You're hired! Now what?

So let's say that one day, out of the blue, I call you and tell you about an amazing opportunity to work as an account manager for one of our clients. You've been working as an account manager for a smaller firm in the same industry. You love your work but you are looking to handle larger accounts and there is no upward mobility in your current role. The job I tell you about sounds pretty perfect.

So you send me your resume and I love it. I show the client your resume and they love it. I ask you some general questions about your skills and experience. Finally, I arrange for you to meet the client. The first interview goes well. The second interview goes even better. You love the people you meet and they love you back. One day, I give you a call and tell you the good news: they want to make you a job offer. They want you to start in a month.

Now what?

Before you dance into work, hand in your resignation, and start singing na na na na, hey hey-ey, goodbye to your annoying co-worker, there are a few things you need to do.

1) Gather your references. Chances are, the job offer is conditional on references. So don't quit yet. Occasionally offers are rescinded based on poor reference checks, and it's better safe than sorry. Think about who the best people are to tell your new employer about you. Your current employer is ideal but unless you are in a downsizing situation, it's unlikely you want to tip your hand that you plan to leave your job. Offer the name of a former employer, ideally the boss at your previous job. Another good bet is someone who has left your company recently, who can talk about your current role. This person does not have to have been a supervisor; a co-worker can still talk about your skill set. It's a good idea to call whoever you give as a reference to give them a heads up and thank them in advance for their glowing remarks. Tell them a little about your new role so they can tailor their comments.

2) Review any employment contracts or agreements you may have signed. Did you sign a non-compete clause or any other agreements that might put limitations on what you do in your new role? How many weeks notice must you give? Discuss any limitations on future employment with your recruiter. It might be worth hiring an employment lawyer to review your contract if anything is unclear.

3) Think about your start date. If you are moving to a competitor, you will likely be walked off the property as soon as you resign. Some employers will want you to work during your notice period so make sure you give your new employer a realistic start date. If you were thinking about taking a holiday, it can be wise to take it before you start your new job so that you can have a few uninterrupted months to get settled. This might push your start date out too.

4) Make sure you understand any terms of probation. Often a new employer wants you to have a probationary period where they can terminate you without cause (or remuneration) should things not work out. While you can assume that any firm working with a research-based recruiter like me wants the relationship to succeed, it's still important to understand the risks before you sign on the dotted line. Find out what measures will be put into place to help ensure your success on the job.

5) Discuss the job change with any key stakeholders. Change can be scary and the bigger the change, the scarier it can feel. If the new job requires you to relocate or make other major lifestyle changes (eg. lots of travel, working from home) make sure everyone affected by the change is on board.

6) Understand any contracts you'll be expected to sign. Your new employer will likely have an employment contract they will want you to sign. Make sure you understand all of the terms of employment before you formally accept the offer.

Once your references have been checked, you've accepted the terms of employment, and you have all key stakeholders on board, it's time to resign. There is only one more thing to consider:

7) The counter-offer. Sometimes your employer will refuse to accept your resignation and will offer you more money or a promotion to stay. Next week, I will discuss the pros and cons of the counter-offer in more detail.

Until then,

Happy hunting!

Nancy

Build a better reference check

As an employer, once you've found your dream candidate and have extended him or her an offer, there is one final step: the reference check. This is usually a rubber stamp but occasionally there is an ugly surprise, so it's always a good idea to be thorough. Here are some ways to make the process more effective:

1. Read between the lines. People are litigious. Some days it's hard to order a sandwich without getting sued. Many former employers are reluctant to give anything but a glowing reference even if it is undeserved. When you are talking to someone's reference, listen to hear if they are being enthusiastic. If I asked you to describe your favourite friend right now, I bet you'd say some pretty nice things. Your voice would be warm and you'd err on the side of giving out too much praise. If on the other hand, I asked you about your weird cousin Ned, you might not say anything bad, but you'd hardly sound enthusiastic. Many firms, not wanting to say anything negative but also not wanting to lie, use what I affectionately like to call Weasel Talk. A great example of Weasel Talk when describing someone lazy is "You'd be lucky to get him to work for you." Clever, huh? Ask questions, ask them to clarify. If they keep using exactly the same phrase, you can be sure it was prepared by a team of lawyers. Proceed with caution.

2. Ask the hard questions. Ask about your candidate's weaknesses. Because of the whole fear factor expressed in point one, you may not get much information but sometimes people will surprise you. At a firm for which I worked when I was just starting out, one candidate - who looked like a winner on paper and in person - was described by his best reference as being "a few cards short of a full deck." The client pushed forward and hired this particular fellow, so sure that the reference must have somehow got it wrong, and the results were as expected: he was a few cards short of a full deck and eventually had to be let go. Sometimes people are shockingly honest. But if you don't ask, they'll never have a chance to tell you.

3. Dot you i's and cross your t's. Call the university and verify the listed degrees. Call the listed professional associations and make sure you are dealing with a member in good standing. One accounting candidate, whose resume made the rounds years ago, completely fabricated his accounting credentials. His former employers had no idea as they simply relied on the previous employers to have done their due diligence. This fellow had worked his way into quite a senior position before he was discovered. If you run into road blocks due to privacy laws, then insist your candidate show you proof of degrees and designations. It feels like busy work but can save you a lot of hassle down the road.

4. Network a little. Anytime you are given a new contact name, it's an opportunity to make a new connection. Often the candidate in question worked in a similar field before and the reference will have knowledge about your industry. Be friendly and see if you can find out at bit about their company and corporate culture. Gather a little market intelligence. Ask the reference about their career path: perhaps they might be interested in working for your firm one day too. I'm not saying to go into headhunting mode or act like you are trying to find a new best friend but a little soft networking rarely goes amiss. The more collegial the reference feels towards you, the more likely they are to give you some honest information about the candidate too.

Happy hunting!

Nancy

Recruiting Lessons from Moneyball

One of my favourite movies about recruiting is Moneyball (the book, by the always awesome Michael Lewis, is amazing too.)

Moneyball is the story of Brad Pitt's Billy Beane, the real-life General Manager of the Oakland A's, who had to rebuild his ball club on a shoestring budget after losing his star players. To help him, he hires Jonah Hill's Peter Brand, the Ivy League economics whiz kid who figured out how to analyze the club's needs and the skills of potential players in order to build an inexpensive winning team. As a research-based recruiter, my clients are Billy Beane: trying to hire a winning team on a budget that is never as large as they'd like. I'm Peter Brand: dissecting the market to find them a team that works.

In Moneyball, before Peter came along with his methodical approach to recruiting, the ball club had all sorts of interesting ways of assessing who might be a good fit for their team (you'll note that Beane was not part of these discussions:)

Grady Fuson: Artie, who do you like?
Scout Artie: I like Perez. He's got a classy swing, it's a real clean stroke.
Scout Barry: He can't hit the curve ball.
Scout Artie: Yeah, there's some work to be done, I'll admit that.
Scout Barry: Yeah, there is.
Scout Artie: But he's noticeable.
Matt Keough: And an ugly girlfriend.
Scout Barry: What does that mean?
Matt Keough: Ugly girl friend means no confidence.
Scout Barry: Okay.
John Poloni: Oh, now, you guys are full of it, Artie's right. This guy's got an attitude and an attitude is good. I mean it's the kind of guy who walks into a room his d*** has already been there for two minutes.
Scout Pote: He passes the eye candy test. He's got the looks, he's great at playing the part. He just needs to get some playing time.
Matt Keough: I'm just saying his girlfriend is a six at best.

Yikes!

I'm not saying this is how most firms hire (thank heavens!) Yet, sometime even firms with a great recruiting process get hung up on certain notions. When you work for a company, you get very immersed in that company's culture and like hires like. But when "like" is not easy to find, that's where a recruiter can be very helpful in expanding your idea of "fit." Yes, in an ideal world, every candidate attended Harvard, needs 2 hours of sleep, has no personal life yet is a fabulously fun person, believes in giving 110% at work, is never sick, is so handsome and charming that people line up to buy your product or service simply to bask in his or her glory, has direct competitor experience, is loyal to a fault (except when it comes to leaving your competitor and bringing all of that amazing knowledge to your firm) and only wants to be paid minimum wage. It's easy to form an opinion about who the ideal candidate might be (often we see a slightly better version of the person who just vacated the position.) And even though we come up with a job description that breaks things down into skill sets and experiences, we often have that ideal candidate in mind. As Moneyball shows, this can be short-sighted. Peter explains:

People who run ball clubs, they think in terms of buying players. Your goal shouldn't be to buy players, your goal should be to buy wins. And in order to buy wins, you need to buy runs. 

When you hire someone, you are buying a set of skills. You are not buying someone who looks good in a suit or attended the right schools or has a firm handshake. These are nice to haves (and in some roles, essential to have - which is why building out a good job description is key) but they are not necessarily what makes a winning team. Sometimes the person who you might have overlooked in a pile of resumes is your next star player. That's where the Peters and recruiters of the world can be helpful:

Billy, this is Chad Bradford. He's a relief pitcher. He is one of the most undervalued players in baseball. His defect is that he throws funny. Nobody in the big leagues cares about him because he looks funny. This guy could be not just the best pitcher in our bullpen, but one of the most effective relief pitchers in all of baseball. This guy should cost $3 million a year. We can get him for $237,000.

With enough money to throw around, anyone can hire A-Rod. His talents are obvious. You don't need us. Where recruiters can come in handy is finding those diamonds in the rough like Chad Bradford. Players who can help your team win.

Happy hunting!

Nancy

Increasing your job search success

We know of a fellow who did not want anyone to know that he had lost his job. Each morning he got up, put on his dress shirt and slacks, and pretended to drive to work. He'd hang out at Starbucks and would discretely look for a job online, figuring he'd let people know he'd been laid off when he secured another job.

This is NOT something we'd recommend doing.

Yes, it's awful when you are let go from your job. But let's face it, it's commonplace these days. It's hardly something of which to be ashamed (unless you were fired in a spectacular fashion with cause, because you did something socially unacceptable, in which case hiding out at Starbucks until the smoke clears is not a bad strategy...)

The reality is, the best way to find a job is by talking to other people. If people do not know that you are looking for a job, people can't help you find one. So here are some ways to use your existing social network to find employment:

Update your status on LinkedIn. Let people know you are looking. This might be hard to believe but recruiters are looking for talented people looking for new opportunities. Nothing tells us that you are keen to talk to us like seeing that you are "between successes," so to speak.

Update your status of Facebook and tell people what you do. I recently heard of a fellow who had dated a woman for the better part of a decade and had no idea what she did for a living. People are pretty wrapped up in their own lives and may not know that you were the best marketer of brass widgets in the Tri-state area. Tell your network you are looking for work and tell them what kind of work you seek. It's amazing what your network can do for you. We're not telling you that you need to get a mega-phone and shout about your job status wherever you go. Then again, we aren't telling you that you don't need to do this.

Get out and about. When you are laid off, you go through a grieving process. It's normal to want to den in and watch Game of Thrones for a month. But the jobs are out there, not in your living room. Go out, talk to people, let them know you are looking. That's how things happen.

Have an elevator pitch prepared. Be able to summarize the kind of job you want and your skills in about 30 seconds. You never know who you might meet when you are out and about and you don't want to be trying to figure out what you want career-wise on the fly. Have a couple of lines about you at the ready so when someone asks what you do for a living, you have a good answer.

Happy hunting!!

Nancy

How to Recruit Your Recruiter

So let's say that you work in HR and you've been charged with filling a hard-to-fill position. Perhaps the ideal candidate needs an obscure skill set and your advertising campaign has yielded few candidates. Now you are considering hiring a recruiter to help you but have no idea where to start. What can you do?

Easy: Hire me. I'm the best. The end.

Short blog post, huh?

Seriously, the first thing you need to do is figure out what kind of a recruiter you wish to hire. In a previous post, I explained the difference between contingency and retainer-based and research-based search firms. Regardless of the type of firm you pick, there are a few things you might wish to keep in mind when interviewing potential recruiters:

Who will be doing the work? Large firms often have sales people, who sell the search work, and people who execute the searches. Not only do you want to know the skill set of the person who will be conducting the work, but you also want to know if you like them. Remember, if a search was easy, you would not need to hire us. You will likely get to know your recruiter quite well over the weeks or months of the search and it's important that you like and trust them.

How will they represent you in the market? While recruiters can do their initial screening without revealing the name of your company, eventually candidates will come to learn who you are. It's a small world out there and an overly aggressive recruiter can sully your reputation in the marketplace. Ask the recruiter how they find candidates. Understand their methods. Make sure you are comfortable with what they will be doing on your behalf.

Do they think outside the box? When looking for candidates, it's rare to find someone who 100% fits the bill. If I am looking for a branding specialist for a consumer goods company and the branding specialists in competitor firms are are happily employed, I need to know where else to look. A good recruiter understands business, so they know where to find the needed skill set when the obvious places do not yield good results. Creativity is key.

Are they charming? Ultimately, recruiting is a sales job. If your recruiter sounds like a sleepy, disgruntled chain-smoking telephone operator from the 1940s, they may not be able to convince an ideal candidate to consider the position you are trying to fill.

Are they persistant? Good people are not always easy to find. A good recruiter has to chase down leads. You want to know that your recruiter has stick-to-it-iveness.

Do you like them? While it's nice to think that you'll give your recruiter a job mandate and then not hear from them until they present someone to hire, this is not the case. There is a lot of back and forth, as everyone figures out who could best fill the position. If you can't stand the recruiter, it will be a long, torturous process. A sense of humour helps a lot too.

It's a tall order, isn't it. The shortcut is to simply hire me. I'm the best. The end.

Happy hunting!

Nancy

How to be Headhunted

So, you keep hearing about people getting these great jobs through headhunters. But your phone never rings. Is there anything you can do to get yourself on a headhunter's radar?

Absolutely.

As a headhunter, I get paid to find the best people for the job. That breaks down into two parts 1) finding the people and 2) making sure they are the best people out there for the position. So first, I need to be able to find you. Second, I like to have evidence that you are good at what you do. The best way I can do this is to have other people in your field recommend you. The second best way is for me to see evidence that you are passionate about your career. This allows me to go to bat for you with my client and say with confidence that you are one of the best out there and it's worth offering flex hours or making a salary stretch to bring you onto their team.

So, how can you show me how great you are when you have no idea I'm conducting a search?

LinkedIn. I can never say this too many times: get your profile on LinkedIn. Some people are nervous about putting their profile on LinkedIn because they think it indicates to their employer that they are looking for a job. Repeat after me, LinkedIn is not a job hunting tool. There are far better tools for that such as the myriad of job boards that exist. LinkedIn is career networking tool. If you have a career, you should be using LinkedIn regularly. Join relevant industry groups and participate in the discussions. You will gain credibility as an expert in your field and build out your contacts -- something that your employers, present and future, will value.

Industry Associations. If you are a very passionate digital marketer, I assume you are a member of your local digital marketing association so you can find out the latest and greatest. Not only are you attending association events, but you are probably helping to organize them. Headhunters are very good at getting their hands on association lists. If you are not participating, you are difficult to find. And even if I do track you down, I wonder how committed you are to your industry if you seem to have no interest in it beyond 9-5.

Conferences. If you are an engaged and valued employee, you probably attend a conference from time to time. If you are perceived as an expert in your field, you probably speak at these conferences too. Often I will get hold of conference agendas and track down the speakers to find out about an industry.

Stay in touch with former colleagues. When someone leaves your group for other employment, make a point of staying in touch with them. That way, when I call them, they'll give me your name. It's like getting a soft reference right up front. It builds my confidence in your skills.

Twitter. Lots of people have their own twitter accounts where they tweet industry-relevant information. Use hash-tags, tweet often. Trust me, I'll find you.

Happy Hunting!

Nancy

Why Headhunting is Exactly like Dating.

So, let's say you are happily single. Life is going well: the job is good, your friends are fun, your half-marathon training is going well, and your cat, Mr. Jingles, is good company during those times you have nothing else planned. 

Then, one day you are at the local Whole Foods, trying to decide whether or not you will be able to get through two cartons of the two-for-one organic blueberries before they spoil. Suddenly, you notice that someone on the other side of the blueberry display is watching you.

Startled, you give the Jeremy Renner look-a-like a half-smile. He's not wearing a wedding ring. He smiles back. You notice organic dog food in his basket. He likes animals too.  

"I find that when I buy both cartons, I end up wasting the second one, " Jeremy Renner says. You know it's you to whom he's speaking because you've turned around, assuming someone else is behind you - like his physicist-swimsuit model girlfriend. But nobody is there but you. 

"You know, I could buy the berries and give you the free carton," he continues. 

And you freeze. You went to Whole Foods expecting blueberries and that Jerk Tilapia they do so well. You did not go to Whole Foods expecting Jeremy Renner. 

A call from a headhunter is not unlike this: the earliest stages of courtship.

It's unexpected. Think of the active job search market as online dating. Companies are aggressively looking, candidates are aggressively looking, and, at the end of the day, it's a numbers game. Plenty. Of. Fish. It's also time consuming and exhausting. When companies hire a search firm like mine to find candidates for a position, it's a bit like hiring one of those high-end matchmakers on TV. Think of me as Jeremy Renner (though frankly, I'm more of an Amy Poehler in real life): It's my role to hang out at the Whole Foods, keeping an eye out for good people. As I identify people who are a good potential fit for the role, I give them a call. The jobs I fill are good ones: I'm offering candidates a proverbial box of free organic blueberries.  But still, candidates can be taken off-guard when, in the middle of minding their own business, they are invited to explore a new possibility. Try to be open to new things. There is no reward without some risk. 

It's a time to get to know each other. OK, so let's say you allow Jeremy to buy you the blueberries and now you are sitting at the little area in the front of the store drinking your fair trade coffee with him. You find out that he's a divorced software sales manager who loves french bulldogs. You are a cat-loving hat designer who called off your engagement to your long-distance Swedish paramour Sven. And you both love The Eagles, Indian food, the colour persimmon, Ayn Rand books, and Jerk Tilapia (Jeremy bought some too.) You have some things in common, enough to arrange for another coffee meeting. This is how you should view the interview process with a search firm. You have a job: life is good. What you are trying to find out is if life could be better. Perhaps this new job would give you more autonomy, a broader scope, a heftier paycheque. At this point you are just exploring possibilities. Relax and have some fun with it. 

It's a time to not rush forward (even though you really want to.) At some point in the process, it will hit you: OMG, I have just met Jeremy Renner and he loves animals and is employed! Depending on your age, you might also realize that you are statistically more likely to be hit by lightning than to have had this happen to you and you want to close the deal now now now. Before you get Vera Wang on your speed dial and have poor Jeremy running for the hills, you need to take a deep breath. If it's meant to be, Jeremy won't go anywhere. He'll realize that there are not many of you - Gwyneth Paltrow meets Tina Fey - on the planet. Companies are probably interviewing a number of candidates, but if they have hired a search firm, it's because there are not that many people who can do the job. Relax. If it's a good long term fit, it will happen. 

Don't have a one track mind. The first thing most candidates want to know is what the job pays. I have a mortgage too: I get it. But salary discussions are a bit like sex. Wait a few dates before bringing it up. A search firm will be feeding the client good information about what the market is paying. If they are willing to pay to hire a search firm to fill your role, they are not going to lose you over a few dollars. If you seem too fixated on the topic, your motivation may be called into question. Again, relax.

It's a time to look for red flags. Confession time: The reason things did not work out with Sven is he took a strong liking for Bjorn. All of those ABBA posters on his wall that time you visited him in Stockholm should have been a clue. Live and learn. Take your time to get to know Jeremy. See how he treats his dogs. See how he treats his mom. Does he tip the waitress? Is he respectful? How is he under stress? How is he when he meets your busty friend wearing that white tennis dress in the rain? Believe me, Jeremy is looking to see how you behave in a variety of situations. The dating process is a two-way street. The job interview process is no different. If it's a publicly traded company, read what the analysts say about management. If it's privately held, find out about the owners. Why did the last person leave? Why is the role hard to fill? The earlier in the process you find out about the bad stuff, the easier it is to go your separate ways. And if there are no deal-breakers? Nirvana!

Consider cultural differences. Perhaps you come from hearty stock who would only take a rest from work if someone were hospitalized. Maybe Jeremy was the baby in a laid-back family who believed a lot in napping. This might be a problem down the road. The same applies to the workplace. If you come out of a hierarchical, rule-bound organization, working for a creative start-up with a bunch of 20 year olds might just blow your mind. Unless you've been itching for a change, in which case it will rock your world. Don't be bound by what you've done in the past. Think about what you want now. 

Consider balance. Maybe you'd like to see Jeremy three days a week. Maybe Jeremy would like to see you once every three weeks so he can work, work out, hang with his posse, practice with his band, and date other girls. This could be a problem. Ditto if you are a nine-to-fiver who is about to take on a job with a 24/7 culture. Work-life balance is key and a valid point to discussion during an interview. Remember, we called you. You have a good thing going already. You can choose to be picky. 

This is the time to run. If Jeremy, cute as he is, starts to bring up topics such as astral projection, that time he was in prison, or his need to stock up on anti-itch creme, don't hesitate to run for the hills. If you mentioned these things, he'd be running. Nobody will be upset if you discover that a job is not a good fit early in the process. When you've accepted the job, the paperwork has been drawn up, your office has been repainted and your predecessor let go, they might get angry when you declare, "maybe I'm just not that into you."

If you just got married, fess up. To be clear, I am not Ashley Madison. If you have just joined a new company to take your dream job, you should not be interested in what I have to say. Yes, I'm Jeremy Renner: new on the scene and kind of exciting. But you're with Brad Pitt. He's promised to stand by you through thick and thin. God bless. And if you have the name of any eligible single friends, please pass them on. 

Happy hunting!

Nancy