Blog

Here’s What Happens When You Don’t Treat a Passive Candidate Well

Here’s a question that TA professionals should be asking: What is it that top level talent is saying about your company when they get into a conversation about opportunities with your organization?

More to the point, how do you deal with a passive candidate when you reach out them — especially the high level ones?

This came to mind when reading a LinkedIn post recently from Oleg Vishnepolsky, who is the Global CTO at DailyMail Online and Metro.Co.Uk. Here’s what he writes about himself on his LinkedIn profile:

An ad tech and Internet technology leader, with extensive international and M&A experience as a CTO and CIO in environments of extreme technical complexity, of high scale and of high availability. Oleg has a long track record of innovation from the first in the industry brokerage website to click-to-call to the very first DMP for ad agencies. He participated in defining Internet protocols and has broad experience managing distributed teams.”

How one passive candidate responded to a job offer

Clearly, Oleg Vishnepolsky is not your typical passive candidate. He’s a high level executive with a great skills and experience, but to the many people (like me) who read his regular postings on LinkedIn, he’s also a guy with superb insights into the workplace, especially when it comes to recruiting and hiring top talent.

A lot of people probably agree with that assessment, because Oleg also has 390,000 LinkedIn followers and has published more than 140 posts on LinkedIn (and you can get to them here).

So, this is a long set-up to one of his posts that resonated with me this past week. It’s about how a company acted when they reached out to Oleg Vishnepolsky as a passive candidate.

In fact, they actually even reached the point of making him a job offer, but how they treated him during the recruitment process bothered him so much that they led this high quality passive candidate to respond with a LinkedIn post to his near 400,000 followers about what happened.

Here’s what Oleg had to say in his post. I’d love to know what some of you think:

Offer declined – I am staying where I am.

The recruiter called me — why ? This is one of the top companies. What’s the counter offer?

Me: No counter offer.

  1. I had six (6) rounds of interviews.
  2. I was grilled with questions but nobody took the time to explain what the job is like, (and) did not even ask if I have any questions.
  3. Lots of questions did not make sense — like why I am leaving my employer. I was not; your recruiter approached me and convinced me to come for your interview.
  4. Where I see myself in five (5) years. They could not tell me where they see their company in six (6) months.
  5. The hiring process is too long, too disorganized.
  6. The offer took too long.
  7. The interviewers did not compare notes because during the six (6) rounds of interviews they were asking the same questions. This should not look like an interrogation. They also looked tired and stressed.

If you want to hire talent, fix your basics. Treat candidates as people, not as applicants.

Fast forward, that company is not in the top tier any more.

Take hiring seriously. Those who you hire will determine your future.”

All candidates should get dignity and respect — especially passive ones

candidate experienceHere’s my take: I don’t think there is anything more aggravating than to have a recruiter or TA professional reach out about a job and then fail to treat you seriously when you respond.

It always makes me think, “If they treat passive candidates this way, how are they treating everyone else?”

I’m for dealing with ALL job seekers, whether they be passive candidates or any other flavor, with dignity and respect, but it makes you wonder about an organization when they reach out to YOU and then royally screw up the process, as Oleg Vishnepolsky so marvelously details in his LinkedIn post.

In my book, every passive candidate needs special care because you reached out to them and are trying to woo them and get them to seriously consider jumping ship for your organization.

And, it reminds me of one of my basic rules of the workplace: Things are always best in the beginning.

When you’re fresh and new is when people seem to treat you best and appreciate you most. I’ve had some jobs where that was the case, of course, and they were the best places I worked at, but, I’ve also had a number of jobs that had issues at the start, and generally, when there are issues at the the start those issues just snowball the longer you’re there.

I’ve seen this happen even more with people I’ve recruited and hired, where I gritted my teeth and made an offer even after something they did threw a big monkey wrench into the recruitment and hiring process. I always hoped those would go well in the end, but too many times, they didn’t.

When you make an offer to a great passive candidate and they turn you down flat without even wanting to counter, well, you better step back and take a good look at your recruiting and hiring process because they’re telling you that something is badly broken.

My thanks to Oleg Vishnepolsky for saying this better than I ever could. There’s great wisdom in his words we would all do well to learn from.

“Do Not Reply to This Email” – How to Improve the Candidate Rejection Process

I received a survey recently from Greenhouse software. This is after receiving the proverbial Dear John rejection letter following an interview with one of their clients. It’s sort of funny that the company rejecting me, and Greenhouse, are both HRIS software vendors, and the coldness of their automated communication to me was concerning.

Not knowing, or caring, that I am a senior HR executive, or even that I write articles for one of the premier Talent websites here at recruitingdaily.com, should raise a red flag for them. Imagine their horror when they read this post and need to put a public spin on their response.

Yes, this is a typical rejection letter today

The rejection letter was generated by Greenhouse software, as was the survey letter. Here is a slightly redacted version of it:

XXX takes care to ensure that its recruiting process is well run, and candidates have a great experience.

We’re sending you this survey to gather some honest, anonymous feedback about your recent interview. No personal information about you will be seen by XXX — all survey results are anonymized.

Please take a moment to give us your feedback and tell us what you think could be improved about the process.

Candidate Survey link

Sincerely,

Greenhouse 

 

And here is the rejection letter itself:

Hello Mark,

Thank you for your interest in XXX. While we were impressed with your qualifications, we have decided to proceed with other candidates who are a better fit for the YYY role.

We appreciate your time and effort to apply, and sincerely thank you for your interest in XXX. We will keep you in mind if a more applicable opportunity becomes available. We wish you the best of luck in your job search.

Best Regards,

The XXX Team

 

A response you wish more applicants would give

A classic rejection letter from MAD magazine

It’s fairly generic and signed by the team, although I interviewed with the hiring exec. It could have been for any job at any level. It also could have been sent after resume submission versus after an actual interview.

So here was my response to the survey:

When you interview a candidate and say you will get back to them by a date, keep your word and make a phone call. I am an adult and can deal with rejection, however an automated email after the fact (from Greenhouse software) is a poor close to an interview experience. There is no excuse for this.

As a retained search executive and former CHRO at some high-profile businesses, I am astonished and disappointed that the hiring manager did not just pick up the phone and say, “Hey Mark, you did well, however xyz… let’s stay connected for the future.”

I am a consumer of software (theirs and yours). I also write for two high profile social media talent sites, including recruitingdaily.com and fistfuloftalent.com. I am sure I will reflect on this in future articles that are seen by thousands of HR and recruiting practitioners. Want some real feedback? Pick up the phone and talk to me like a human instead of like a “BOT.” There is a time and place for both…”

 

Here’s how candidates SHOULD be rejected

So, my suggestions for all Talent and Talent software vendors is this:

If you see or represent a client and want to pass on a candidate that had an interview or interviews, have the guts to call them personally to tell them they are no longer being considered. They gave their time to the process and deserve some courtesy – and a phone call goes a long way.

If you really can’t call, then a real personal rejection is a whole lot better than an automated template email. Also, remove the “do no respond” or name of the software company in the email address. Here is part of the email extension on my rejection letter: @outbound-mail.greenhouse.io on behalf of

Remember that your candidates are flesh and blood, not robots. They also talk to other human beings and your reputation is on the line. Your business and employment brand are too.

I like Greenhouse and they are well intentioned – but they blew it. Hope they learn from their mistakes.

Just some food for thought.

Signed,

A real human being … 

The 3 Hottest Trends That Will Impact Recruiters in 2018

Effective talent acquisition and recruitment often top the list of priorities for organizations as they move into a New Year, and 2018 is no exception.

With unemployment in America continuing to decline (it’s currently at its lowest percentage since 2000), the job market is becoming increasingly competitive. In fact, a serious labor shortage exists across the United States. It’s not simply due to a mismatch in skills, but there are actually fewer employees available overall, especially in industries that most need them.

As a result of today’s job market, recruiters and hiring managers are working to not only expedite the hiring process but to ensure they market their businesses accordingly and target the right candidate for the job.

Looking at best practices to consider in 2018 will help show hiring managers what they should be working on today in order to hire for tomorrow. While many of the anticipated recruiting trends in the New Year focus on the best use of technology, recruiters should also be sure to understand and improve upon overall brand perception to attract top applicants.

Let’s dive into the top trends and hottest topics that will impact recruiters, HR professionals and hiring managers in 2018:

1 – Fighting against unconscious bias

Even when recruiters have the very best intentions to impartially evaluate a job candidate’s skill set, competency in performing tasks, and the ability to align with the culture of their organization, they often still fail to do so equitably.

Unconscious bias very much persists in nearly all aspects of today’s hiring processes. In fact, in 2016 the Harvard Business Review conducted studies that found when there is only one minority candidate or female in a pool of four applicants, the chances they will be hired are statistically zero.

It’s an unfortunate reality given that bias is essentially hardwired into our nature. As humans, we find familiarity comfortable so we often unknowingly deem applicants who act and appear similar to us as a safe hire even when another candidate may be more qualified.

Finding ways to eliminate unconscious bias in recruiting was a hot topic this year and will continue to be a big focus for companies in 2018 as they work to ensure that factors such as sex, race or age play no role in hiring decisions. Companies like San Francisco-based OpenTable are even going public with their goal of encouraging fair employment and recruitment practices.

To combat this growing issue, innovative recruiters and hiring managers are shifting away from screening candidates through phone calls, instead choosing to utilize text messages to ask applicants top-of-the-funnel questions.

Text-based interviewing platforms like Canvas offer the ability to engage a candidate’s de-identification feature to conceal an applicant’s name and gender specific pronouns or words before sharing an interview transcript with a hiring manager. Additionally, text messages eliminate any voice recognition within a screening interview for added masking.

Texting candidates can be a game changer for allowing hiring professionals to put bias aside and focus exclusively on determining the right applicant for the job.

2 – In 2018, recruiters must think more like marketers

Considering the current low unemployment rates, employers now face an uphill battle to win over top talent.

The good news for employees is that they now have the luxury of being selective in their job search and picking a workplace with the type of culture and reputation that most aligns with their values. That’s why, in 2018, recruiters should reinvent themselves with the mindset of a marketer.

To engage the target job applicants, recruiters should promote positions as a product they’re trying to sell to the workforce. One key component of this is to build and nurture a strong employment brand. This shows candidates what it’s like to work within the organization and how they might fit into the overall work environment.

Text interviewing platforms offer a new way to promote a company’s employment brand to prospective hires. When a candidate asks questions about the vibe of the workplace, the recruiter can film a quick video around the office on their phone and text it to them. Or with the touch of a button, the recruiter can send photos from recent company outings, documents outlining benefits or job descriptions.

Additionally, leveraging text messaging for candidate engagement can position organizations as innovative and forward-thinking and set them apart from their competitors who are probably still stuck on 1997 recruiting tactics.

Strong employment brands can make a huge impact on a business by building the talent pipeline, improving the overall quality of the hire and reducing cost per hire.

3 – Leveraging analytics to improve the bottom line

Companies today want to find better ways to oversee employees to advance business performance.

Analytics can help with this undertaking, and it can make a big impact on a company’s bottom line. A study from IBM and MIT found that organizations that made high investments in HR analytics experienced 8 percent higher sales growth and 58 percent higher sales per employee.

Workforce analytics can improve policy, showcase insights on everything from hiring needs to candidate attraction and even provide an evidence-based perspective on challenges within the organization. For recruiters and hiring managers looking to explore analytics more in 2018, they should focus on:

  • Working with colleagues who are willing to accept new ideas with analytics and truly need them for various business objectives.
  • Starting small on more straightforward projects with a controllable scope. If all goes well, move forward with more difficult projects.
  • Nurturing relationships with other functions of the business, like finance or IT to ensure you make the most of the resources available for analytics.

When it comes to text-based recruiting platforms, recruiters can now utilize machine learning and natural language-based analytics to automatically suggest resource and response recommendations and more. These algorithms will also generate pre-built interview questions to increase candidate quality and reduce time to fill open positions. These new features accelerate the screening process for recruiters, enabling them to connect with more candidates daily.

These are just a few of the topics and trends impacting recruiters and HR professionals in 2018 as they work to avoid costly hiring mistakes. The New Year is sure to bring about some exciting advancements in the industry, and we’re excited to be a part of it.

Why Bigger is Not Always Better — Especially With LinkedIn Connections

Expanding your network on LinkedIn is easy; you just hit the blue “Connect” button and wait to see if the people are going to accept or not.

If they accept it, you will add new people into your network, and that’s it.

Yes, this is the easiest way to build a network on LinkedIn. You don’t need any special reason to add them, or even need to know them. If you want to connect someone, that blue “Connect” button is there for you.

The only thing you need to do is click it.

But, some people click on that button quite often. This tells you they do not care about the “quality” of their connection, only that quantity matters. Their goal is to reach the magical goal of 30,000 LinkedIn connections as soon as possible and use that network for sharing their thoughts, articles, and posts.

I don’t blame them, because we all are have our own ways of building our networks. My way is to add people that will interact with me at some point in future. I am NOT going to be just other number in their network.

Online activities always bring new connections

When you are active on LinkedIn and sharing interesting posts, posting articles, and adding comments under posts, the number of invitations you receive will grow. Everything you do will attract different people and they will send you LinkedIn invitations for various reasons.  

Recently, I started receiving more invitations than before and I hadn’t changed anything in my activity. I thought I had received more invites because I had published a book, but the reason I had started getting so many invites from people that were not connected with recruitment was a mystery. I was curious as to why the number of invitations doubled and I tried to find out why.

And because LinkedIn has started showing if somebody you contacted read your message (You don’t need to be connected with them to access this feature, either), I decided to test it if people were reading messages I sent them before I accepted their invite. I wanted to see how many would answer and learn their reason for trying to connect with me.

The test case was very simple. I planned to reach out to 500 people before I accepted their LinkedIn invitations to discover the reason they wanted to connect with me. Furthermore, because I could see if people read my message, I decided I would also focus on how many people read the message, or, if they didn’t open it at all.

How many new connections actually “connect?”

Accepting all 500 LinkedIn invites (without any personal note) would add 500 new people to my network and bring me to close to the 30K limit. But consider this:

  • Only 15 percent of people never read my message;
  • Some 42 percent of those that read my message never replied (during my 30 day test);
  • This means that 57 percent of people never interacted with me or responded to my message;
  • Also, three (3) people during the test sent me their invitation twice, and even though I reached out to them twice, they never replied.

The question remains: “Are they going to like or comment on any of my posts or articles, or interact with me in any way, if they are not even replying to my messages?”

From the 43 percent that answered me:

  • Some 6 percent told me they sent the invitation by accident (they accidentally clicked on “connect” on mobile, etc.
  • Another 21 percent said they were just expanding their network; and,
  • 16 percent had a specific reason why they sent me an invitation (looking for a job, interested about what I wrote, etc.)

As you can see from these results, if I added 500 people to my network, then 57 percent would never interact with me, and 6 percent sent the invite by accident. Nearly two out of three (63 percent) of didn’t have any special reason to add me, they only wanted me to bring them closer to their 30K limit.

And if I add the 21 percent just expanding their network, 84 percent had no specific reason to add me or be in connection with me — and 84 percent of 500 is 420 invites from people that will probably never interact with me, ever.

If you are accepting every single person and these results from my test are applicable to everybody, then when you hit the 30K connection limit you will have 25,200 people that will probably not interact with you at all.

Final thoughts

I often hear from my friends things like, “Recruiters didn’t check my LinkedIn profile” and many similar things. Well, here is a news flash: many people are not reading anymore. I got 500 invites, contacted every single person from that list before I hit “Accept” to their invites, and still 17 people replied that the main reason they sent me an invitation is because I have an interesting profile, but they’d never even visited it before, they just sent me their invitation.

And what was the reason the number of invites doubled? My guess is this “new” LinkedIn functionality together with that some people just hit “Add connections” (on purpose or accidentally).

I also sent most of the messages in English, but because I am also not a native English speaker and I got many requests from people from my country, I also sent the messages in my native language. However, I’m convinced the language I used in my note doesn’t matter because the percentage of people who never read the message, or who just read the note and never replied, or read the note and replied, was the same for the messages I sent in the Czech language as it was for those in English.

Here’s what I learned, and something all recruiters should consider: You can have the biggest network in the world, brag about it on LinkedIn, and even put the number of connection into your headline on your profile, but your network has no value without a real connection and interaction with those who are connecting with you.

Yes, it’s easy to get to 30,000 connections very fast, but a bigger network does not mean you’ll get more views or likes under your posts.

I believe that your network is your net worth. Building a quality network is not some Pokémon game where you need to catch them all.

The Challenges of Recruiting in the #MeToo Era: Yes, This Is On Us, Too

#MeToo.

Not a day seems to pass without new sexual misconduct allegations coming to light. Even as I write this, my Twitter feed is filled with posts that yet another high profile male figure has been accused of inappropriate behavior with a woman.

As issues of exploitation of women continue to come to the forefront in the workplace, politics, Hollywood and beyond, it’s disheartening not only for women but for our male colleagues as well.

Yet sadly, it’s not surprising.

I feel this frustration, especially as a female leader in the recruitment and technology space, two industries that have long been male-dominated. I’ve certainly heard my fair share of inappropriate comments, and have a game plan when I attend conferences and other events.

While I hate needing a strategy for this, I ask myself the same questions beforehand: Who’s going, what will be involved, how late does it go, and will I be safe? And while I’m fortunate that my experiences haven’t entered deep into #MeToo territory, there are so many others who can’t say the same.

An October survey of more than 900 adults conducted by The Wall Street Journal and NBC News, revealed that sexual harassment remains prevalent at more than two-thirds of American companies. Even more startling is that nearly half, yes half, of women said they’ve been the object of an unwelcome sexual advance or harassment.

Despite our anger and frustration, I’m hopeful that as the stream of #MeToo stories continues, the impetus to make real change will stick and, as things hit closer to home, we won’t become numb or take a step backward in fear to avoid each other.

All of this is especially true for us Talent Management and Talent Acquisition professionals. In our people-focused industry, we especially have an obligation to take the steps needed to break the chain and discourage this behavior.

As we face this watershed moment, we need to confront these challenges head on from several different angles.

Recruiters: This is on us, too

Now is the moment, more than ever, to hold ourselves and our clients to the highest professional standards.

Dana Shaw-Arimoto, founder of consulting and advisory firm Phoenix5 LLC, agrees that it’s the recruiters’ “responsibility to ensure that they are putting people into environments in which they will feel safe, valued and able to thrive,” and that they need to thoroughly vet clients before making a placement.

After that initial assessment, it’s even more crucial is to stay in touch.

JJ Hurley, CEO of GDH Consulting concurs, adding that “recruiters need to maintain constant dialogue with candidates and employees regarding their experience and working environment.”

#MeToo means we move forward, not back

As more stories come forward, and we know they will, you need to avoid the fatigue that may come with the constant flood of news. Move forward in a mutually respectful and professional environment by encouraging women (and men) to continue to assert themselves, speak up in all situations and demand equality.

At the same time, men (or anyone in the shoes of the offender) need to be honest with themselves about what’s appropriate. This doesn’t mean avoiding women altogether for fear of being the next accused — that won’t get anyone, anywhere — especially as our workforce becomes more diverse.

Hurley adds that, “when respect is offered to all employees, the environment should not produce the opportunity for exploitation.”

Shaw-Arimoto recommends a simple strategy to keep yourself in check by asking this:

Would I treat a family member the way I’m treating a client, prospect, partner, internal colleague, etc.? If the answer is an emphatic ‘NO,’ think again about your own behavior.”

3 simple actions you can take — right now

While it seems overwhelming when you look at sexual misconduct and harassment issues as a whole, there are plenty of actions that recruiting professionals can take right now to ensure that all the talk leads to real change:

  1. See it, say it — If you see something happening that shouldn’t be, speak up. Protect people around you, including those you place on assignment. Adds Shaw-Arimoto, “NEVER look the other way, if you know the environment or hiring manager are toxic, you have a moral compass and need to use it!”
  2. Encourage clients to leverage new strategies — The recent spate of allegations has opened a new set of options when it comes to sexual misconduct prevention, awareness training and response. As many policies and procedures are outdated, recommend your clients and partners take advantage of, as Shaw-Arimoto says, “anti-sexual-harassment training and hands-on situational role-playing, that actually teach people how to handle various situations, not just how to identify them.” We’re also seeing companies leverage new technology to address the issues at hand. The women’s communication platform, Mogul, recently launched Safety@Work, a new tool that lets employees anonymously report incidents of sexual harassment and sexual assault to multiple HR leaders and stakeholders at one time. Navex Global also offers an app that provides a confidential communication channel for reporting misconduct.
  3. Be upfront – When working with new clients, ask them what programs they currently have in place to combat potentially hostile environments — and don’t leave any stone unturned. Rhona Driggs, President of Volt Consulting Group, recommends recruiters “ask for copies of harassment policies, and gain an in-depth understanding of the exact training provided.” Other strategies include checking Glassdoor posts to see if there’s been any issues, or performing a Google search to see if lawsuits have been filed against the company.

Despite all that has happened (and most likely will continue to occur), I’m hopeful that no matter the industry, sunlight will be the best disinfectant to stop these issues cold.

Let’s face it — equality isn’t just about equal rights for women, it spans race and sexual orientation as well. This kind of behavior has been tolerated for years and years, so let’s make sure it’s an issue that future generations will never have to deal with again.

As recruiters we’re in a unique position to make change. Let’s seize it — now!

#MeToo

What Makes a Bad Hire, and the Future of HR (Spoiler Alert – It Looks Pretty Good!)

It seems to be that time of year for everyone to be releasing surveys, and here are two with some interesting wrinkles that crossed my desk this week.

One, from CareerBuilder, had a headline finding that should trouble anyone who hires people — Nearly Three in Four Employers Say They’re Affected by a Bad Hire.

According to the new CareerBuilder survey, companies lost an average of $14,900 on every bad hire in the past year, and it’s a pretty common mistake because 74 percent of the employers surveyed admit that they’ve hired the wrong person for a position.

What makes for a bad hire?

The survey went on to detail exactly what went wrong when they made a bad hire. See how many of these may have been issues for you:

  • While the candidate didn’t have all the needed skills, they thought they could learn quickly (35 percent);
  • The candidate lied about his/her qualifications (33 percent)
  • Took a chance on a nice person (32 percent);
  • We were pressured to fill the role quickly (30 percent);
  • Had a hard time finding qualified candidates (29 percent);
  • Focused on skills and not attitude (29 percent);
  • Ignored some of the warning signs (25 percent);
  • We lacked adequate tools to find the right person (10 percent); and,
  • Failed to do a complete background check (10 percent).

Of course, this list above should make you wonder exactly how the CareerBuilder survey defined a bad hire, and here’s what those who responded had to say:

  • The employee didn’t produce the proper quality work (54 percent);
  • They had a negative attitude (53 percent);
  • They didn’t work well with other workers (50 percent);
  • The new employee had immediate attendance problem (46 percent); and,
  • Their skills did not match what they claimed to be able to do (45 percent).

“Poor performers lower the bar” for others

“It’s important to note that there’s a ripple affect with bad hires. Disengagement is contagious — poor performers lower the bar for other workers on their teams, and their bad habits spread throughout the organization,” said Rosemary Haefner, chief human resources officer at CareerBuilder, in a press release about the survey.

She added: “The best thing hiring managers can do is put in the time and effort on the front end to make sure they have the best available pool of applicants for every job opening. And, just as importantly, have good procedures in place for evaluating candidates.”

There is more to this survey, of course, including the regrets that many job seekers have about positions they accepted, and that’s always an interesting perspective, to get into. Overall, I doubt this survey will tell you much that you don’t already know, but it is surely worth a look.

The survey was conducted online by Harris Poll from Aug. 16 to Sept. 15, 2017 and included a representative sample of 2,257 full-time hiring managers and human resource professionals and 3,697 full-time workers across industries and company sizes in the U.S. private sector.

The Future of HR in 2018

The other survey that grabbed me this week is The Future of HR in 2018 report from Namely. Although it’s focused more on human resources than on recruiting and hiring, there are some interesting and unexpected findings in the data.

For example, it answers a question I have heard asked a great many times at HR and talent management conferences over the years, and as simple as it is, I’ve never heard a definitive answer.

Here’s the question: How many people work in HR (in the U.S.)? The answer? According to The Future of HR report, there were 5.6 million working in human resources as of 2013.

That’s a lot of human resources people, and as the report pointed out, they make pretty good money for what they do.

How good, you might ask? Take a look at these numbers:

  • HR specialists bring home a median amount of $59,180, and HR Managers a whopping $106,910;
  • Namely’s own data shows that the average HR salary is $98,048 across all levels.
  • HR Directors and Vice Presidents at companies with more than 300 employees make the most of all — a whopping $192,592, on average.

There’s a lot more interesting data about HR professionals in The Future of HR report (you can get it here), including a section on “Most Creative Job Titles” that goes to show that even HR is not immune from the silly title trend that too many organizations seem to have fallen into. For example, Culture & Geek Resource Manager or Head of Optimistic People are just embarrassing — even for HR.

A positive note of HR

But, the report does end on this positive note:

It wasn’t always this way, but HR has evolved far beyond its strictly administrative legacy. While tasks like processing payroll and managing compliance continue to matter, the profession has a new, higher calling. Modern day people teams are expected to be strategic and data-driven, whilst driving seemingly subjective criteria like employee wellbeing. Business theorists no longer talk about HR needing “a seat at the table,” because it’s assumed as an established fact. If people truly are a company’s most valuable resource, it’s hard to overstate an HR professional’s role in cultivating and maintaining that asset.

Quite simply, the state of HR has never been stronger.”

Namely’s The Future of HR in 2018 report analyzed data from over 1,000 mid-sized companies across the country, through November 2017.

Win the War for Talent in the Age of AI

The adoption of artificial intelligence for recruiting is happening faster than you may think. Over the next few years, the impact of smart technologies will continue to grow, with recent research from IDC indicating that 67% of organizations plan to adopt AI over the next 5 years. This is no surprise considering many companies have already adopted AI and machine learning to increase productivity, automate business processes and uncover new business insights.

Now, everyone else is following suit, with recruiting and talent acquisition poised to join the AI revolution. With the unemployment rate near record lows and the talent crunch deepening for many key professions, this move will give talent acquisition teams the resources and technology they need to find and hire the best possible talent in a crowded and competitive job market.

So what are some the biggest benefits from automation for recruiting teams?

  1. Increased workflow efficiency
    Automation tools can reduce the amount of time your team spends on manual processes like sourcing candidates, soliciting feedback from interviewers and hiring managers, scoring resumes, reaching out and responding to candidates and other critical processes. This dramatically reduces the amount of work and effort it takes to nurture candidates through your recruiting funnel, giving your team back crucial bandwidth.
  2. A more consistent candidate experience
    Speaking of automating manual tasks, people are sometimes inconsistent. We all have off days and there’s nothing wrong with that, unless you’re the candidate who catches a recruiter on a bad day. Recruiting will always have a social, relationship-based element, and automation takes the strain out of the manual side, allowing talent teams to do what they do best, the human side of recruiting. This improves the hiring experience of candidates and makes them more likely to accept a role.
  3. Deeper insights into your recruiting process
    One of the least mentioned benefits of automation is that it makes it easier to track your data and optimize your processes. In modern systems, every datapoint is logged, making it possible to look at each stage of your hiring process, from the first candidate touchpoint to the last, and isolate for inefficiencies, points of success vs. failure and other critical information that will help your team do their jobs better.

As you examine the countless potential benefits of automation technologies, do so with urgency, knowing they will soon be critical for recruiting teams. Positioning your team for success now means giving them the cutting edge tools they need, and adopting new technology before you’re behind the times.  

To help you determine your next steps when it comes to winning the war on talent with AI in your back pocket, Entelo is hosting for an exclusive event, “The War for Talent in the Age of AI” from 6:30 – 8:30 pm ET in New York City on Thursday, December 14. The event will unveil the results of Entelo’s brand new 2018 Recruiting Trends Report and feature a panel discussion with recruiting and hiring leaders from some of the world’s leading brands, including Amazon, Citizens Financial Group, and American Express as they discuss how their teams are adopting AI and automation technologies to gain an edge in recruiting.

The age of AI has arrived. Recruiting teams need every possible edge as they fight for the best talent available going into the new year. Join Entelo on Thursday, December 14 to learn how you and your organization can harness it to achieve you recruiting goals in 2018 and beyond.

Are We Really Hiring From a Sense of Purpose? 5 Good Reasons Why We’re Not

We’ve all heard words like “mission,” “vision,” “purpose,” and “sense of purpose” bandied about at all-hands meetings.

Sometimes they’re defined. Often times they’re not. It can feel like a lot of lip service at the end of the day. Do as I say not as I actually do.

Now, also often times, I’ll come across some hiring or recruiting “thought leadership” that makes me want to gag because it’s so distanced from reality.

A recent morning was one of those times.

Here’s a nice headline over at The Muse — How To Stand Out When You’re Competing Against 3,000 Other Applicants — so, as clickbait does, I clicked on it.

It’s written by a global head of recruiting at Johnson & Johnson, so it seemed pretty legitimate.

Sadly, it was not.

What’s so bad here?

If you take people at absolute face value and don’t look past the BS, we’re all good.

But the author — from Johnson and Johnson — claims they hire around “professional purpose.”

That essentially means knowing what you want out of your career and where it’s headed. That’s obviously great and very noble. Careers are a big chunk of a white-collar existence, so having a sense of purpose around them is a solid quality in anyone.

But now we come to the issues.

5 big issues with “sense of purpose” hiring

  1. It directly contradicts the modern era — The modern era is supposed to be rooted in data. It’s the new oil, right? Judging someone on “professional purpose” is entirely subjective. You cannot compare A to B on sense of purpose without knowing a host of personal factors of the two candidates. Those factors likely wouldn’t arise because many hiring processes are still rooted in generic, easy-to-game interview questions.
  2. The headcount/speed issue — A lot of modern hiring processes are designed around speed (which Malcolm Gladwell does not like) and immediate headcount backfill, i.e. “Get me a body now!” It would be hard to accurately screen for sense of purpose in candidates under a “time is money” philosophy.
  3. The dichotomy — I would love — love — to believe that companies care about the professional purpose in the career trajectory of their employees. However, most research (and the actions of executives) shows they don’t. Companies do not operate according to moral norms. (Some of the better ones do, yes.) The philosophy of most companies is “The guys at the top drive the ship, and everyone else is interchangeable.” Once revenue tanks, those guys at the top are now also interchangeable. It’s very fickle. Plus, average North American job tenure right now is about 3.6 years, so I’m not sure how important your professional sense of purpose is to the end game if you’ll be gone in less than 48 months.
  4. Tasks, tasks, tasks — Again, a lot of hiring is done because some tasks seem overwhelming to an existing team, so they need a new person. That’s the reality of it. Saying you hire for “sense of purpose” when you hire for KPI task work is kind of like the shallow vs. deep work argument.
  5. Bosses — Once a new hire comes in via a supposed sense of professional purpose, a boss would need to develop their career goals in line with that. Does a boss really want to do that?

So… what about sense of purpose hiring?

I personally don’t think so. It feels like a lot of un-quantifiable lip service, much like hearing “vision and purpose” from executives as they go rush to count their Q2 profits.

But maybe I’m jaded and a horrible person. It could be true!

So what do you think: Are companies legitimately trying to hire with a sense of purpose? Could it even happen?

Predictions and Pitfalls In the Workplace: 6 Things to Watch For in 2018

As the year winds down, it’s a good time to reflect on the year that was and the trends reshaping the nature of our work and workplaces heading into 2018.

The main driver of this change? It continues to be the increasing scale and use of technological solutions to traditional and modern workplace challenges. As we progress beyond the advent of connected work apps and online platforms of the past five years, we’re preparing to move past other impactful organizational shifts — like the rise of remote workers.

All this is to say that 2018 is going to be another significant and very interesting year for both workers and their relationship with the workplace, and there are some key things those in the HR space should be aware of.

Here are my predictions on what will be making an impact in the year to come.

1 – The app and information overload will continue

Apps and SaaS online platforms have become as standard in our jobs as Microsoft Office, and while they have added some great new tools and abilities to our work day, they  are also increasingly making work more challenging. How? By giving us more programs to juggle and making information more scattered and difficult to retrieve.

Though this overload is hard to stop. We’re seeing the rise of a new solution that will greatly expand in 2018: the use of AI-powered assistants that can plug into the various apps and platforms we already use and retrieve the information we seek on our request.

With developments in natural language processing, we can now have a text chat with a helper bot and ask questions about diffuse information sources that it answers in plain English.

2 – Employee engagement efforts will get smarter

Making employees feel more connected, engaged and happy at work has become a major priority for workplaces and their HR teams. We’ve seen a lot of enterprise firms getting flexible with their approach to employee work-life balance and adopting some of the more casual approaches to work and workplace rules seen in trendy tech startups.

This will continue in 2018, but at a higher level: efforts to engage employees will be given a major boost by smart new digital tools that let HR better monitor and react to engagement and office culture.

Underlying AI technology — like machine learning — is now parsing the language used on workplace chat platforms, and even in employee emails, to analyze employee sentiment for potential negativity, a sign of disengagement, and doing so on an office-wide level.

Expect this to become more widespread as new tools read more telltale signals. Researching whether such engagement tech is right for your HR challenges will be key in 2018.

3 – Diversity and inclusion will be an even bigger priority

This past year saw some major corporate scandals around diversity and inclusion, leading to more awareness and calls for change. There have been some major shots across the bow, and we’re seeing executive teams start to make some major reforms to modernize their workplace makeup and culture.

This will be a significant priority in 2018, not only in response to very public scandals but also because of the fact that more inclusive, diverse workplaces have been linked to higher productivity and are now recognized as better for innovation and new ideas (and more attractive to Millennial hires).

At the ground level, HR should be aware of the new set of equity tools designed to eliminate unconscious bias in recruiting practices. You can now have your job-posting text read by an AI bot who will suggest more inclusive language, and another will help screen resumes in a fairer way.

This is a fast-growing area, and one every HR department should be evaluating for fit.

4 – More human workplaces, more collaboration

Can smart tools using AI and machine learning make work better?

We don’t have a complete answer to that yet, but we are seeing the needle start to move with the application of AI software to areas with a direct impact on our workplace mood and empathy levels. This includes the physical design of our offices to be more human-centric, and assistants that can read our emails as we write them and let us know if we’re coming off as unprofessional.

At the same time, the importance of collaboration is rising as the micro-jobs that eat up our work day are automated by virtual assistants — tasks like booking meetings and drafting routine documents. With more time for creative, deep-thinking work, more value is being placed on employee collaboration, which is becoming a key factor in firm performance.

Both these trends are going to get bigger in 2018, and successful workplaces will want to stay on top of them.

5 – Remote workers are the norm, and can do more

Having an employee work from home once elicited some quiet skepticism around the water cooler, but those days are now long gone. Indeed, leading workplaces now treat remote work as a standard feature, one that can not only let employees be more productive, but opens the door to a truly global workforce that provides a deep bench of talent.

Working remotely was once a bit awkward in terms of work routines and processes being locked to a physical space, but the digital workplace has gone a long way to throwing off those restrictions. Come 2018, and beyond, this will become the standard, and expect a majority of high-performing firms to have a constant chunk of their staff permanently off-site.

Our workplace tech stack has adapted to this new reality, and as more software migrates to the cloud with files accessible 24/7, we’ll see remote working grow tremendously.

This will be further accelerated by the rise of smart tools giving remote workers new abilities that would previously have required a visit to the office, such as creating and exchanging routine documents and meeting with HR for basic work-policy questions and assistance. The range of remote applications will continue its exponential growth, and is something the modern enterprise must be aware of and willing to adapt to.

6 – AI will go mainstream and get REALLY smart at understanding data

In what will be a seismic shift in 2018, enterprises will no longer require a computer or data science degree to understand and use the baseline and deeper functionality that workplace AI brings. Non-specialized knowledge workers will see the immediate benefits of these AI-powered tools, from frictionless collaboration and information sharing to quick and accessible new insights.

Yes, 2016 and 2017 both paved the way for the arrival of mainstream AI, and now we’ve reached a turning point, thanks to the standardization of third-party apps and integrations that can be understood and augmented by AI. This will allow employees to do more at work using previously inaccessible data, yielding new discoveries. To pick one example, 2018 will usher in the era of business intelligence beyond the usual, allowing employees to derive success metrics at the click of a button and gain new perspectives.

It’s clear that 2018 is going to be another exciting year for employers, workers, and their relationship with the workplace. HR teams should be aware of the upcoming shifts and opportunities to unlock new value, and, understand how to properly use data, insights and emerging tech to supercharge everything from employee engagement and productivity to organizational structure and IT.

Happy New Year!

When It Comes to Recruiting, It’s Not About Effort, But About Value

Recruiting isn’t about how hard you work, or how many late night interviews you conduct, or how many weekend networking meetings you attend.

Recruiting, like everything in business, isn’t about effort, it is about value.

I know some of you reading this have the mantra “I must work harder.” In fact, when judging someone to be a good person one of the first things we say is, “gosh, they were a hard worker.”

“I must work harder” is fine for horses on a farm, but it can be devastating advice for people. The phrase “work smarter not harder” tries but ultimately fails to convey this message. Working smarter is about increasing your efficiency, not about spending more time camped in front of a TV.

What conveys value for a recruiter?

To keep your job, to get promoted, or to be successful in anything, your work must convey value. So, how do you, as a recruiter or a recruiting manager know what is of value when it comes to your job?

In recruiting, we have tried to build a house around value by tracking activity. However, you will quickly learn that activity metrics only matter when production metrics have not been met.

Spoiler alert: Your production metrics are the measure of your value add to the company.

Activity metrics are only closely examined if production metrics are not met. The reason that your activity metrics are being challenged is because, in the eyes of the business, you are not creating more value than you are consuming. In the eyes of the business you might be a bad investment.

However, there IS a silver lining. Investors are willing to take a loss in the short term for a chance at a higher return long term. As a recruiter, it is your job to show them on what you bring to the table.

To many of us use our activity metrics to try to sell the business on our value. You need to share with them what you add so that when you have a bad month, or three, so they are willing to continue to invest in you.

Sometimes, it makes sense to invest in a money-losing project

Maybe you don’t believe me when I say that a business will invest money into a project that loses money in the short term. So as an example, I’d like to use Jeff Bezos, who just became the richest person in history with an estimated net worth of $100 billion.

For those of you not familiar with him, Jeff Bezos was the person who founded Amazon.com back in July 1994. The company did not turn a profit until Q4 of 2001. In fact, Amazon lost money every quarter for nearly seven (7) years, and the first time Amazon made a profit it was $5 million on $1.1 billion of revenue.

At the time that was about 1 cent — yes, 1 penny — per share. So why was the market willing to invest in Amazon for so long? It’s because the value of Amazon isn’t in the products, it is in the disruption it caused in retail and the value it added to its paying customers.

How much is a share of Amazon worth today?

When you understand this principle you will see why Tesla is worth $53.3 billion today, more than any other American car manufacturer. The name of the game isn’t effort, its value. In the case of Amazon, it was the value of disrupting the retail industry. For Tesla, it is the transportation industry.

Tesla hasn’t made that many cars. They have not produced $53.3 billion worth of effort. What they have done is added $53.3 billion worth of value. The value is in a self driving, electrically powered, disruption to the transportation industry.

For recruiters, it’s all about making the hire

Remember: It’s about value, not effort. If you were ever in sales you may have heard it put this way — once value is established, cost is no longer an issue. If you can establish your value as a recruiter you will be promoted more frequently, win more awards, and have more of your requests for support from the business answered.

So as a recruiter or a recruiting manager you have to understand that what you do — calling candidates, scheduling interviews, extending offers — is the effort you put forward, but not what you ultimately bring to the table. No, the value a recruiter brings is in a hire.

If you want to be the Amazon or Tesla of recruiting, you need to show the business how you will add value to their company. The term some people use to describe what they are looking for can be found on many a job description as “creative sourcing tactics,” or “innovative strategy.”

What they are trying to tell you is that they want you to disrupt recruiting.

Still not convinced? Let’s do a thought experiment: If recruiter A has 5 interviews and 5 offers, will they get a raise, promotion, award or recognition before or after recruiter B has had 50 interviews and 3 hires?

Yes, success in recruiting, and in any business, is about delivering value.

A Secret Strategy to Hire Better/Faster, Engage More and Retain Longer

Last summer, I was approached by a recruiter about an incredible role and it got me thinking about a friend who I thought may be a great fit so I called him to ask if I could refer him to the recruiter.

I did, and I advocated for the consideration of another friend she’d also called. Why? Because I believe in karma.

Fast forward to fall, and the friend I referred has relocated and started in the new role. It’s funny how free-wheeling and fast it moved. Isn’t that how it works? It’s not what you know, it’s who you know!

Just last week a good friend and recruitment leader told me that they don’t hire applicants. Here’s what he said: It’s passive candidates we want.

A few hiring stats you should consider

Still, we make sure that job postings are picked up by all the aggregators and we invest time and money to make sure our openings come to the top of candidate searches, but to what end?

  • We are spending on average $3,000 to $4,000+ per hire.
  • We are alienating applicants – Jobvite says there are 59 for every hire. I’ve also seen 100 and 250 per hire.

Let me get a little crazy with other data from Jobvite:

  • Internal hiring is six (6) times more effective than all other sources of hiring.
  • Referrals are five (5) times more effective than all other sources of hiring.
  • Nearly half (46 percent) of employees hired through referral programs stay for three years or more, while only 14 percent of those hired through job boards stay.
  • Referrals are hired 55 percent faster than those hired through a career site.
  • To get quality referrals, 64 percent of recruiters report awarding monetary bonuses as incentive.

Add to those stats, top trends from Deloitte’s 2017 Global Human Capital Trends Report:

  • High-performing organizations operate as empowered networks, coordinated through culture, information systems, and talent mobility.
  • Leading companies are moving to overhaul their career models and L&D infrastructure for the digital age.

Leaving talent “on the table”

And, there’s an article from the Harvard Business Review titled Having Work Friends Can Be Tricky, but It’s Worth It, which states:

… People who have a “best friend at work” are not only more likely to be happier and healthier, they are also seven times as likely to be engaged in their job … (and) have higher levels of productivity, retention, and job satisfaction than those who don’t.”

Given all that, I propose that we would be well served to reward employees for referring their work-friends, teammates, direct reports, bosses, partners, and peers within our very organization.

Thanks for reading. Have a great day!

Oh, you’re still here? Why would I suggest that?

It’s because I suspect that we are leaving talent “on the table,” or worse yet, driving it out by not reinforcing a culture that reflects an empowered network and talent mobility. This is all while lamenting the challenges of hiring for cultural fit, and because if internal hires are six (6) times and referrals are five (5) times more effective, then selecting internal employees who were referred must be 30 or 65 times more effective.

But don’t quote me on that math.

The high you get from a successful referrals

If people with friends at work are more engaged, productive, and long-lasting, then we should reward internal friendships. Thankfully, empathy is hot right now.

So, reward employees for looking out for one another, and empower people to treat co-workers how they want to be treated, and to feel part of your growth and success.

If I can get a high from being part of helping a friend get a great position at another company, how much better might it feel when encouraged and rewarded to help a friend within my own organization?

A Recruiting Lesson From Baseball: Sometimes, It’s Not About the Money

I am now, and have been most of my life, a baseball fan.

The off season is always interesting, especially seeing the movers and shakers coming and going through free agency and trades. However, every once in a while a mega-deal happens that’s sort of like Haley’s Comet coming again through the sky.

This is one of those years, it involves a baseball player from Nippon (Japan), and his name is Shohei Ohtani.

Ohtani is a proverbial beast coming into Major League Baseball, and quite literally all 30 teams want him. He is an outfielder AND is a left-handed pitcher, and he could easily play either position — or both.  Oh, and did I mention that he is only 23 and also batted .332 the last two years?

That, my friend is a threat, and I mean a big one.

This is a baseball case where it is NOT about the money

The New York Yankees, based on their history of landing Japanese players they have pursued, were ranked among the teams most likely to sign Ohtani, but the Yankees lost out, and the seven teams still in the running includes the Texas Rangers, Los Angeles Dodgers, Chicago Cubs, and Seattle Mariners.

The top clubs are going to win out, or are they? You see, there is a twist in all this because Ohtani is just 23 and therefore is limited by the seven teams’ international bonus pools. Ohtani already knows exactly how much each team can offer.

The Yankees could have maxed out with a $3.5 million signing bonus, but now that they’re out of the bidding, only the Rangers, at $5.35 million, can offer the most. Because there’s only a $2 million differential between what teams can offer out of the international bonus pool, it’s not going to come down to salary for teams trying to land Ohtani.

No, it’s actually going to come down to something else, and it’s this: which team is the best fit?

An industry source confirmed that on Friday, all 30 major league clubs received a memo from the representative for Shohei Ohtani — authorized and distributed by the baseball commissioner’s office — asking interested clubs to answer a flurry of questions that will help determine which MLB team Ohtani, the pitcher-outfielder for the Nippon Ham Fighters, will eventually join.

In recruiting, there are sometimes other things besides money

The memo, released in the name of Nez Balelo, co-head of CAA Baseball and Ohtani’s lead agent, asked each suitor to do the following:

  • Evaluate Ohtani’s talent as a pitcher and as a hitter;
  • Explain its player development, medical training and player-performance philosophies and facilities;
  • Describe its minor league and spring training facilities;
  • Detail the resources for Ohtani’s cultural assimilation into the winning team’s city;
  • Demonstrate a vision for how Ohtani could integrate into the team’s organization; and,
  • Show Ohtani why their team is the most desirable one to play for.

OK then, let’s get this party started and start putting some real thought into this!

Imagine if you could take salary out of the equation when you are recruiting top talent. I look at Shohei Ohtani as that top prospect that you have always wanted to recruit for your company, but you find that you have to go up against some tough competition out there. There are some really big names involved, like Facebook, Google, Amazon, etc., and there is really no chance to win, or is there?

Yes, you need to keep in mind that Ohtani is looking for more than a place to play baseball. He wants a home. Yes, this is a recruiting lesson for all of us.

It’s more than just getting bodies through the door

In over 20 years in this business, I have been negotiating deals and I get this as an environment that is important both for the candidate AND the company. There is nothing worse than coming into a new situation and realizing that this was all a really big mistake. Been there, done that actually during my years of contracting, where it’s all about “try before you buy.”

I tell every candidate that a hiring decision comes down too both parties wanting to work together, and not just one or the other wanting it.

So, what would you do? Do you sell your company? Do you chat about benefits and company perks with the candidate? Do you even ask them what it is they want or what they are looking for?

Most recruiters don’t care, because it’s all about them you see. They need to make the numbers, and that is all driven by crappy management not understanding the process that we go through. Senior leadership is usually so far away from the process their very understanding is driven by just getting bodies in the door.

Here is a little trick to get them to understand: Have them apply to a role with the company using a fake name. Take them through the process and have them see what you are doing every step of the way. I am being 100 percent serious here.

Send them an email, call their cell, shoot them an email, screen them, have a mock interview team interview them just as if they really were looking for a job. I have done this before and I once had a COO tell me after we were all done that we needed a better practice. A week later we did it again, however, we did it my way, and they felt what my candidates felt like with my process.

Oh, he did not get the job the second time, but a call from us letting him go. He came down to my office right after, closed the door behind him and said, “That’s the way we are going to do hiring in this company starting today, right this minute.” He then shook his head, laughed, and said, “Damn if I didn’t get the job though. I thought I really nailed the interview.” He laughed even louder and left the office.

Mission accomplished.

Don’t Be Surprised at Who Tops Glassdoor’s 2018 Best Places to Work

There are a number of best places to work lists, and the one from Glassdoor, which touts itself as “one of the largest and fastest growing job sites in the world today,” has grown to be one of the best.

Glassdoor’s 10th annual Employees’ Choice Awards, honoring the Best Places to Work in 2018, is no exception. It’s based on the input of employees who voluntarily provide anonymous feedback, and by completing a company review about their job, work environment and employer over the past year.

Here are the Top 10 companies:

  1. Facebook (4.6 rating)
  2. Bain & Company (4.6 rating)
  3. Boston Consulting Group (4.6 rating)
  4. In-N-Out Burger (4.6 rating)
  5. Google (4.6 rating)
  6. lululemon (4.6 rating)
  7. HubSpot (4.6 rating)
  8. World Wide Technology (4.5 rating)
  9. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital (4.5 rating)
  10. Ultimate Software (4.5 rating)

Among the more than 700,000 employers reviewed on Glassdoor, the average company rating is 3.3.

Facebook is No. 1 for the third time in 10 years

It’s not a surprise that Facebook is No. 1 again, because it’s the third time they have taken the top spot since 2008. And three employers — Bain & Company at No. 2,  Google at No. 5, and Apple at No. 84, are the only three employers to make the list for 10 consecutive years since these awards debuted in 2008.

The 2018 list include 40 newcomers, including Blizzard Entertainment (No. 28;), Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants (No. 37), Electronic Arts (No. 56); Kronos Incorporated (No. 63); T-Mobile (No. 79) and adidas (No. 93), to name a few.

Even United Airlines made the list this year (No. 55) for the first time, and that’s despite how horribly they handled an incident that ended in a customer getting literally dragged off one of their planes. Make of that what you will.

And here’s one more fun fact: Nearly half the companies (46) on the Best Places to Work 2018 list come from these five U.S. regions: the San Francisco Bay Area (which includes San Jose/Silicon Valley) — 18 companies; Boston — 7 companies; Southern California — 7 companies; New York City — 7 companies, and Seattle — 7 companies.

“We know today’s job seekers are more informed than ever about where they go to work, researching everything from company culture to career opportunities to pay philosophy and more. To help people find companies that stand out from the pack, the Glassdoor Employees’ Choice Awards recognize employers that are truly Best Places to Work because they’re determined by those who really know best – the employees,” said Robert Hohman, Glassdoor CEO and co-founder, in a press release about the list.

Glassdoor also ranks the Best Small & Medium Companies to Work For in 2018  Here are the Top 10:

  1. Silverline (4.9 rating)
  2. New Home Star (4.9 rating)
  3. Next Century (4.9 rating)
  4. Acceleration Partners (4.9 rating)
  5.  Zoom Video Communications (4.9 rating)
  6. OppLoans (4.8 rating)
  7. Glint (4.8 rating)
  8. Life.Church (4.8 rating)
  9. CB Insights (4.8 rating)
  10. CarShield (4.8 rating)

Qualities that make top talent want to work for you

Here’s my take: What’s different about Glassdoor’s Employees’ Choice Awards and Best Places to Work winners from other lists — like Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For — is that there is no self-nomination process. Employees who participate in Glassdoor’s anonymous online company review survey drive the rankings.

And what qualities do these Best Places to Work have that other companies don’t. The things that employees mention the most shouldn’t surprise you:

  • Employees feel valued;
  • They have a mission-driven company culture;
  • They work with smart colleagues;
  • Competitive compensation;
  • Great perks and benefits;
  • Opportunity for advancement;
  • Transparent senior leadership;
  • They have challenging/exciting work that delivers impact.

It’s easy to be cynical about these “best places” and “best companies” lists because the organizations that make them tend to market the hell out of the fact. That may be so, but you shouldn’t lose track of the bigger point — that the qualities that the “best” companies embrace are the kind that show the workforce they care and make the very best people want to work for you.

And if making one of these “best companies” lists doesn’t help your recruiters and TA professionals do their jobs better, nothing will.

How these lists are done

Employees’ Choice Award winners for the 2018 Best Places to Work and Best Small & Medium Companies to Work For are determined using Glassdoor’s proprietary awards algorithm, and each employer’s rating determined based on the quantity, quality and consistency of Glassdoor-approved company reviews submitted by U.S.-based employees between November 1, 2016 and October 22, 2017.

Companies are ranked based on their overall rating achieved during the past year. (Ratings based on a 5-point scale: 1.0=very dissatisfied, 3.0=OK, 5.0=very satisfied; Actual calculations extend beyond the thousandth decimal place). 

During the year-long eligibility period, employers considered for the large list must have received at least 75 ratings and employers considered for the small & medium list must have received at least 25 ratings, respectively, for each of the eight workplace attributes (overall company rating, career opportunities, compensation & benefits, culture & values, senior management, work/life balance, recommend to a friend and business outlook) taken into account as part of the awards algorithm. For reporting simplicity, ratings are displayed to the nearest tenth, though calculations extend beyond the thousandth decimal place to determine final rank order.

 

Recruiting Strategies That Really Help in Retaining Top Talent

With employee quits continuing to outpace layoffs at a 2:1 ratio, executives now consider retaining top talent a higher priority than employee engagement or even cost management.

Considering the growing costs of replacing employees (things like money, time, talent, intellectual property, to name just a few), retaining top talent is a necessary corporate strategy. Today’s HR leaders can leverage extremely powerful technologies to help reduce attrition, such as pinpointing flight risks via predictive analytics, or using advanced AI surveys to reveal real-time employee sentiment.

But while these technologies are extremely valuable for evaluating the current workforce, the most effective retention campaigns include practices that begin long before sending the offer letter.

Recruiting is much more than a tactical function. Talent acquisition should have an influential seat at the table, actively partnering and integrating with talent management and succession-planning strategy.

Here are four (4) strategies that can enhance organizational recruitment efforts, strengthening the employee base and helping in retaining top talent as well:

1 – Begin with the candidate in mind

Teams should create a detailed candidate profile, fine-tuning expectations and desired traits for the role to form a clear vision of the ideal hire.

I highly suggest also assessing cultural fit and drive in addition to experience and verifiable competencies, as these key personality traits play a major role in attrition. This specific candidate profile will tailor the hiring process to attract not only the top talent, but the top talent who are likely to contribute to the organization — and culture — long-term.

I like using Design Thinking methodology to develop ideal personality profiles. The five steps endorsed by the Stanford Institute of Design — empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test — encourage talent acquisition teams to develop candidate-centered methodology and innovative new ways of identifying people who “fit” with your organization’s culture and are likely to stay. This includes collaboratively ranking candidates and utilizing specialized testing vehicles to assess their skills.

Consider Steve Jobs’ legendary quote:

It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and then tell them what to do; we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do.”

Culture is heavily based on trust and respect, so leaders should strive to deliver an experience where candidates feel comfortable and confident sharing their ideas, even during the interview process. You should want (and expect) employees to challenge the status quo so they can continue to make your culture, products, and services better.

2 – Uncover innovative recruitment opportunities

Think beyond traditional marketing strategies to find exciting new ways to reach potential hires. Design Thinking helps with this, too.

Carefully consider how ideal candidates spend their free time, what web sites they might be using, and how they’re likely to respond to a different approach. Then, develop a plan of action, and test it, then try something else, test again, reconsider, and repeat in a non-linear fashion.

Consider utilizing unconventional online platforms like Reddit in your efforts. By joining in discussions about current technology topics, recruiters are able to interact with viable candidates in a friendly, informal way and share information about offerings with people who match their ideal profile.

3 – Make sure to make it a team effort

The people we work with can have a substantial impact on our engagement and satisfaction, as well as our retention, which means leaders owe it to their teams — and their organization — to prioritize personality and cultural fit.

Employee feedback should play a primary role in recruiting. Teamwork is a critical aspect of nearly every position, so hiring managers should include the candidate’s future peers in the interview process and give significant weight to their observations and opinions. This has a huge impact on culture, overall work environment, and employee retention.

4 – Deliver skill-based assessments

Here’s something I highly recommend: Having candidates on your “short list” take assessments to ensure they possess the necessary skills for the role.

It’s incredibly illuminating to watch someone attempt to solve a problem. Analytical assessments are fantastic at gauging critical, numerical, and abstract reasoning, while cultural-assessment analyses can be leveraged to reveal a candidate’s work style, people acumen, drivers, and values.

Although they aren’t perfect, these tests are likely to raise red flags if any of your top picks are ill-suited for the position — and, therefore, unlikely to stay.

Finding the right person to fit in a role, a team, a corporation, and a culture can be daunting, but keeping long-term retention, especially retaining top talent, in mind is worth any extra effort and time spent during the hiring process.

Candidate Questions: The One Thing That Most Every Interviewer Usually Asks

There are lot of candidate questions that get asked, but there is always one candidate question that most every person vying for a job gets asked near the end of a job interview, and it popped up recently on LinkedIn’s Premium Career Group from an MBA candidate from the Kogod School of Business at American University.

You’ve probably asked it (or been asked it) many times too, and it’s this:

“I don’t have any additional questions. You answered all of mine. What questions do you have for us?”

Let me state for the record that I have a mixed track record of answering candidate questions myself, and my guess is that every hiring manager who has conducted candidate interviews have heard a wide variety of responses to the question.

What questions should candidates be ready to ask you?

But, here’s what the MBA candidate asked about this question on LinkedIn:

Many interviewees become overwhelmed with the interview itself that they forget an interview is also a conversation. It seems that some are stumped by this invitation to ask questions about a prospective employer.

It is clear that this invitation helps interviewers gain more insight into how prepared an applicant is, how much passion they exude, how interested they are, or even what type of things (that) hold value to them.

I’m curious though — What types of questions have you all come prepared to interviews with? How did you adapt when the prepared questions were “already answered”?

For those in HR — Help us understand what you think about an applicant that has nothing more to ask in an interview.

An effective approach to preparing for an interview is that you do research on the role, the company, the history, etc. Could it be possible that a candidate truly does not have any more questions? Is this acceptable?

Tell us more, please!”

This is a great question because of that last point — “Could it be possible that a candidate truly does not have any more questions. Is this acceptable?” 

Most hiring managers I know would NOT consider it acceptable if a candidate didn’t have some questions ready to ask when they had a chance, and the more the candidate has prepped and prepared for the interview, the greater the likelihood that they will have a great many questions they would like answers to.

Is NOT having more questions a deal breaker?

But I keep coming back to this notion that “having questions = good candidate to keep talking to” and “not having questions = bad candidate we should eliminate immediately.”

So, here are some of the best answers from some of the nearly 1.1 million members of LinkedIn’s Premium Career Group when it comes to the issue of candidate questions. See if they align in any way in what you believe candidates should ask YOU at the end of their job interview:

  • From a leadership consultant in Vancouver, British Columbia — “As a hiring manager, I have generally considered it a negative when a candidate cannot ask any single, reasonably relevant question when invited. An exception might be for an internal interview, where the role parameters and key stakeholders could be very well known to the candidate. As a recruiter, or if dealing with very junior candidates, I might also be less judgmental.”
  • From a customer service program manager in Atlanta — “I love asking “Is there anything that you’ve learned about my work experience that you’d like more clarification on?” or “How do you feel my skills fit this position?” or “Do you have any hesitation about my skill set?” There have been times when the interview was incredibly conversational and I really didn’t have any additional questions, but I always like to close by asking next steps.”
  • From an executive recruiter in the San Francisco Bay Area — “Recruiters do not want to hear a list of perfectly staged questions. They honestly want to answer any questions you may have. Shift your perspective from “What do recruiters when to hear?” and switch to being “Wildly Curious.” Ask because you are totally curious. Try to avoid shifting the focus. They really do want to know if you have any other questions.”
  • From a game programmer and software developer in Seattle — “I had a similar issue but I got around it by actively asking questions during the interview where appropriate. While I didn’t have additional questions to ask at the very end, I got in a lot of questions through the interview. I think it is important to remember that interviews are templated. Even if you asked 100 questions during the interview they will still ask if you have any additional questions at the end.”
  • From an HR/payroll systems manager in Nashville –– “Get specific about how the company operates. For example, ask how often does the company reorganize itself. Get specific about the job for which you just interviewed… but twist it somewhat. Ask how many people currently hold the same position, what is the average amount of time any given person stays in that job. Then ask the interviewer his/her opinion about why it is the case.”

Another view: Maybe this is about leaving a good impression

This is all good advice, and there is a lot more of it if you spend some time in the candidate questions thread on LinkedIn’s Premium Career Group. But all of this makes me wonder — what would TA professionals, hiring managers, and interviewers have as advice on this?

Here’s what Al Palumbo wrote about this on Resume-Live.com under the section Why your questions for the employer matter:

No matter what you’ve said in an interview or how great your credentials are, when we sit in a room afterward and discuss which candidates to bring back, the ones who leave the best impression are the ones we remember most.

So don’t make the mistake of thinking “well, I gave great answers already” and therefore you ease up just as the interview draws to a close. This is the time when you can leave them with a feeling that you are someone who is exactly the bright, resourceful, energetic person they want to add to their company.

And so how you ask your questions of them – one of the last things they’ll remember about you – can be as important as the questions themselves.”

Is there a right or wrong answer here?

So, what are YOU looking for when you interview a candidate and end with, “What questions do you have for us? Is there anything you would like to ask?”

When it comes to candidate questions, is there right answer, or a wrong answer here? Is it really the candidate’s big chance to make a powerful impression? Will they ruin their chances of you hiring them if they don’t have something meaningful to ask?

Or, is there a better way for a hiring manager to end a candidate interviewer? Is there something more tangible, more meaningful, or more insightful that should be asked and answered here?

I would love to get some recruiters, hiring managers at TA pros to weigh in candidate questions, and particularly “do you have anything you would like to ask?” Leave your questions in the comments, or send them to me directly at [email protected].  If I get enough, I’ll write another post about them here.