Mark McMillan | Founding Member, HRExaminer Editorial Advisory Board
Please welcome Mark McMillan back as a returning contributor to the HRExaminer Editorial Advisory Board. Mark is co-founder of Talent Function, where he combines executive coaching expertise with ten years of recruitment software industry experience. He started his software career for the Oracle Corporation and later joined BrassRing as a Director of Strategy and Business Development. Full Bio…
The Darwinian Evolution of the Recruiter
by Mark McMillan
For the next 19 years, 10,000 baby-boomers will retire each day, leading to the hackneyed conclusion – recruiting is going to get harder. That phrase should start paragraphs, not end them. Like all species, the “recruiter” must evolve to survive. Recruiter’s need to grow a new compassion appendage that is going to make them look, more and more, like a coach.
The changing contours of the labor supply mean that recruiting is changing in importance and complexity. Recruiters cannot simply rely on passive candidates. Let’s examine passive candidate recruiting:
| Recruiter Inquiry Effort Level | Passive Candidate State | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Level I | Passive “Aggressive" | Candidate is performing a high level and they have made the decision to check out the market. They will have not posted their resume, but they are talking to headhunters and are working their networks to get a new job. They are making a move, but they will play their cards as a passive candidate. They are in the border region Afghanistan and Pakistan in the “active” – “passive” schema. They have emotionally quit their job. They are ready to negotiate. |
| Level II | Passive “Ripe” | Already has a clear idea of what they are looking for in a new job and a new company. Possesses a flickering desire to make a move depending on the day. They feel like they should make a move to improve their career trajectory. They may have a particular dissatisfying issue that is a deal-breaker with their current company. If you can get a hold of them, because they are busy, then you could get them to negotiate very easily. |
| Level III | Passive “Latent” | They are humming along in their job. They are happy and haven’t given any thought to leaving their current job and company. They haven’t done any of the soul-searching required to make a move to another company. They have not done any career reflection. They don’t know what they want because they haven’t thought about it. |
The prevailing definition of passive candidate recruiting includes Aggressive and Ripe candidates only. This is when the hunter archetypes swoop in and close the candidates. You can picture the aggressive, type A recruiter pushing for the decision. This is all about closing skills. These skills are important and will only get more important going forward. But they will not be enough.
Recruiters will also have to learn how to work with Latent candidates. The recruiters that I know run from Latent candidates. They send them to their friends (like me) that are coaches. The recruiters simply don’t have time to invest in an inquiry process that might not result in an active candidate. For many of them, it also isn’t in their make-up. What makes these recruiters successful is their certainty, and, to a degree, their impatience. They wield certainty. They don’t have time for candidate fog.
In the new world order with a smaller workforce, recruiters won’t have the luxury of turning away latent candidates. The Type A, hunter, closer approach doesn’t work with these candidates. That coaching appendage will be necessary to provide recruiters with the insight to give candidates a hand.
The coaching skill set is required to recruit Latent candidates. Coaches are trained to produce and control conversations that yield what is really going on inside someone’s mind. They are masters at rapport that enables them to get to trust quickly. And with that trust, they can control conversations that lead to the candidate stepping into their own new thought meadows. I am not saying that Latent candidates are going to be easily sold by the coaching skill set. What I am saying is that if there is any real opportunity for a job change, then the coach stands the best chance of uncovering it.
If you want an exaggerated, entertaining glimpse into the mastery of coaching, then I suggest you take a look at the television show, Lie to Me.
In order to be successful in the coming years, recruiters will have invest more time in candidates and to learn to understand and guide them. This may or may not result in filling the current requisition on the desk. But I do believe that the candidate, recruiter and importantly, the client, will be more satisfied with both the process and results.
That new appendage emerging is just the hand that both candidates and clients will require in the coming years.
