Are You Using Recruiters Effectively?
Curt Skene’s In2Win! Career Coaching Supplement.
Whether you love or hate them, recruiters play an important role in the career search process. In order to have the best possible relationship with them you need to understand that they work for the employer, not you. This means if they don’t have a job that fits your skill set, experience or personality, then they will not contact you. Make sure you know the most relevant recruiters in your profession and get them on your radar screen early.
After you connect with them it’s your responsibility to keep them in the loop during your search. Never expect a recruiter to pull your resume every time there is a similar opportunity because they are busy and have many good candidates to sift through. In some cases, another recruiter performs the initial candidate matching process. When meeting recruiters, always be prepared, be memorable, show respect, send ‘thank you’ or ‘touching base’ cards and offer help even when you are employed.
The easier you make their job the more helpful they may be to you in the future. When an opportunity is not for you think of others in your network who may be a better fit. Not only are you helping a recruiter you just may find someone else a great new job! Finally, in an employers’ market recruiters have little inclination to work with executives who want to make a career switch.
There are already many “perfect” candidates… and ultimately they are the people recruiters are getting paid to find.
Recruiter activity can reveal competing candidates and market movement. Use that information intelligently.
Why I Wrote This Page
Because recruiters are economically incentivized to serve the client paying them, the employer, not you. Understanding that plainly changes how you should invest your effort with each recruiter relationship.
This isn’t a criticism of recruiters, it’s simply how the arrangement works, and pretending otherwise leads to disappointment. A recruiter without a live mandate that fits you has little reason to invest time in you, no matter how much they like you personally. The professionals who use recruiters well aren’t the ones who expect loyalty. They’re the ones who make themselves genuinely useful to the recruiter, memorable, well-prepared, occasionally a source of referrals, so that when the right mandate does appear, they’re the first call.
Recruiters are one channel among many, not a substitute for your own search. Treat them accordingly and you’ll get more from the relationship, not less.
Action Steps
- Identify the recruiters most active in your specific niche and get on their radar early, before you need them urgently.
- Send a genuine referral to a recruiter when you can, even if it doesn’t benefit you directly. It’s one of the fastest ways to become memorable to them.
- Never wait on a recruiter relationship alone. Keep your own search running at full speed in parallel.
In2Win! Afterthought
Curt’s current observations and updated guidance will be added here.
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