How to Take Your Recruiting Skills from Good to Great

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• February 4, 2014
• By Sean Revell
• 5 Comments

Do you strive to be a good recruiter — or a great one?

If you’re a good one, people might take your call and they might listen to what you have to say. But mights don’t have guarantees. (Click here to tweet this thought.) That prospective hire might also hang up.

Leave good behind and become great with these six steps:

1. Listen

Someone once said successful communication is 80 percent listening and 20 percent talking. This applies more than ever when you’re recruiting people. Stop the sales techniques and stop talking. Listen to what your client wants, and when you start approaching people for the role, listen to them, too.

Invite them to share more information with you, and they’ll probably do so happily. By knowing more about the role and the people you’re considering, you’ll be more knowledgeable when making choices and picking the correct candidates.

2. Don’t be “that guy”

You know the one. The person who calls when you’ve specifically asked them to email. The person who phones at 5 p.m. even though you requested morning contact. Pay attention to those details and people will warm to you faster and be more willing to cooperate.

The best recruitment consultants don’t swoop in overly brazen; they establish the relationship first. They find out the best time to call (because who wants to get caught while they’re at their desk at their current job?), and they play to their candidates’ rules instead of their own.

Show you care and people will invest in your skills and your ability to find them a job.

3. Don’t kid yourself

Don’t assume candidates are desperate for jobs and you can throw anything their way, even if it’s only remotely linked to what they asked for. When people are job hunting, they’re likely in contact with a few recruiting companies.

It’s like dating. Make sure you always stand out for the right reasons. If a candidate is great, fight for them because within a week or so, someone else might snap them up.

4. Go the extra mile

Don’t rely on the same old techniques for finding candidates. Great recruiters scan the Internet and job market all the time for opportunities and people who might be a great fit for the role in question.

Use social media. Sites like Twitter and LinkedIn are fantastic choices for tracking down people searching for roles. You can filter out tweets by specific keywords, use Chrome plugins like TweetDeck and track tweets that might mention things like “job hunting London.” Be as specific as you can for more tailored results.

5. Attend industry events

It can be easy to hide behind a computer during your day job, but the great recruitment consultant is someone who immerses themselves in their industry. Research industry get-togethers, conferences, meetups and fairs and get yourself down there.

Introducing yourself in person and being the go-to person for recruitment in your field is where you want to be and what you want from your career path. Hand out plenty of business cards and don’t be shy about it. The more, the better.

6. Practice your phone manners

Remember when you’re chatting that there are real people on the other end. It sounds obvious, but you’d be surprised by how much of a skill it is. Don’t ramble without taking a breather. Introduce yourself and let them do the same, as you would in any conversation.

Practice this at length before you get on the phone with anyone, and you’ll notice how much your communication and relationships improve.

Sean Revell has been writing about how employers can find, source and converse with the right candidates and advising job seekers on finding the right careers via Leisure Jobs since 2008.

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