Change the message. Attract more of the right people by speaking to ‘What’s In It For Them’. Focus less on what you’re looking for and more so on why the candidate should consider you.
Stop describing the ugly parts. For instance, when hiring and SDR, “calling out “scheduling 7 demos a week” or “100+ dials a day” is a major turnoff.” Instead focus on the excitement at your firm like mentioning big name customers, and describe the promotion trajectory and career track for the candidate. Give a sense of the great things that are possible for the company AND the candidate.
Targeting. What are the backgrounds of some of your best reps? Where did they go to school? Where do they spend time? Focus your targeting on the characteristics of your best reps.
Streamline the application process. Don’t make a candidate fill out a bunch of fields, set up a username and PW, or go through multiple pages. The best ones wont do that. Each additional step or field creates friction. If you’ve got more than 5 fields or multiple pages to click through, you’re over doing it. Once candidates submit their resume and fill out their 5 fields (which include name, contact info, and maybe 1 or 2 questions tops), you can email them and ask them to fill out a survey if you must have some proof of real interest.
Phone screen. This shouldn’t be done by you, but rather by HR or talent specialist. The call is quick and the goal is to find red flags (reasons for job change, what they want in a role, etc), not evaluate skills.
On-site interview. You and your team do this, so once you’ve set up all those meetings, the candidate may be on site for a few hours if not half a day. One-on-one interviews with your team members are far superior to group interviews. If you want them to do some take-home work, now is the time to give it to them.
Score the candidate. After the on-site interviews, the feedback from your employees cant be “I liked her,” it needs to be quantitative. Use a scorecard with a 1 to 4 scale rating for the characteristics you’re looking for. 1 to 10 is too many and just a “yes” or “no” is too restrictive.
Don’t lose candidates. Once someone accepts the offer, you need to continue selling them because once they put in their two weeks, they have 24+ days including weekends to change their mind. Have your current employees connect on LinkedIn, send them swag, send over an orientation agenda, and finally email them 3 days prior sharing your excitement to have them join. Perhaps send them a pic of their desk.
Incentivize referrals. “In terms of lower-cost and higher-quality, referral recruiting can’t be beat.” Pay for valid applications submitted, not just hiring success. “Think of your referral process as you would qualified appointment setting. If an SDR sets a meeting that meets the proper criteria, they’ve done their job — whether or not the deal ever closes. When generating referrals, the goal is the same: put qualified candidates in front of hiring managers.” One idea for paying for applications: “Each month, reps who referred candidates get their names in a hat. On the 1st, draw for the previous month. Perhaps last month’s winner is ineligible. Or maybe multiple referrals mean multiple chances to win. You can work out the fine print. But two factors are critical. One, every month someone wins something significant. Two, there’s a short lag time between action (referral) and reward (the drawing).”
companies. I’ll build a list that we’re going to go through together.”
we fast-tracked their careers, refer younger siblings, roommates, and friends. A very high percentage of our hires are referrals. Our alumni continue to serve as advocates for the company and the program. They are an ongoing recruitment marketing resource. When we’re interviewing people, I like to tell them, ‘I challenge you to go find another hiring manager who’s going to truly care what you’re doing three, four, five jobs from now. I will because you’ll continue be an ambassador for the program.”
sammy@blossomstreetventures.com