Technical recruiters become a scapegoat whenever a startup or company isn’t able to close a candidate or isn’t generating a pipeline of applicants. But its actually not entirely a recruiters fault. While sourcing candidates is the primary responsibility of recruiters they are only effective if founders have done the following:
- Set a compelling vision for their company and are actually executing on it.
- Clearly defined positions with reasonable expectations of skills and experience levels.
- Have enough materials (an online presence being the key ingredient) that are easily accessible for a candidate to get a sense of the company.
Meanwhile closing a candidate is completely the responsibility of a founder, CEO, or whomever the hiring manager is. Here are some common mistakes that these folks commit when closing a candidate:
- Not crafting a compelling close which includes reiterating the vision of the company and how the candidate would be integral to bringing it to reality. This cannot be canned close! It has be tailored to the skills and experience the candidate would bring to the company!
- Extending an offer that gives a candidate less than a 3 days to decide. While most people think you need a forcing function, getting someone to commit their livelihood to you for a long term requires careful thought on their part.
- Coming off too eager. This is a side effect of fawning over a candidate, which happens when people are so desperate for help they make the candidate seem like they are in need of a savior.
Setting a recruiter up for success not only means thinking about the above but the doing the following as well:
- Having a clear and consistent process during the interview. Everyone who is conducting the interview needs to know this process. While their screening techniques and questions might vary they all need to buy-in to a common process.
- Putting yourself in the candidates shoes. There might even be subtle cues that you are giving to candidates, that you don’t realize. Like if you’re trying to hire a woman and there is only a men’s bathroom nearby. (I know seems obvious, but happens more often than you think!)
Finally, most recruiters are great at collecting feedback from candidates because they care about working with your company and helping to build it, make sure you haven’t disregarded it!
If you want to learn more recruiting strategies come to my talk at General Assembly in San Francisco on Novemer 12th: Keys to Attracting Top Technical Talent.
