Amitai Givertz’s Recruitomatic Blog

I having nothing to add to a recent post by Michael Specht: Tips for virtual conference attendance. He says it all. I just hope ERE are taking note. Onrec and LRP too.

Listen to Joel Cheesman’s podcast with HotJobs’ Dan Finnigan and you’ll hear an interesting take on what is around the corner for job seekers who want relevancy to spice up their search experience.

HotJobs’ new strategy is very interesting but raises a number of questions. For example, If Merrill Lynch favor Monster.com as their job board of choice – I think that is fair to say – how would HotJobs win their business when the potential exists to have their postings returned in the context of today’s news of a three million dollar award against them for defaming a fired employee? Of course, this would not be just a problem for HotJobs and Merrill Lynch alone, but any job board and advertiser that decided they wanted to “enrich” the candidate experience.

Just a thought.

In a comment made by Yvonne LaRose – who gives career and executive recruiting advice on her splendid site – she asks who came up with the idea of an icon for the Blog Swap.

Using an icon or logo for the Blog Swap bloggers was not my idea. However, I believe that I did invent the term “blog-bling” used in my post Spin the Bottle. The term describes the use of a (prized) icon to adorn one’s blog and to authenticate a claim to blogebrity status. In my post, I linked to Blogebrity.com which makes blog-bling available for their list of celebs. I am sure that my references to blog-bling had no bearing on the decision to revisit a means of letting those of you not included in the Blog Swap know that you are among a group of, well, elite bloggers.

My mother used to say: “The true test of a good idea is the number of people who have the same idea independently of you.“ For the record: my mother invented maternal love and my father invented Duraglit. Neither was ever credited for their remarkable contributions to humanity, even to the extent that they themselves did not refute the widely held opinion – among family at least – that I was a self-centered bastard. Herein are my two primary motives for claiming the term blog-bling as my very own creation.

As a part of my overall strategy for promoting my own blogebrity status, I will be adding blog-bling on Wikipedia with a link back to this very page. That way Mother, Father and their favorite son can be memorialized long after the bling has blong.  Also, I will be applying to be considered for inclusion to Blogebrity.com’s “A list.” That, too is, I believe, my birthright.

Please, if you can find an example or the reference to the use of the term “blog-bling” in any publication prior to my own, would you be nice enough to reply to this post and let me know? That way, anyone who had the same idea, independently of me, can be tracked down and scrutinized appropriately.

Thank you for your continued support and for reading my blog. For those of you who missed it, here is this week’s most read post: Possibility Recruiting.

Yesterday, I posted Sex, Lies & Politics: Welcome to SHRM. In my post, I referenced a commentary by Your HR Guy: When it rains, it pours. He commented. I commented. We left it at that. Hold that thought.

After listening to Joel Cheesman’s podcast with HotJobs’ Dan Finnigan – or is it Finnegan? Joel, you should check your spelling and issue an immediate apology – I revisited Your HR Guy’s original post to see who had commented further. It was late in the day and my mind was somewhat muddled having tried to decipher the meaning behind all the comments on MySpace Vs LinkedIn and trying to understand in the same stream of consciousness why JobCentral would be underwriting Joel’s promotion of HotJobs. Maybe it’s a thesis, antithesis, synthesis kind of a thing. Or, perhaps Joel is trying to give us a peek under the kimono using HotJobs as shill for his own SEO/relevancy master plan. Joel is far cleverer than his pretty looks would suggest.

And then, one of my finer caffeine induced shockers – I actually started to piece it all together. At least in mind I did:

Read the rest here »

As a professional body, the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) does a respectable job of representing the HR community to its various constituents, and there are many. As well as providing education and networking for its members and the community-at-large, SHRM plays a political role lobbying government. SHRM also provides important research that helps us to understand and shape the future for our industry. SHRM does good things. Don’t be surprised then, if you die and go to heaven, to find a SHRM chapter there.

I know there will be a lot said, reported, written and blogged about the SHRM Annual Conference and Exposition in Washington, D.C. this week and next. No doubt, much of it will be useful, as will the actual event for those who are surviving the rain. Some of it, no doubt, will be crushingly boring and trivial. I suggest that anyone who wants to make an impact with their commentaries on SHRM, and be heard above the inevitable din, should inject a little of what we all secretly want to know about: sex and scandal.

Read the rest here »

Whether you like it or not, recruiters who are believers, agnostics or atheists are all bound by forces at work which are beyond our comprehension, benevolent forces that make effective recruiting possible. Unbelievable? Consider this:

When running an ad or posting, more often than not we are actually deploying a strategy called “hope and pray.” If we are absolutely certain that the ad or posting will generate the desired result – a hire – that’s called “blind faith.” I have seen many instances where “blind faith” has been applied despite the cautionary words, “Don’t do that. It’ll never work.” In those instances where a hire was made, I have heard the soothsayers then say, “Well, I’ll be damned.”  Conversely, when “hope and pray” fails, I have heard things like, “What have I done to deserve this?” as if the failed sourcing strategy is, indeed, some kind of karmic retribution.

Instances of “hope and pray” abound. Look at the classifieds, think about the readership and demographics, and it is obviously at work among the notices for Sarbanes-Oxley or Six Sigma, for example. Interestingly enough, for these extremely challenging searches, the number of ads appearing for third-party recruiters beautifully illustrates how “hope and pray” can, with the intervention of a shaman, become indistinguishable from “blind faith.” News flash: I don’t know of anyone in recent memory who has hired these skill sets from an ad in the classifieds – in print or online. If you do, please let me know.  I’m documenting recruiting miracles for a new book.

Similarly, it could be argued that postings are more like opium for the masses than an effective means to drive candidate flow. Most postings for trades, for example, rely on some kind of divine intervention. After all, with nothing to distinguish one posting from another, getting a plumber to pick one among the thousands of openings, and apply, is a little bit like hoping for the Chosen One to show up on your doorstep. And, when the Chosen One comes, and when the Chosen One clicks, what does the Chosen One find? Any employer branding or other signs of wonders? No. A value proposition, maybe? No. A compelling call to action? No. News flash: When the good book said: “Watch and pray for I shall come like a thief in the night,” it didn’t mean post your jobs as if He is one, if you see what I mean. The principles of good recruitment marketing apply equally to skilled workers as it does to top-flight talent.

Realizing this, we should consider abandoning the old rituals of recruitment advertising and consider a more enlightened approach. The scarcity of candidates only exists in the God-forsaken places that have proved a wasteland for most recruiters – traditional print and job boards. There is an abundance of available talent that exists for every recruiter who is prepared to embrace a world of “possibility recruiting.”  Possibility recruiting assumes that one can internalize a problem and draw on the creative forces that can manifest themselves in practical solutions. Here’s how it could work:

I heard of a recruiter who went through the horrors of recruiting skilled trades for the construction industry. I don’t know where this was exactly but the usual strategies of “hope and pray” and “blind faith” left this recruiter struggling to find the meaning of life. A voice said, “Seek and ye shall find.”  And that’s exactly what she did.  And this is what she found:

Tradespeople eat breakfast on the trot in greater numbers than they read the help-wanted ads. Very few fire up the wireless to look for jobs online. They don’t need to. They can move from contract to contract, site to site, and get a job anywhere because they know better than anyone – there aren’t enough of them to go around. But they do need nosh. And cash. With a newfound appreciation for what targeted recruiting is all about, the recruiter took her money and invested it in placemat advertising. Her ad was fairly large; the real estate was fairly cheap. The ad read: “Need extra cash? Send me an electrician, a plumber or carpenter I can hire and I’ll give you $30.00. If I do hire them, I’ll give you $300.00 more.” Did it work? It doesn’t matter. What matters is that the possibility exists that it could. That’s the point.

Schneider National knows all about possibility recruiting. They have been desperate to recruit truckers for the longest time. Columns and columns of help-wanted ads are producing a diminishing return. Postings are working a little better. Possibility recruiting leads Schneider National to consider alternatives. Example: USA TODAY covers the same geographic footprint as 814 national newspapers. It has a readership of around 248,000 drivers, truckers and related workers in transportation and materials handling. It is read on the road at truck stops, in motels and other places where truckers hang out.  That makes its targeted audience and distribution equal to the industry rag, The Trucker, and for national coverage, a drop in the bucket compared to the outrageous per-column-inch rates the classifieds demand. So, for a fraction of the cost, employment branding and targeted recruiting can be delivered to passive candidates as well as active job seekers. Did it work for Schneider? It doesn’t matter. What matters is that the possibility existed that it could. That’s the point.

So, how are you going to apply possibility recruiting in your search for talent? You might think this approach is bunk and I will not try to persuade you otherwise. Possibility recruiting relies more on faith and inner strength than white papers and recruitment technology. But if you’re going to revert to “hope and pray” and “blind faith” alone, I hope and pray you find what you are looking for – and in great abundance. Have a nice day! 

Yesterday I erroneously stated that Joel Cheesman was planning to auction his SHRM shirt(s) on eBay. This is not true. The post has been corrected to reflect what I should have said which was that that was my speculation only.

I unreservedly apologize to Joel and to anyone who took me too seriously.

It occurred to me that waiting for Mr. Cheesman to answer the questions posed in my recent post, Cheezhead: Mastermind or Millionaire? may be like waiting to get my money back from Messrs. Lay and Skilling. What with the impending distractions of SHRM and having to champion the cause for 25% of the Fortune 500, I realize we might be in for a long wait.

I suspect the T-shirts which Joel will be wearing at SHRM will – upon his triumphant return – be auctioned on eBay, further delaying the unfolding of the future of online recruiting.

Joel: I know that you are busy, busy, busy. I got your email. But in the overall scheme of things, do you believe that hobnobbing at SHRM is more important than enlightening us on what your vision of the future of online recruiting will look like?

If you cannot reply, I understand. I am already resigned to an absurdly long wait. Perhaps there are some pretenders out there who feel sufficiently powerful to answer in your stead.

Nah. Impossible.

Suppressing the news is nothing new. As one of the most active members of the Wobblies in England I learned back in the 70's the government and it's agents will stop at nothing to suppress the truth. I published my post The Double Agent. Hacking into my computer and changing the time of my post to have it appear at the bottom of the feeds is typical. Paranoid? I don't think so.

Dave Lefkow posted a great diversity recruiting story, saying there are great lessons for employers to be learned from the FBI’s diversity outreach. He’s right. But the warm fuzzies promised in the casual introduction to “Jericka Robinson. Mother, computer engineer, FBI special agent” are an unwitting peddling of Washington spin. Worse, we could all be innocently drawn into a wider conspiracy, a cover-up. Let me explain:

I quote Dave quoting from the original article:

“A recruitment poster on the FBI’s Web site tells a new story, with a picture of a black woman and the words: Jericka Robinson. Mother, computer engineer, FBI special agent. Today’s FBI. It’s for you. Visit FBIjobs.com.”

Well, I have it from a reliable source from within law enforcement circles that Ms. Robinson was – until recently at least – Supervisory Special Agent Jericka Robinson of the FBI’s Personnel Resources Unit. In other words, Ms. Robinson is literally a poster child for the FBI’s diversity program and not necessarily a result of it. Of course, it is possible that Ms. Robinson has been reassigned from an elite group of Glock-toting recruiters to an equally elite group of key-tapping computer engineers. Why not? It seems like a natural transition for a black working mother working her way round the Beltway, doesn’t it? If this extraordinary reassignment is for real, the FBI would be better served promoting itself as a champion of talent management. If they are capable of leveraging their human capital at a time when recruitment funding is being held at levels that would cripple any employer in the private sector, then there are lessons there we could all learn from.

Let’s look beyond Dave’s post for the real lessons here:

1. Metrics: We do not have enough data to draw any meaningful conclusions. However, I would submit that if only 18.8% of Special Agents are women, then the numbers do not support the notion that the FBI’s outreach is working. A spokeswoman for the FBI quoted in Dave’s post (who for all we know could be white) says: “There are no targets or quotas.” Then performance metrics for the FBI, like gender, is a “non-issue.” Good. No harm done.

2. Diversity Recruiting: The FBI used to be highly visible in print – even dominant. As far as I can see, they have gone undercover. I have long lauded LawEnforcmentJobs.com and the diversity sites that that engine powers as the best destinations for recruiters looking to attract qualified diversity candidates. Nada. On DiversityInc.com, another old stomping ground, the only sign of the FBI is the moonlighting it does for Fortune 500 companies. I found the CIA and NSA on LatPro, but, again, no FBI. Will the Men (or Women) in Black please stand up!

3. Employer Branding: Employer branding is not like product branding. It’s something that exists in the minds of stakeholders and constituents. It cannot be manufactured or even manipulated as such. Your brand exists – like it or not. If effectively managed, employer branding can be a tremendous contributing factor to optimizing the return on all recruitment marketing, including, of course, diversity. 9/11 did more to change the perception of law enforcement as a career prospect than years of trying by the FBI, NYPD, LAPD to transform a less than glamorous image. And the FBI, like all the agencies who saw demand for specialized talent skyrocket, missed a golden opportunity. Unfortunately, the whistleblowers will be remembered long after the FBI’s horn-tooting for an inclusive workforce. I say the FBI has really blown it. They should have looked to the gal next door and taken a page out of Condi’s book.

4. Sourcing Strategies: I know from past experience recruiting talent fluent in Pashto, Farsi, Swahili, Arabic and all dialects of Chinese is a cake walk. Russian and Chechen – old hat. You just run a few 4×6 ads in the Boston Globe (preferably with half of that ad taken up with a photo of a real diversity phenom.) and hey-presto! Yiddish-speaking mashuganas start clogging up your ATS. Today, the only ads you’re likely to see are band-aids put out by the field in support of their local initiatives comprised mostly of career fairs for students.

5. Screening and assessment: Here the agency scores big time. If you have the hard skills, can pass the physical and have never been caught chopping down cherry trees, you’ll get put through the FBI grinder. It doesn’t matter if you are a white male lawyer, accountant or cop, black working mother or Jewish Rastafarian, get this far in the process and the FBI does not discriminate. Scientifically developed staffing assessments to guide employee selection decisions – what a concept. For those of you who recruit salespeople, another lesson learned: polygraph your applicants.

6. The Special-Special Agent: You can train a man or woman to withstand psychological and physical torture. You can train them in the ways of the Ninja. You can arm them with sophisticated weaponry and state of the art surveillance equipment. But that doesn’t mean you can expect that person, however well-intentioned, to be an effective recruiter. When recruiting is relegated to being a second-rate desk-job, it’s not recruiting anymore. Sorry.

7. Retention: I used to see huge ads for Special Agents run in national papers with a TTY number as one of the response mechanisms. This is true. Polygraph me. I’m told that the prognosis for an Agent who can’t hear the words, “Incoming!” and “Duck!” is not good. Otherwise, the FBI could be a job for life. If you don’t meet the rigorous requirements for work in the field, you can join as a recruiter and end up in programming, or forensics, or business management. That kind of career progression speaks volumes, even to the hard of hearing.

But hold on! Hold on for just one cotton-pickin’ minute… Could it be? None of this is the FBI’s fault?

The FBI does a stand-up job under extraordinarily difficult (staffing) circumstances. That is an irrefutable fact. They should be commended for not giving up however tough the going gets. But, if there is one agency that should be held to account for the FBI’s failed diversity recruiting, it should be the Bernard Hodes Group. In my opinion – and no, I don’t know it all, and yes, there are always two sides to a story – in recent years Hodes has squandered what little money the FBI did have and left their diversity recruiting efforts – even on a continuing resolution (read: no commissions) – wasted. What’ll be next? Pawning the jewels in the FBI’s crown – the real gems like Jericka Robinson? You guys really rock.

HR Guy: I read your post Announcement: Resume Workshop and would like to comment.

Increasingly I find it difficult to suggest practical uses for resumes. I have come to view them as problematic on a number of levels and look forward to the day that the Curriculum Vitae will go the same way as the Didus Ineptus.

I am aware that resumes continue to be a sort of currency in some circles and that too much criticism may draw more ire than interest. But for something that justifies such huge investments of time, money and effort for an ROI measured in piles and piles of paper that end up on managers’ desks gathering dust, and eventually, at best, shredded to make bedding for hamsters and defecating puppies, I have to question what is really going on. Don’t you?

The real rant for me is this: it’s not that resumes can be used to pervert the truth or skew meaningful data; it’s not that resumes fill applicant tracking systems and slow search engines to a crawl; its not that entire industries have been built on subjective views being expressed as objective facts. And it’s not that we have institutionalized navel contemplation.  My overriding problem is that most everything to do with resumes is fundamentally flawed. Otherwise, how is it they draw so much comment?

In the interests of full disclosure: I am a consumer and trader in resumes and human souls. That’s not an apology. It’s a fact. Like you, HR Guy, I’m a recruiter. Good luck.

"TV is really in the gutter these days". Ain't that a fact.

I’ve followed Joel Cheesman’s blog for two years or so now. I have learned a lot and some of my clients have benefited from what Joel promotes and shares. So, before getting to the nitty-gritty Joel, you are, indeed, the big cheese.

Back in the 70’s and in England I used to look forward to one show in particular: Mastermind. The game had a set complete with black leather chair and spotlight which no doubt inspired the set of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. On Mastermind the contestant would be interrogated by a stoic Magnus Magnusson.  First round: questions about the contestants' topic of specialization. Round two: general knowledge.

The subjects that a Mastermind contestant could pick for themselves to be quizzed on in round one were so obscure that the limited number of possible questions, and therefore high probability of a correct answer, gave that contestant the immediate credibility of being an "expert" and, of course, the early advantage of a high score. Well, when I came across Joel and his blog, and because I didn't know any better I guess, I had to put “Search Engine Optimization and Marketing for Human Resources” and “Online Recruitment Search Engine Strategies” in the same Mastermind categories as “The Life Cycle of the Honeybee” and “The Six Wives of Henry VIII”. 

Seriously, Joel, few would question your expertise or that you’ve piled on a great score but can you help with some general knowledge now?

1. What evidence is there that job boards are struggling to reinvent their old-web architecture and applications to better compete in a Web 2.0 world?

2. I don’t know whether their strategic partnerships, product realignment, brand equity, customer loyalty, gobs of cash and/or job seeker naivety will continue to keep the big boards relevant in the next five years or if they can – or even want to – transcend their URLs. What do you say?

3. With the commoditization of resumes in our industry, job boards still have the juice, right? We might not like the idea of being dependent on a foreign detractor for oil, but hey, we’ve got to play nice (and keep posting our jobs) until the ethanol comes on tap, don’t we? 

4. If the answer is, “No”, what exactly is your prescriptive for resume-guzzling employers who are a) largely beyond the influence of industry thought-leaders and innovations in the online recruiting space; b) typically slow to adopt new technologies, methodologies and non-resume based approaches to candidate sourcing?

5. If we follow the emerging alternatives to resume databases – LinkedIn, ZoomInfo and Jobster for example – at what point do you think their offerings will have the same level of acceptance as the big boards do today? Are these next-generation services likely to get the job done when the acceleration of emerging technologies and internet use may be their real nemesis?

6. HRSEO theory and practice assumes that recruiters (as a body) would still prefer that candidates come find them rather than having to go looking for the talent themselves. Is this true?

7. Can you predict the catalysts and timing for the eventual demise of job boards as we know them? If so, what are/will be the tell-tale signs?

8. Two of Henry's wives were executed and two were divorced. One wife died. Which wife survived the king?

Joel, I know this is a lot to ask and you may have already answered these questions in previous posts. If so, please point our readers in the right direction. Alternatively, maybe we could use one of your Lifelines? How about "Ask the Audience?"