20 tips for the recruiter I was in 2010
Dear Chloé from 2010!
It’s Chloé from 2020; I know you've just started as a recruiter a couple of weeks ago, and I thought that in my (now) great wisdom, I would share with you 20 things that I've learnt that would have made my life a lot easier if I had known them before.
So here goes:
1. Type your notes while on the phone. The amount of time you’re going to waste copying them up in the ATS is insane.
2. You’re human, you’re going to forget to get back to some people. Don’t beat yourself up, and set up a bunch of reminders in your calendar instead.
3. Learn Boolean and x-ray search straight away. Practice, practice, practice.
4. Stop recruiting for multilingual sales roles and get into IT recruitment. There's no point feeling intimidated; it's not harder to recruit a developer than a German sales exec in Dublin.
5. Learn how to scrape data.
6. Some hiring managers are going to suck – find a way to work with them that works without making yourself miserable.
7. Always ask candidates if they have holidays booked in the next 6 months – they will not tell you if they have 3 weeks booked in Thailand until after signing the contract!
8. Manage people’s expectations – the hiring manager agreed to get back to you within 1 working day, so tell the candidate it will be 1 week.
9. Stand your ground when a hiring manager is being actively discriminatory and put forward the best candidates for the job.
10. Some people that you hire will go on to have an amazing career in the company and some will fail miserably. This is not your fault. Keep being honest about the pros and cons of the job and let the candidate make up their own mind.
11. You suck at Business Development. Find other ways to generate new business. I know social is not a thing back in 2010, but you should really get on that boat soon.
12. Post content on social media without waiting for the Marketing team’s approval. Spoiler alert, it’s going to take 7 months; imagine all the candidates you could have reached in that time…
13. When a candidate abuses you on the phone, hang-up on them, even though the SVP of HR is sitting right in front of you.
14. Learn about calls to action – I mean, seriously!
15. Get an appointment scheduling tool – you can get free ones if you have 0 budget. This is going to unclutter your inbox so much; no-more back and forth “can you do 2 pm?” “no I can’t” “ok, can you do 5 pm then?”.
16. Book a lunch hour in your calendar – Not that you will really ever take a full hour, but if it’s in your calendar you won’t book yourself back to back throughout the day.
17. Cynicism comes with the job – I mean, how many car crashes, and death in the family can one person get?
18. Everybody lies. I could have stolen that sentence from House M.D. but it’s very relevant to recruitment: the white lies, the outright lies, the omission, the approximation, the forgetfulness… “I will make a decision on this candidate by tomorrow”, “I always hit my target”…
19. You will never stop educating hiring managers, even the ones with whom you have the best relationship.
20. Recruiters in your team with more years of experience than you are not necessarily better nor more experienced than you. In your first two years in recruitment, you’re going to achieve and learn more than most. Don’t automatically think that they know more than you.
2. You’re human, you’re going to forget to get back to some people. Don’t beat yourself up, and set up a bunch of reminders in your calendar instead.
3. Learn Boolean and x-ray search straight away. Practice, practice, practice.
4. Stop recruiting for multilingual sales roles and get into IT recruitment. There's no point feeling intimidated; it's not harder to recruit a developer than a German sales exec in Dublin.
5. Learn how to scrape data.
6. Some hiring managers are going to suck – find a way to work with them that works without making yourself miserable.
7. Always ask candidates if they have holidays booked in the next 6 months – they will not tell you if they have 3 weeks booked in Thailand until after signing the contract!
8. Manage people’s expectations – the hiring manager agreed to get back to you within 1 working day, so tell the candidate it will be 1 week.
9. Stand your ground when a hiring manager is being actively discriminatory and put forward the best candidates for the job.
10. Some people that you hire will go on to have an amazing career in the company and some will fail miserably. This is not your fault. Keep being honest about the pros and cons of the job and let the candidate make up their own mind.
11. You suck at Business Development. Find other ways to generate new business. I know social is not a thing back in 2010, but you should really get on that boat soon.
12. Post content on social media without waiting for the Marketing team’s approval. Spoiler alert, it’s going to take 7 months; imagine all the candidates you could have reached in that time…
13. When a candidate abuses you on the phone, hang-up on them, even though the SVP of HR is sitting right in front of you.
14. Learn about calls to action – I mean, seriously!
15. Get an appointment scheduling tool – you can get free ones if you have 0 budget. This is going to unclutter your inbox so much; no-more back and forth “can you do 2 pm?” “no I can’t” “ok, can you do 5 pm then?”.
16. Book a lunch hour in your calendar – Not that you will really ever take a full hour, but if it’s in your calendar you won’t book yourself back to back throughout the day.
17. Cynicism comes with the job – I mean, how many car crashes, and death in the family can one person get?
18. Everybody lies. I could have stolen that sentence from House M.D. but it’s very relevant to recruitment: the white lies, the outright lies, the omission, the approximation, the forgetfulness… “I will make a decision on this candidate by tomorrow”, “I always hit my target”…
19. You will never stop educating hiring managers, even the ones with whom you have the best relationship.
20. Recruiters in your team with more years of experience than you are not necessarily better nor more experienced than you. In your first two years in recruitment, you’re going to achieve and learn more than most. Don’t automatically think that they know more than you.
Good luck to you Chloé from 2010!
Chloé from 2020.
PS: 2020 really sucks!