Every market, strong or weak, creates problems. The difficulties inherent in a good market are far preferable to those encountered in a poor one. Nevertheless, to proceed as though a booming market is totally free of problems is to reduce income in an excellent market and to develop habit patterns that will be very difficult to correct should the market turn sour.

While we’ll detail the Strategic Traps in a future article, the most obvious is simply a reduction of effort. Every long-tenured manager has seen this phenomenon. Transferring his observations to his staff, however, or even avoiding the trap himself may be a different matter.

In a solid market of demand for talent exceeding supply, it is (relatively) easy to produce acceptable or more than acceptable billings. However, there is an appropriate Wall Street saying that applies to our industry as well: “Don’t confuse brains with a bull market!”

While our industry actually contains its fair share of brains, there are two areas where many of us do come up short – a strong work ethic and a continuing desire to improve in good times!

It is part of a sales personality to be optimistic and confident. While this is clearly a positive in terms of tenacity during difficult times or situations, there is an accompanying negative to this trait. That negative is the belief that good times will last forever and a ten-dency to “coast” in a buoyant market.

This is no time to “coast”! Rather, it is a time to work hard, stay focused, improve skills, and reap all the rewards we deserve.

The following quiz will take less than five minutes to fill out. And it will provide a valid indicator as to whether you are maximizing your market or letting the market carry you along!

Work Ethic Daily Quiz
(To be filled out at the end
of every day)

1. Did you arrive on time at the office this morning (no later than 8:30 a.m.)?

2. Was your daily planner filled out thoroughly from the day before?

3. Did you make at least five business calls before 9:30 a.m.?

4. Do you have a slightly addictive “reward program” (example: second cup of coffee) set up for five early presentations? Did you earn the reward early today?

5. Did you accept or make no more than one nonbusiness call during office hours? (Calls under 30 seconds do not count.)

6. If business is good, did you make presentations to (and qualify) at least two new prospective accounts today? If business is only fair, did you make presentations to (and qualify) at least five new prospective accounts today?

7. Did you achieve at least 30 fairly extensive business conversations today?

8. Did you set up at least one first interview (including phone interview) today?

9. Do you have a sign/note on your phone that is less than a week old to remind you to improve habit patterns?

10. Is your daily planner thoroughly and logically filled out for tomorrow?

11. What time are you leaving the office to go home? Is it at least 5 p.m.?

12. Do you have plans to improve skills at least slightly this evening? Examples: Reading business book, critiquing previously taped call, watching part of a business video. (Should be done at least three days a week.)

Deductions

1. Did you do general reading (such as newspapers) or industry reading (such as magazines in your area of specialization, or industry books or newsletters) in the office during working hours?

2. Did you participate in nonbusiness discussions in the office during prime working hours? Did you allow yourself to be distracted by pointless “business” conversations? More than five minutes is too much!

3. Did you spend more than five minutes of nonbusiness time on the Internet?

Scoring

Ten points for each yes answer. If you answered yes to any of the deduction questions, deduct 10 points each. Notice that you had 12 questions, so if one does not apply to how you do business, this is factored in.

Results

100+ points Terrific! Combine this with good skills, and you are doing what you must to be successful.
90 points Signs of problems ahead. Long term, this will affect your productivity.
80 points Not good. This will lead to sporadic performance and more-than-occasional slumps.
70 points Poor! How serious are you about succeeding, anyway?
60 points/less Quit fooling around! This is not acceptable!

If this test seems difficult to you, or unrealistic in some ways, note that a no answer to any of the main questions, or a yes to any of the deductions, will absolutely reduce your concentration and production. Moreover, this test is more flexible than it seems. Twelve correct answers would give you 120 points. You could effectively miss two questions and still score 100 points!

How often should this quiz be taken? Daily for 30 days will be more than enough to identify long-term areas of concern. Anyone can have an occasional unproductive day. But if you find yourself missing the same questions, your productivity reduced by the same problems, for an entire month, then it’s time to realize that you are skating on thin ice.

Success in our business is not measured solely by annual produc-tion. Rather, it is measured by billings in relation to the general state of your market.

Good production combined with poor focus is an eventual recipe for disaster! You will find it very difficult to suddenly change habit patterns in a deteriorating market.

The above test will identify areas where you may have drifted away from a serious concentration on business. When combined with solid industry-specific selling skills, a consistently good score will enable you to maximize your income – in any market!

Steven Finkel is the president of the St. Louis-based firm Professional Search Seminars. For over two decades, and on four continents, he has been regarded as a leading speaker and trainer in our industry. Recruitment International magazine, Europe’s largest such publication, has referred to him as “the only major trainer in search and permanent placement in the United States.” His website is www.stevefinkel. com, or he can be reached at (314) 991-3177. Mr. Finkel is the author or co-author of a number of hardbound books for our industry, as well as a full line of other quality training products.

Several months ago in The Fordyce Letter, a reader wrote with a not-uncommon problem. He owned the finest training products in our industry, but they sat, as he said, “on the shelf,” while his group of experienced search consultants continued to repeat errors and limit their production, showing questionable improvement. He questioned why this was the case.

Reality

Unfortunately the reader, by his very phraseology, appears to be denying reality, and therein is the problem. There are a number of excellent motivational products available, from the book Think and Grow Rich, by Napoleon Hill, to Larry Nobles’s three-tape audio series “Success Behavior.” Everyone should be exposed to these outstanding works or their imitators.

Nevertheless, the reality is that most people, in the absence of a truly life-changing event, are not self-motivating beyond a certain point. The fault in this instance lies solely with the manager. To let excellent training products “sit on the shelf,” as he says, and expect the non-self-motivated to improve is about as likely to yield results as purchasing exercise equipment for a non-motivated spouse. Improvement by osmosis is highly unlikely. Does this mean there is no hope? Of course not. But it requires personal involvement and work from the manager.

A Culture of Learning

The manager shapes the organization. He develops the corporate attitudes. He forms the culture. If products simply sit and it is left to each recruiter to utilize them as he or she sees fit, this sends the clear message that continued learning is an individual responsibility, and thus an option. That message is wrong. Professional growth is not an option, and not individual. It is a permanent ongoing responsibility of the entire firm. But it is the manager’s responsibility to develop a plan – and to enforce that plan – to bring it about.

The Key

The plan itself embodies four elements, and they will be discussed in this article. But the key to these elements is group meetings that cannot be interrupted. To allow calls to be taken during meetings addressing skill improvement is to send a message that these meetings are not of the highest priority, and to reduce the quality of the meeting. Eventually, everyone will be filtering in and out of skill-improvement sessions, reducing the focus and concentration of the entire group.

These skill-improvement sessions should be con-ducted twice a week, in the morning, and not on Fridays. A rough estimate of length might be 30 to 45 minutes.

Topics

The difficulty that many managers have is deciding on topics and organizing the material. Without sufficient preparatory work, they simply pick a subject and blindly stumble into it the morning of the meeting, relying on their consultants to bail them out of their lack of structure by making contributions. This is rarely productive – and totally unnecessary.

In fact, there is no need for a manager to flail about wildly seeking subjects or specifics, as the outline of our industry has long been established and codified, and since broadened and refined.

Thirty years ago, a trainer named Phil Ross developed an audio series entitled The 28 Steps to the Placement Process. The superb foundational training book by Larry Nobles Search and Placement! contains 28 chapters. This author’s own book Breakthrough! contains 30 chapters. His two recruiter-based DVDs consist of eighteen 30 to 40-minute modules.

All of these high-content resources, plus selected passages from The Fordyce Letter, are repeatable, reviewable, relevant – and should be the foundation of solid sales meetings to improve skills and production.

For those recruiters who claim to be too advanced to learn, a quotation from an early manager of this writer should draw quick acknowledgment: “No one is smart enough to remember all he knows!”

Role-Playing

The reality, of course, is that people in our business do not get paid for what they know; they get paid for what they do. Improvement is useful only if it translates to increased production. There is only one way to go from knowing to doing, and that is role-playing.

New people should have this as an integral part of all training. But for experienced ones, an analogy will be persuasive. No matter how many millions of dollars a baseball player earns, every day – regardless of income – he does batting practice.

Role-playing is our batting practice, and we do it for the same reasons: to polish skills and correct weak points leading to improved performance.

An extensive article on this subject, titled “From Knowing to Doing! How to Implement,” can be found at the author’s website. It should itself be the subject of an entire meeting to clarify and explain why this is mandatory and how to do it.

The most frequent error made, however, is attempting to role-play face-to-face. To be effective, role-playing must be real; that means on the telephone, not face-to-face.

You can’t consistently hit for a high average if you skip batting practice.

Management Evaluation of Calls

What does this mean? It means that the manager must find out what the consultant is really doing on the phone. How? By listening in to his calls at his desk.

A simple analogy will show the value of this. In outside sales, it is part of a sales manager’s job to travel the territory with the people he supervises. On some calls, he will participate by adding clout on “key account calls,” while on others his job is to listen, evaluate, and then conduct “curbside coaching” with the aim of improving performance.

The technology to do this is readily available, either at any Radio Shack or similar electronics store, or with headsets designed with an extra jack for taping. The easiest way is simply to tape the call with the manager listening in via an earplug.

Speakerphones are not recommended, as they will alter the quality of the recruiter’s voice (reverberations are common), thus reducing the worth of the call.

Poor performers will resist this idea, as it will show them up. Good performers will like being listened to, as they believe it shows them off.

Signs on the Phone

Habit patterns can be broken and poor habits improved only by practice (role-playing) and repeat reminders. The manager should insist that the recruiter put a sign on the phone as a reminder of habit patterns that must be broken. Examples of this may be “slow your pace” or “who else?” for a recruiter who stops at one referral, i.e., lead to new recruits.

Conducting Sales Meetings

Aristotle wrote that “the truest knowledge of an art is achieved only by teaching that art.” As the manager conducts substantive, structured, formal skill-improvement sessions, this will be found to be true. However, this benefit should not be limited only to the manager. The experienced search consultants too will gain markedly by preparing for and conducting such meetings.

In a firm with five or more experienced recruiters, the manager should eventually be conducting no more than 50% of the twice-a-week meetings. Every experienced recruiter has a skill in one or more of the facets of our complex business. Even if it is only playing a tape of a call and critiquing his own performance, he should be in charge of occasional skill-improvement sessions.

The entire firm, but especially the meeting conductor, will be the beneficiary.

Numbers and Ratios

There is no point in repeating what has been said in detail elsewhere (see aforementioned two books), but at some point keeping track of numbers and analyzing ratios is mandatory.

As President Bush said in promoting his successful “No Child Left Behind” education bill, “If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it!”

Advance Preparation

It cannot be too strongly stressed that “winging it,” i.e., no preparation, yields poor results. And, in fact, there is no need to do so.

The 50+ chapters in the aforementioned two books, the 18 modules in the previously referenced DVDs, and the 24 modules in the Larry Nobles audio series Successful Search and Placement – to cite a few examples – mean that topics and structure are no longer a problem for any manager!

The owner should let his people know at the end of the week in written form what topics will be covered at the two meetings the following week. The recruiters must thus do reading or thinking about these topics, and be ready to discuss them.

For example, if the subject is desk organization, everyone must read the first two chapters of the Larry Nobles book (which address the subject), underline or highlight, and be prepared to discuss these chapters.

Each person must have his own copy of the books that are the foundation of our business in order to give structure to the meetings.

Implementing

The original question in The Fordyce Letter referenced the fact that the finest training products in our industry “sat on the shelf” while the manager left it up to his individual people to implement the material.

This manager is at fault. He is not doing his job, and is thereby cheating his people and himself by not instituting a culture of continued improvement in his organization.

Corporate cultures can be changed, and the steps outlined in this article will accomplish this over time.

Nevertheless, there will be a jolt when changes are made. The manager should conduct an initial meeting outlining these changes. He should commit himself to consistent implementation of these steps in front of his people. He should put a sign on his own office wall to remind him to continue to do so. And he should get a clear commitment from each person to wholehearted participation in these changes.

In explaining this to his staff, there is no reason that a certain amount of fear cannot be utilized with experienced people only (not with new ones). Experienced people have seen recessions. And they know that all markets have ups and downs. Our market is strong and our future is bright. Yet there will be brief downturns in the future.

The reason our entire industry suffers so badly in a slowdown is singular. We “confuse brains with a bull market.” We quit expanding and upgrading our client base. And we quit improving our skills.

Tell your experienced people this. They know it is true. And resolve to do your job. Resolve not to let it happen to them.

The Difficult Consultant

If you suspect that one individual will not participate in these changes, take pre-emptive measures. Bring this person into your office and give advance notice of your meeting. Flatter him. Tell him you’re counting on him. Tell him he’s the leader. Build him up. Repeat this to keep him on track with the program. Ask for his help, and allow him to conduct sales meetings.

If despite all your efforts, this person not only fails to change but also exhibits behavior that slows down the rest, there is only one right answer. Bob Half of the Robert Half organization wrote, “One bad person can spoil an entire office, because bad spirit is more contagious than good spirit.”

A person who consistently exhibits a bad attitude over time and cannot be changed must be terminated, regardless of production.

Consistency

It is critical to realize that building a culture of continued learning into your entire organization is not a matter of “motivation” or of one-shot blasts as in attending a conference, though that may be fine if you can afford the cost in time and money. The focus must be on comprehensive, repeatable, reviewable products that represent a long-term investment.

A culture of continued improvement can be achieved only by a consistent ongoing plan that incorporates the above steps and more. This is the responsibility not entirely of the consultants, but of the manager as well, who must serve as a coach, guide, and shaper of the skill level of his entire firm.

Only in this way can the production of the firm and the individual people be maximized, and the true potential of our glorious industry be achieved.

A 30-year veteran of our industry, Steve Finkel has consulted with hundreds of firms on four continents. He has been described by Personnel Consultant Magazine, produced by NAPS, as possessing “the most in-depth knowledge of search and placement in industry history.” The producer of many excellent training products (www.stevefinkel.com), he is also the author of Breakthrough! How to Explode the Production of Experienced Recruiters, considered to be the definitive work for recruiters on this subject. Highly recommended. He can be contacted at (314) 991-3177.

A reader in a recent Fordyce Letter indicated that he has high staff turnover as a result of new recruiters lacking an appropriate work ethic, and inquired as to what can be done to identify this critical quality. He has put his finger on the key ingredient for success in our business.

Regardless of other qualities, the lack of a willingness to work to learn this business is a virtual guarantee of failure. Its presence is a huge help to any aspiring recruiter. But can this quality be selected for? Of course it can!

If a long-tenured owner/manager were to add up his cumulative costs over their time in business, putting aside only commissions paid to consultants, it is probable that the highest expenditure would not be rent, nor phone, nor furniture. Rather, it would be the lost draws, social security, unemployment payments, phone, and business costs associated with ultimately unsuccessful consultants!

Moreover, in addition to tangible costs, that owner would have such items as time, emotional drain on both manager and office, lost deals (not always known), negative client reactions to a poor consultant, the fact that another person on the same desk could have been doing much better, candidates not recruited who might have been placed by someone else in the office. The expense of an unsuccessful consultant is truly staggering.

Some choose to rely on a spate of tests, services, and consultants purporting to improve their odds in the selection of new employees. Bad idea! For some years, heavy testing was in vogue amongst many major corporations. Huge amounts were spent in an attempt to arrive at a formula or test which would predict success. Consistently poor or mediocre results have caused most of these firms to drop the testing programs. They have been weighed – extensively – and found wanting. Thirty-five years ago, Charles B. Roth, one of America’s finest sales trainers and business authors, wrote, “The weakness of aptitude tests lies in the fact that they can’t tell much about intention; the important thing is a man’s willingness to throw himself whole-heartedly into the job.” This statement remains as true today as the day it was written. “Work ethic” is not all. But it is much.

What, then, is the answer? Given the assumption that the selection process and the initial training must both be as excellent as possible, what else can be done to identify a strong work ethic?

The key to doing so is to pay close attention to an old saying of Andrew Carnegie’s. “The older I get,” he said, “the less attention I pay to what men say, and the more to what they do?”

I believe that rigid adherence to a system of progressive and quantifiable steps of elimination will help any organization. The earlier an individual who lacks the necessary ingredients for success can be identified and eliminated, the more we can concentrate our time and money on those who deserve it – and the greater our profits.

Following are some ideas to consider to accomplish just that:

Screening Interest

Perhaps the key factor involved in success in our business is a willingness to learn. Regardless of talent or even background, this business must be learned by serious study. The reason the “born salesperson” is so seldom successful in search and recruiting is the long learning curve involved; a glib consultant unwilling to work hard to learn tends to be a “shooting star” of short duration.

Specific questions should be asked about this when checking references. However, beyond this, there is a simple way of testing for this vital quality. Give the prospective consultant a book on this industry to read, and see how enthusiastically he or she dives into it. A person determined to succeed will absorb the book rapidly, read some chapters twice, and come back with questions. A future failure will probably read very little.

There are several excellent books out on this industry now, the most recent being Larry Nobles’ well-written comprehensive work, “Search and Placement! A Handbook for Success” (www.larrynobles.com). Its obvious use is as a training manual and reference guide for every consultant. However, it will be found to be an effective “screening tool” for new people as well.

Don’t just “let the consultant read the book!” Give it to them, dated, signed, and inscribed (“To Bob, A future superstar”) by the manager. A serious person will highlight and underline it. See what happens. That’s how you determine Charles B. Roth’s previously-mentioned “most important thing” at an early stage.

An extremely high-producing recruiter of my acquaintance was screened by her manager in a similar way. He gave her Tape (now DVD) I of my five-volume series “The Art of Recruiting,” told her to take it home and watch it over the weekend, and to come back Monday morning prepared to discuss it. She showed up with nine pages of notes and three pages of questions! He paid attention to what she did … and hired her immediately. You should, too.

Pre-Hiring

A well-respected individual with a major franchise organization recommends having the potential consultant make 25 to 50 calls (for example: Marketing calls) to a pre-determined list of prospects before hiring. This individual says he is not concerned with the results; he is concerned with how rapidly the potential consultant hits the phone and the amount of time spent between calls. Too much reluctance eliminates the candidate from contention.

While I have never personally utilized this method, it seems well worth considering as an early eliminator, and will certainly identify a good work ethic..

First Two Weeks

1. In the early stages of training, a series of daily written tests will help identify those who will be ultimately unsuccessful in our business at a very early stage, despite a rigorous selection process. This method has allowed those firms utilizing it to eliminate 25 to 35% of those hired in the first week. Barring major personal traumas, poor scores always indicate either a lack of intelligence or a lack of commitment (they didn’t study). Either eliminates a prospective consultant from eventual success and from further employment.

2. A written structured evaluation should be conducted at two weeks. While it is not possible to predict with certainty a “winner” at this time, it is frequently possible to predict a “loser.” Habit patterns such as arriving late and leaving early, not studying training material, poor voice or speech patterns, inattentiveness during sales meetings or formal training, and many other problems are unlikely to change. For a sample two-week evaluation form, visit the author’s website (www.stevefinkel.com) and see the article “The Early Evaluation.”

First Month

1. Every firm should have a good daily planner. (Planners are available for sale through our firm). Especially in a new consultant, a consistent reluctance to fill out the daily planner indicates an unwillingness to take direction, to follow the system, and to pay the price necessary for success in our industry. Termination of the new employee is indicated.

2. The new employee must keep track of their numbers. The manager should have minimum acceptable numbers each week which have been written out before the new employee comes on board. If the minimum number of calls are consistently not achieved, the employee lacks commitment. Early termination is the answer.

3. Correct Role-Playing should be a mandatory and on-going part of every training program (see “From Knowing to Doing: How to Implement” on author’s website for complete information). If the new consultant does not do well in role-playing, they cannot do well “for real.” Consistently poor performance in role-playing with no sign of improvement is a clear indication of qualities which do not indicate future success.

First Quarter

1. Minimum acceptable billings should also be determined and written out before the new employee comes on board. This will obviously vary depending on the firm, as a clerical desk will produce billings more rapidly than a technical desk, for example. The manager must determine what is acceptable for their firm, must write out their minimum anticipated results, and must rigorously eliminate those who fail to achieve these results.

2. Formal reviews of the fledgling consultant must be done at 30, 60, and 90 days. The consultant must be told their strengths, their weaknesses, and what is expected of them in terms of hard numbers during the next 30-day period. These expectations must be written out by the manager and put in the consultant’s file (copy to the consultant optional). This step will stop the old “they haven’t produced any billings, but they’ve got a lot going on” feeling at 90, 120, and even 150 days, as the investment in an unprofitable consultant spirals. Consistent failure to achieve pre-determined quantifiable minimum objectives necessitates termination . . .and the earlier, the better.

These suggestions, with the emphasis upon early elimination, may appear to be harsh to some. They are not. The pre-determined minimum objectives must be realistic, attainable, and based on knowledge of what has been achieved by others. To do otherwise is counter-productive. Given the fairness of the goals, however, the owner-manager must base their decisions as to the continued employment of new consultants upon quantifiable results at early stages of development. Focus on what they do, not what they say!

As recruiting firms add to their staff, many lessons of the past will have been forgotten by experienced managers or never learned to begin with by newer ones. There is no better lesson than learning how to make appropriate and logical decisions on new people with your firm. Can you improve hiring decisions, greatly increase profits and select for a strong work ethic? Yes!

Any improvement in the selection of consultants and in our initial training program will obviously benefit us; however, only by rigid adherence to a planned program of early termination predicated upon realistic minimum numbers can we truly develop our firms—and our profit margins—to the maximum!

Editor’s Notes: A 30-year veteran of our industry, Steve Finkel has consulted with hundreds of firms on four continents. He has been described by Personnel Consultant Magazine, produced by NAPS, as possessing “the most in-depth knowledge in industry history”. The producer of many excellent training products (www.stevefinkel.com), he is also the co-author of the new comprehensive training manual in hardbound book format by Larry Nobles,“Search and Placement! A Handbook for Success”. (www.larrynobles.com.) Highly recommended.

A strong economy yields boom times for our industry. Yet there can be no light without the dark. Problems also abound in such a market. For some – the inexperienced, the poorly trained, or those lacking in mental vigor – these can appear to be insurmountable. To others, however, the attendant mild difficulties and their solutions are yawningly predictable.

Foremost among these are the accepted counteroffers and falloffs encountered by some. The natural tendency under such circumstances is to rely on perceived selling skills – saying the right words to the candidates. It is certainly true that all problems in our business eventually yield to superior selling skills. The best verbiage, however, will not serve if major systemic flaws in the search and placement process exist. A major part of correct selling skills is the ability to coolly analyze that process – and then to make appropriate changes.
Following are the questions to be asked:

1) Are you selecting the right search assignments?
Working on the wrong assignment leads inevitably to placements that disintegrate. A poor offer, a slow-growth client, an unmotivated hiring authority, any of the 21 keys to selecting the search, if ignored, leads to doom. The first principle of “Making the Sale” is selling the Best Product. In a market where it is easier to get search assignments, it is also easier to work on the wrong assignment.

2) How are you obtaining candidates?
“Recruiters” whose main sources of candidates come from means whereby all others have easy access – ads or the Internet, for example — will always lose a high percentage at the end. When scores or hundreds of others (including clients) have the identical candidate, how can all this competition not result in turndowns? If an actively looking candidate has many opportunities from which to choose, there is a tendency to delay or simply not to choose yours. If you are not doing real recruiting as opposed to cheap non-recruiting, you guarantee yourself problems. The “Easy Way” is frequently the hardest.

3) Are you recruiting correctly?
“Target” recruiting on a specific, well-selected search yields serious, motivated candidates who accept. Old-style, “generic” recruiting — “We have many opportunities to help your career” — yields shoppers, accepted counteroffers, turndowns, and fall-offs. “Indirect” recruiting also yields reduced effectiveness. The proper way to recruit in today’s market is directly, professionally, with a strong sales-oriented presentation which answers the prospective candidate’s question, “what will this specific opportunity do for my career?”

4) Are you properly obtaining in-depth candidate concerns?
Working with candidates not actively looking to make a change is very different from doing so with the unhappy, unqualified, or unemployed people to be found through ads or the Internet. Beyond the obvious difference in quality is the change in techniques necessary to obtain candidate concerns. What does the person not like about their present position?
A recruiting call is inadequate if “softeners” are not utilized to thoroughly elicit in-depth and total concerns. Without these concerns, you have little ammunition to counter difficulties when they arise – as they will.

5) Are you following up effectively after First Interview?
Solid selling skills here will really make a difference. Thorough use of such techniques as reinforcing positives and eliciting specifics will greatly elevate the perceived worth of the opportunity to the candidate. The foundation of our business is a serious grounding in Classical Selling Skills. Extensive reading and study combined with role-playing and taping and evaluation of these calls will yield a major boost in income. Most recruiters are extremely shallow in this critical area.

6) Are you covering the counter-offer at the right time in the process?
The most appropriate verbiage will not serve if used at the wrong moment. The time for greatest results is between the offer being accepted, and the candidate turning in their notice. This specific window of time – which may be from an hour to two or three days – is when counteroffers must be addressed, and as thoroughly and as well as possible. It will thus be freshest in their minds should this circumstance arise. To do so earlier is not only to blunt the effect of your script; it can actually put counter-productive thoughts in the mind of the candidate.

7) Are you utilizing the best tools to assist you?

“Third-party references” – the judgements of respected outside authorities – are a proven and effective sales technique. Written material will serve to reinforce whatever you might say. Should a candidate mistakenly accept a counteroffer and then later call with a tale of woe, have them send you a letter detailing their regrets. Then use it to send to other candidates to warn them against duplicating the errors of others. Secondly, while the Internet is of questionable benefit in recruiting, it will save you hours of tedious researching of mundane subjects. See what you can find to support your case against counteroffers, and then use it at the proper time (see #6). The Fordyce Letter, our industry’s only national newsletter, has an excellent article entitled “Counteroffer Acceptance: Road to Career Ruin” which is available to their subscribers on written request or through:http://www.careerjournal.com/columnists/perspective/20040809-fmp.html

Much time and effort is spent in most search firms in an attempt to develop verbiage which deals with thetotally predictable problem of possible counteroffers. It is evident that the best possible script is necessary to reduce the incidences of this occurring. A cool and logical analysis of the entire process, however, will frequently yield major errors which appear earlier. When these flaws are corrected, a massive improvement in production will be the inevitable result.

Editor’s Note: An international author and lecturer for over two decades, Steve Finkel has been referred to by Recruitment International, Europe’s largest industry publication, as “the world’s premier trainer in search and recruitment.” He is the producer of the acclaimed DVD/video series “The Art of Recruiting,” widely regarded as the definitive work on this topic. A full line of excellent training products and services including several 300+-page hardbound books is available. For complete information, call 314-991-3177. His website is www.stevefinkel.com.