for every candidate search. It should be included in every recruiter’s methodology, without exception. It should be taught as a first-line activity for every candidate search. It’s estimated that less than 10% (and I think this estimate is generous!) of a recruiter’s daily activities are engaged in names sourcing – the number should be three times that! If you spent two hours of every day “names sourcing” (believe me, the time will go very fast!), your pipelines would fill to overflowing in no time at all!

In the real estate business, they say, referring to listings, “If you don’t have it on the shelf, you can’t sell it!” It’s no secret in that business that the best sales agents are usually the best at listing properties for sale. When I was a broker, my sales always elevated in the years I had the highest volume of listings “on the shelf.” To list property, the real estate industry recommends “farming” to its participants” Farming involves cultivating a specific set of targets. They may be in a specific area, in a specific price range, in any specific reference area. The idea is to have a multiple number of contacts with the same people, getting your name and service in front of them, in an effort to procure their business. In marketing, it’s called branding, and in our industry I propose we call it sourcing.

Telephone vs. Internet

There are two types of sourcing: Telephone and Internet. Telephone sourcing is the reliance on the telephone as the main procuring cause for the information that is gathered. It does not mean you don’t do a little Internet sourcing in combination with the telephone – in fact you do! A telephone sourcer uses the Internet many times to glean “a few names in” that will facilitate her calling once she starts.

Internet sourcing is the reliance on the Internet as the main procuring cause for the information that is gathered. It does not mean you don’t do some telephoning in combination with the Internet – in fact you do! An Internet sourcer uses the telephone many times to “check” the veracity of the information that is found on the Internet.

The “checking” phase of Internet search holds vast promise. When you’re checking whether someone’s title is, in fact, still Research and Development Manager, it sometimes occurs that this person has moved into a Director or VP position within the organization. Armed with the name (that is, in fact, still an important part of the organization), a skillful Internet researcher will ask, “Who is the Manager of R&D at the present time?” More often than not, they’ll be told!

Another fascinating aspect of Internet search is the networking capability of the format. Internet sourcers who are also skilled at communication can fruitfully turn one name into 20, picking up whole departments on their forays into organizations. This prototype is approaching being a true telephone sourcer, because this is what telephone sourcers are notorious for. It is my opinion, and some may disagree with me, that many Internet sourcers do not care for the human interaction that is required to turn one Internet sourced name into several. Or they may not have the ability (language, proper equipment, allowances) to do this. Telephone sourcers have a great edge over the sourcing competition in this realm, in my opinion!

Maureen Sharib is a telephone names sourcer, names sourcing since 1997. She and her husband, Bob, own the names-sourcing firm TechTrak.com, Inc. (www.techtrak.com), which helps companies fill their hard-to-place positions at a fraction of the cost of traditional recruiting venues. Maureen is the 2007-2008 Guild Guide for the newly formed Sourcers Guild, a professional organization for sourcers (http://finance.groups. yahoo.com/group/sourcersguild/). She is also the author of the one-of-a-kind and very popular “Magic in the Method” telephone names sourcing training course and a frequent contributor to many online recruiting-related sites. Maureen holds a bachelor of arts in economics from the University of Cincinnati and lives in Morrow, Ohio.

Tips to share with your clients
Get Your “Houses” in Order!

The best companies are having trouble attracting employees. Not only are companies in different industries vying for the same candidates as the current crop of college grads embraces career experimentation, but these candidates themselves present different challenges from only a couple of years ago. The 80 million strong Millennials (also known as Generation Y/Echo Boom) are acutely discerning job-seekers who understand the value of their unique tech-savvy skills and the power of their networking achievements. Demanding, and receiving, more competitive pay and benefits, faster advancement, and more responsibility, this entry-level generation alone presents a vastly different set of challenges than any before.

Multiple job offers frequently greet new graduates, which contributes to today’s drive in pay. Civil engineering and accounting graduates alone are nearing $50,000 in beginning pay, and one sector, chemical engineering, has cracked the $60,000 notch while other engineering disciplines (electrical, mechanical) hover already in the mid-$50,000s, beating out recent economics majors, who are being offered $51,600.

Word to the Wise: Ratchet up what you’re willing to pay to market expectations. Get real and get down to business.

The reason my telephone names sourcing job exists in this world is that companies are having so much trouble finding candidates. The entry-level candidates that are entering the workforce today are the same ones I’m going to be sourcing after tomorrow on your behalf. In order to attract them in the future, you need to understand how to attract them today. What are you doing to attract employees? Have you thought about it?

One solution comes out of the real estate practice of “home-staging,” in which a home is “set up” to present its best face forward to potential buyers. In the Recruitosphere, this can be called “job-staging.”

Job-staging techniques can be tailored to fit any company’s budget. The first thing to do is to glam up your curb appeal. Whether it’s an attractive and well-tuned website that moves with intuitive alacrity to the viewer’s (job seeker) command or fresh carpeting in your office reception area, curb appeal is paramount in getting job seekers through your front door.

Make your entrance memorable. The second a potential job seeker lands on the front page of your website or reaches for the polished and gleaming front door to your office, he or she should be thinking “looks good, sounds good, feels good, smells good.” Keep it clean and keep it updated with fresh material and information.

Take a look at your job descriptions. Are they the same old, same old “Requires this, requires that, don’t bother applying unless . . .”? Move over and get with the program! Today’s job seekers are willing to experiment, and they expect you to be willing to “experiment” with them. Open your minds (and close down some of your “requirements”) in order to attract them. Some of them just don’t make sense. Lose the stinkin’ thinkin’ and embrace the sea of change.

Sand, steam, pressure clean, and replace what is obviously no longer working. You can do better.

“Job seeker first.” Learn to think like this and get out of their way. Make yourself unobtrusive, and make whatever “furniture” you have lying around that could get in their way unobtrusive, too. Remove the barriers to entry. Clear the decks. Streamline. Less is more.

Modernize everything. Today’s job seeker is tech-savvy like no candidate you have ever seen before. Offer (and allow) her the gadgetry – she needs much of it like she needs the air (I hope it smells good) she breathes in your office. Think TECh: Technology Ever Changing. Keep up with it.

Project a world-class image everywhere. Look at your offices as if they were a five-star hotel. Small things add up. Flowers on the reception desk, pleasing and welcoming “greeters,” fast elevators, shining clean bathrooms, convenient and socially attractive cafeterias that serve good and modern food, break rooms that offer solace and quiet, private cubicles that approach the coddled feeling that so many of this entry generation grew up with – think what’s going on inside their heads. Cater to them. Read up on the Servant Leadership mantra.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Servant_leadership

Don’t forget what your sites “sound” like. Remember, this generation grew up on technology, and they expect to be surrounded with sights, sounds, and smells that inform and appease, flat screens that stream the day’s news, and hallway music that soothes their savaged senses. That’s what they’re talkin’ about – learn to listen to the language they’re speaking.

I promise you, you will get your money back (this is all tax deductible, anyway) in the sale of your job if you “stage” it correctly. You’ll add square footage to the “opportunity” you’re presenting if you approach this dynamic, emotively thinking generation in a way that’s sure to elicit that “Wow!” response you’re looking for. Watch and see if it doesn’t work wonders on your more seasoned candidates as well!

Maureen Sharib (maureen at techtrak.com) is a telephone names sourcer, names sourcing since 1997. She and her husband, Bob, own the names-sourcing firm TechTrak.com, Inc. (www.techtrak.com), which helps companies fill their hard-to-place positions at a fraction of the cost of traditional recruiting venues. Maureen is the 2007-2008 Guild Guide for the newly formed Sourcers Guild, a professional organization for sourcers (http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/sourcersguild/). She is also the author of the one-of-a-kind and very popular “Magic in the Method” telephone names sourcing training course and a frequent contributor to many online recruiting-related sites. Maureen holds a bachelor of arts in economics from the University of Cincinnati and lives in Morrow, Ohio.

“Sourcing! Sourcing! Sourcing! It’s all I hear these days – source this and source that and source this way and source that way – what’s up with this sourcing business?” the tired HR executive said at the end of a long, grueling day of perusing still unfilled vacancies on his company’s staffing roster.

Putting down the sheet and looking up over his glasses at his staffing director standing before him on this late Friday afternoon, he continued, “Now that you have my attention, what is sourcing anyway? How is it accomplished? You’ve mentioned we need a sourcing group here in-house. Tell me more – do we really? How do we form one and where do we find the people to fill it? How do we pay them and what are the potential pitfalls to avoid? Will our recruiters embrace the process? Is it good money after bad? What, what, what? Talk to me.”

“Third-party recruiters have been using these guys for years!” the staffing director shot back excitedly. “Heck, before I came ‘inside,’ when I ran my own staffing firm, we used one in particular – she’s in Cincinnati and her name is Maureen.”

“Sharib. I’ve heard her name,” the VP interrupted. “I think someone just sent me an ERE article she wrote last month – something about the secrets of sourcing?”

http://www.ere.net/articles/db/0C88327111DB488D9721A2352427E83D.asp

“Yes, she writes a lot on the subject and has been for the last few years. I think she started over on ERE three-four years back, and since then she’s been aggressively advocating the use of telephone sourcing in proactive research. She took some heat in that article you mentioned because she suggested sourcing could be considered as a Six Sigma methodology subject. I happen to agree with her suggestion, and so have a couple others over the past few years.”

http://www.erexchange.com/Articles/default.asp?CID={6FFC61FA-A146-4D7B-83D5-EAEA23F8703D}

“So tell me, what is sourcing?” the HR decision maker asked as he pushed back in his chair and folded his hands behind his head, waiting for an answer.

“It’s when you work to proactively fill your jobs with people that do not necessarily have their résumés ‘out there’ or ‘in here.’ It’s when you find people that reside inside other companies that are hard at work doing the work we’d like to see them doing for us!”

“You mean cold calling? Hell, that’s how we did it in the old days!” he guffawed, leaning forward in his high-backed chair as his feet hit the ground with a thud. “You mean to tell me we’re not doing that today?” he demanded incredulously.

“Are you kidding me?” the staffing director remonstrated. “All I have in this department are paper pushers and board surfers. Ask them to get on the phone and find someone who isn’t listed in a database and they tell me, ‘That’s not my job.’ We’ve got kids, here, Sir, no offense, and they need shaking up.”

“They certainly do,” the VP replied. “How can we get this thing back on track?”

“The first thing we can do is give them the tools they need to succeed. I suggest we do this in a two-pronged approach. Because there are two types of sourcing – Internet and telephone – we bring in trainers to teach our people how to do both in a one-two punch. There are a couple people out there I’d recommend for Internet training: one is Barbara Ling – she was one of the early adapters – and the other is Shally Steckerl. Both of them have Internet-based and on-site training capabilities.

www.risetrends.com
(Barbara Ling)

www.jobmachine.net
(Shally Steckerl)

“For telephone sourcing the only program I know of is Maureen’s “Magic in the Method.” It’s provided online as well as on-site, and it picks up where the Internet search instruction ends. (http:// www.techtrak.com/magicmethod/magicmethod)

“It teaches telephone sourcing skills, and that’s what we really need to kick things up around here. Some of them may not like hearing about the new sheriff in town, but it’s what they need!”

“I agree,” the gray hair said. “How fast can you make this happen?”

“I can announce the new program immediately. It would help if I could be budgeted with money to accomplish the training. It may take in the range of $20,000 to bring the training to all 20 of our people. What they do with that should repay the training in a few days.”

“You’re kidding!” the HR VP exclaimed. “In a few days?”

“In a few days,” the staffing director affirmed. “In a few days,” she repeated, for emphasis.

NEXT:

How is names sourcing accomplished?

How to find names sourcers and how to pay them.

Is it legal? Immoral? Unethical? Fattening?

Maureen Sharib is a telephone names sourcer, names sourcing since 1997. She and her husband, Bob, own the names-sourcing firm TechTrak. com, Inc. (www.tech trak.com), which helps companies fill their hard-to-place positions at a fraction of the cost of traditional recruiting venues. Maureen is the 2007-2008 Guild Guide for the newly formed Sourcers Guild, a professional organization for sourcers. Sourcers Guild: http://finance.groups.yahoo. com/group/sourcersguild/. She is also the author of the very popular “Magic in the Method,” a one-of-a-kind telephone names sourcing training course, and a continuous contributor to many online recruiting-related sites. Maureen holds a BA in economics from the University of Cincinnati and lives in Morrow, Ohio, on a 12-acre paradise with Bob, their dog Buster, and three barn cats. She is most grateful to be able to do what she does.

I see lots of posts on the boards about starting a recruiting business; in fact, when you do a search on Google on “starting a recruiting business” you get 611 hits. When you do a search on “selling your recruiting business” or “selling a recruiting business” you get no hits. What’s up with that?

Many short winters ago I sold small businesses. For those of you who know me, you also know I spent 20-plus long years doing this, most of which for a company that I owned and ran.

It’s an exhausting and trying business; mostly, you’re attempting to sell “small businesses” to people who can’t get a job. Try that on for size. People “who can’t get a job” are driven by other factors than people who can get a job. People who can’t get a job are many times older; they may have lost their jobs in economy moves that their former employers made that set them out on stoops with little to no security for the future. These people sometimes are shell-shocked and bitter, and dealing with some of them can take a special set of patience and temerity mixed in with empathy.

Once in a while you get some-one who nobody will hire for legal reasons. I once had a wife tearfully call me the night before closing on a $350,000 deal to tell me (for the first time) that her husband was a jailed felon and could only receive permission to attend the closing during a certain short two-hour period and what could we do to accommodate the jailer’s schedule? YES, this actually happened. He attended and sat dutifully next to his wife (who was buying the business with HER money FOR him, a second husband after the death of her first), a broken and sad soul. I forget what he had done that landed him there and only learned of all this shame that night before the closing and learned more when I was called upon to sell the business two years later for the “arrangement” that wasn’t working out.

There are many other stories I could tell, but the reason I bring these up here is to demonstrate that your likely field of “buyers” usually comes with some “issues.”

The first thing you must do if you own your own business is PLAN, PLAN, and PLAN some more. You’re not going to live forever and, yes, it’s easy to get caught up in the 15-hour-a-day madness that it takes to own and run your own business. DO NOT overlook this component. Hire professionals to help you do this. Be careful about thinking your kids want your business; they usually don’t, so don’t burden them with it! They might, though, and the best way to equip them for the future trauma is to make sure they receive a college education beforehand followed by an internship of service that includes running every single part of the business in some capacity.

You might also consider some-one within your own business with whom you have a mentoring relationship who has expressed an interest in future ownership. People aren’t mind readers; talk to this person about this subject like a Dutch uncle (you do talk to this person in this manner anyway, right?) and set some kind of stepping-away timetable that ties the company’s performance to some kind of revenue-sharing benchmark for yourself. It’s never too early to plan.

If you have nobody lined up “internally” to act as your successor, the time will come when you want to sell. You will need to take a cold-blooded and calculatingly hard look at your business and see it for what it is. Blood, sweat, and tears have no market value, so lose them in this process. Selling a business takes time. Be prepared for at least a year’s stretch; it can take less, but in my experience a year is a pretty good benchmark.

I say one year if, in fact, you have collected everything ahead of time that you will need to sell your business. My best advice to you at this point, once again, is to hire professionals. You’ll need your financials in order, and these should include at minimum three years of tax returns and accompanying balance statements. You will also need to set a price on your business, and that can be a very tricky endeavor. Your price is impacted (usually almost wholly) by the financials you can bring to the table to “show.” Any monies “on the side” (wink, wink) are not countable, so don’t even bring it up. You’ll look like a fool. Different “multiples” are customary across different industries. Do you know what they are? Do you know what can be considered as value in the original multiple?

You also need to look at what the selling market is like at the time you wish to sell. Is what you’re selling unique? Is it hard to duplicate? Is there a lot of inventory and equipment that needs to be addressed in the selling price? Real estate? You may need the services of a Realtor; try to find one who has business brokerage experience. Good ones are rare, but they’re out there. Does your recruiting business consist almost wholly of human capital? Can it exist without you fueling the furnace? What happens when you are gone?

Do you have contracts in place with your customers? How do they read? Will your customers stay with the business when there is a change of ownership?

You’re also going to need someone’s advice as to how to structure a sale. Your account-ant/tax person is a good one to turn to for this advice, but don’t be fooled by a shingle. Ask them if they’re knowledgeable about cur-rent tax laws in selling a business. Tax law is a tricky and moving target, changing constantly.

And last but not least, you’re going to have to decide if you want to deal with all the crazies who show up on your doorstep, wanting to “lookie-lou” your business over. “Everyone” wants to own their own business, and you’re going to be deluged with nine and a half requests out of ten by people who do not have the wherewithal (money) to buy your business. You have the energy to wade through all that? Do you understand how to ask for a confidentiality agreement? How to vet a buyer’s balance sheet? You may (and probably) want to hire a professional to do this for you. There are brokers who specialize in the sale of small (and large) businesses. They usually charge a commission on the sale (10-12% is not unusual) and, if they’re smart, will charge you some other nonrefundable fees to bring your business to market in a professional manner. Having someone between you and the crazies is priceless.

But don’t ask me to represent you. I wouldn’t go back to that nightmare for all the tea in China. I love telephone names sourcing!

Maureen Sharib (maureen @techtrak.com) is a telephone names sourcer, names sourcing since 1997. She and her husband, Bob, own the names-sourcing firm TechTrak.com, Inc. (www.techtrak.com), which helps companies fill their hard-to-place positions at a fraction of the cost of traditional recruiting venues. Maureen is the 2007-2008 Guild Guide for the newly formed Sourcers Guild, a professional organization for sourcers. Sourcers Guild: http://finance.groups. yahoo.com /group/sourcersguild/. She is also the author of the very popular “Magic in the Method,” a one-of-a-kind telephone names sourcing training course, and a frequent contributor to many online recruiting-related sites. Maureen has a BA in economics from the University of Cincinnati and lives in Morrow, Ohio, on a 12-acre paradise with Bob, their dog Buster, and three barn cats. She is most grateful to be able to do what she does.