A few years ago, we urgently needed to fill the position of a human relations manager in a client company of ours. The workers in the company virtually chased the former occupant of the position who was handpicked by the managing director away. You see the man was not only high handed he was also insensitive to the plight of the workers in the company. To crown it, the guy was always rude and insolent to the executive director and even to the managing director who virtually handpicked him. On my part I however think the position was too big for the man and this got his head swollen thereby making him incapable of handling and managing it.
We therefore placed an advert for the vacant position and in addition we also sourced from our database for some passive candidates we considered fit for this position. After short listing and eventual conduct of series of interviews, there was this particular gentleman we considered extremely fit for the position based on his skills, abilities and accomplishments. In point of fact, the man wowed us all during the interview and based on his achievements and experience we felt he would be able to handle the staff comfortably. However being actively and happily engaged elsewhere, the man was not too keen on joining our client’s company. He kept on giving one excuse after the other why he could not join the company. The onus then fell on our company to convince this talent to join our client’s company. To cut a long story short, it became our duty to convince this top active but passive candidate to join our client’s company. We managed to do this and he performed exceptionally well while he occupied the position. With our persuasive and sales skills we were able to sell our client’s brand to this rare talent and convince him to join the company. The rest is now history.
What therefore is the moral in this story? It is that recruiters should endeavor to treat talent acquisition the way the sales person treat prospecting. This will in essence make talent acquisition more successful and fruitful.
You see, we are all sales persons of some sort, in one way or the other, whether you are a doctor, a lawyer, an attorney, an investor, a banker and especially we recruiters. Salesmanship is all about attraction. It is all about the selling of promise to make the attraction seductive, appealing and of course possible. As a recruiter/hiring manager, you have to sell an appealing promise to a talent you desperately require in order to attract him or her to your company (or for your client).
Over the years and in the course of recruiting, I have come to appreciate the relationship between salesmanship and recruitment. The sales person is supposed to sell solutions to people’s problems. Recruitment which in essence is also about selling solutions to the talent acquisition problems of employers and job seeking problems of job seekers should be seen in this light as well.
Therefore like sales:
1. Talent acquisition is about persuasion: Like the sales person, a recruiter is supposed to sell solutions to the client’s or employer’s talent acquisition problems by employing all his persuasive skills to solve this problem. Like the salesman, the recruiter is a toast master. Being the persuaders that we are, our target talents does want to say yes to our proposals particularly if we are pleasant, friendly and professional enough. Therefore we should not spare any effort in persuading a required talent to come on board our ship.
2. Talent acquisition is about transference of feelings: As in sales, talent acquisition is about transference of feelings. It is all about letting the potential employee know that as recruiters we really care about him (or her) and have his genuine interest at heart. If you the recruiter project this feelings pleasantly enough, a potential employee will never say no. This is because saying no to your proposal will mean the end of the relationship between the two of you. This is because he never can tell, your proposal might be better than what he currently enjoys and therefore might not want to lose out.
3. Talent acquisition is about the sale of the job on offer: As in sales, the recruiter is selling the job on offer, its benefits and the company putting the job on offer to a prospective employee. In addition you are also selling yourself the hiring manager. You are selling yourself because you represent the face of the company. That is the face of what your candidate’s future will look like for many years to come. You therefore need to give a good impression during the hiring process. You know intuitively that your recruit is more inclined to join your team if he or she likes you. For the recruitment that you do every day, if you are liked, you stand a much better chance of success. Smile. Be friendly. Give a sincere compliment when necessary; make some brief small talk. Sympathize with a recruit. Empathize with his frustrations. Trust me, success shall be attained.
4. Talent acquisition is about creating a win-win situation: A happy day in the life of a sales person is when he has been able to land a hot prospect that he has been chasing for some time. Like in sales, a happy day is when you (the recruiter) has been able to land a hot candidate who is really excited to be coming on board. In any hiring process, all parties involved should be happy with the results and feel good about the transaction. Again, try to get a sense of what the other side’s underlying motivation is. It may be very different from what you want. To make it a win-win situation however, each party in the process must be joyous about it.
I met the human resource manager we recruited for our client several years later. He was doing very fine. After leaving our client’s company he went on to join one or two others later. He is now the Director of Administration in a reputable organization in Nigeria. He is such a rare talent. Our client was therefore very lucky to have been able to have him work for them. He actually stabilized things and left an indelible mark there.
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