Transcript - Episode 001 - Listening
Episode 001
Listening Through Frustration
Hi, I’m Daava Mills, the Rebellious Recruiter. I’ve been in the trenches of finding people for 20 years. I’ve experienced frustrated candidates at every stage of the game, and every level of service. I’ve had successes, I’ve made mistakes, and I’ve discovered some great people when I just listened, and when I defied best practices.
Let’s chat.
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Frustration is one of the most visible issues that candidates bring with them to the application, the interview, and sometimes to the job.
Today we’ll explore the causes of frustration at each step of the game, and what processes you can put in place to identify, understand, and deal with the frustration of the candidate and new employee. This episode focuses on high level information. In the coming weeks we'll be taking deeper dives into specific aspects of this information.
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If you looked for a professional job 30 years ago, you printed up your resume on Ivory or Bright White paper, almost as thick as poster board. You went through your local newspaper, made a list of the companies you were most interested in based on a short 5 line ad. Donned a suit, popped your resume copies into a brief case, and headed out. Each company you went to, you spoke with a receptionist, you left your resume at the front desk for the hiring manager. Some receptionists would hand you an application, which you would spend 15 minutes, using your best penmanship to fill out. And sometimes, if you were lucky, the hiring manager came to the front desk to look you in the eye and size you up. You’d be called back for an interview. A week later, you’d be called back for a second interview. They’d like you. Your references would be handed over. They’d be called. You’d get the job. If you didn’t, a very nice letter would be printed up, and mailed to your home. You’d repeat this scenario, until you landed a position.
Then faxes became more accessible, and for a few bucks you could go to a local packaging store and send off a carefully crafted cover letter, and resume, and game was modified. Then email was accessible. Then came TheMonsterBoard.com. The game started changing, rapidly. Candidates could post their resumes to the board, and be contacted by multiple employers, as well as email their resume to hundreds of employers, in a few days-time. This huge initial push over the boards and email happened during a recession, so people were applying all over the country.
During this recession, employers were overwhelmed with resumes, most of which were not qualified. Employers would email rejection notices, candidates would email back irate responses. I actually had one response where the guy told me he was going to be homeless. I sent him back some sound resume advice, and he told me my advice was no good because his resume was written by a Cambridge grad.
Enter the notorious ATS, Applicant Tracking System. ATS’s slowly became like artificial intelligence. And just like 30 years ago, it takes time to fill out an application, this one is just on-line and uses a strong copy and paste strategy. So here we are, 30 years later. No longer is filling out 5 applications in a full day activity, it can be done to completion in a couple hours. In this day and age of immediate needs, filling out an application takes precious time, and feels archaic. Rejection notices are sent from an email that no-one mans, so no one has to read the irate responses.
This new culture requires access to information, immediate response, and lots of reassurance to the candidate.
And the process has not really caught up to the current range of expectations. Why? Because we're using a process developed by Baby Boomers, on platforms designed by Generation X, and hiring the largest segment of our workforce which is Millennials. No wonder we're frustrated!
So, this process right now? It looks more like this.
The candidate has listened to friends and family and has crafted a resume they are proud of. But candidates rarely hire resume writers anymore, and no one has been taught the fine art of resume writing as part of skills training in high school. So it’s really not that good. Then the employer, and sometimes Key Word programmed Applicant Tracking System, you're looking for something specific. It’s nuts really, gone are the days where being an accountant, dressed nice, good handshake, and solid, non-job-hopper experience, landed you an interview, and a 20% chance at a job offer. Now that same accountant has to have a keyword rich resume, applying company specific information into a semi-customized resume, with lots of numbers, percentages, and ratios. There is an untrained talent acquisition professional on the other end, often a recent college grad looking to be an HR pro, or an overworked office manager, making decisions without all the information or knowledge on what the job entails… this is not their fault. And sometimes, oftentimes really, rejecting perfectly qualified candidates, for unknown reasons. Ultimately the resume overwhelmed manager offers the job to the production manager’s son’s best friend, because they are smart, and can learn.
Enter the frustrated candidate.
With all the unspoken rules, some real, some made up, can you blame a someone for entering a job search with trepidation and a little cynicism? I don’t. Best practice tells us to send them a polite "thanks but no thanks" note. But that note? Just breeds a systemic issue, that is deep in our culture thanks to being overwhelmed by applications.
So why does this happen?
The first time in a hiring process that you’ll see a frustrated candidate is caused by how you require them to jump through hoops during the application process. But unless you’ve spent a lot of time creating an online environment that attracts people, and passively developing emotional capital with potential applicants, you haven’t done much to earn their time and energy. This process is a give and take, and you the employer need to give before you take. You may require a cover letter, and unless you create a space online with a lot of available information specific to your culture. No, not the fluffy stuff about your culture. The hard-hitting stuff about your culture… Unless you make yourself vulnerable as a company you won’t see anything special. It’s hard for the candidate to put special and specific information in their cover letter if there is no information for them to relate to on your website or social media feed. Let me be clear. If you should not require the candidate to blindly throw at a target and hold them accountable to rules that are unwritten, unspoken, and specific to you, unless you've built out your website to talk about the nuances of your culture. At the very least the ad should have some interesting information beyond company provided snacks and bubbly water, put strategically placed in your employment ad.
Do you play rock music loudly over lunch? Put that in the ad. Do you have a culture of getting answers now? Put that in the ad. Do you believe people should spend no longer than 10 minutes looking for a piece of information before asking for help? Put that in the ad. Do you need help crafting a better employment part of your website? Put that in the ad. Okay, I jest (sorta). But the point remains. People need to see a real vulnerable picture of what your company is about before making a decision to apply. And advertising that you can't do it all? That's the first step. It also gives them the benefit of understanding the target they are now aiming for.
The next potential time you’ll see a frustrated candidate is the face to face interview. You may catch them fighting an eye roll. If that happens, do this.
1. Set down your pen, close your laptop. Basically, stop taking notes.
2. Call them out, politely, on what you see. “Hey there Mr. Candidate, it looks like this job search process has been a bear. Tell me what’s been going on for you.”
3. Listen. I mean really listen. Watch them. Engage. Ask question about the jobs they missed out on, and what they think happened.
A couple different things will become readily apparent. You either have a perpetual Negative Nelly on your hands, who is probably not someone you want on the team. Or, you have a broken optimist. Broken Optimists can easily be brought back around.
How do you know you have a Broken optimist? Their history for why they are job searching will tell you. Why did they leave their last job, what were they hoping to achieve, what was the company that broke their heart. During this 10 or 15 minute segue you will be building emotional capital. This emotional capital is important for 2 reasons.
1. If the person is ultimately right for your team, you have earned their loyalty, respect, and trust.
2. If the person isn’t right for the team, they will remember that you took time for them, and keep your company on their radar, either for another job for them, or for one of their pals.
Emotional capital is REQUIRED if you want to build a passive applicant pool, and this is a step in the process.
What is emotional capital? It's the act of filling their emotional bank account without you expecting anything in return. It's a five-minute act of hope. Yes, it takes time, but it's a reputation builder.
Let me take a couple minutes and tell you a story. I am using his real name, because there is an industry article about this gentleman, I’ve put the link to the article in the show notes.
I was asked to speak to a group of homeless veterans about how to craft a good resume. In this group of soldiers, airmen, sailors, and marines, there was one person in particular that stood out. This guy was a dessert storm veteran. When he left the military he moved to Mexico and became a master diver. He did that for many years, until a life change brought him to Oregon. The job in Oregon disappeared upon his arrival, and he soon found himself homeless.
He stood out because he was borderline rude, actually he was rude, he rolled his eyes, was constantly on the verge of arguing with me, and always asking questions that were one or two slides in advance of where I was in my presentation. And I saw through the façade right away. No, actually… he annoyed the crap out of me, and who wouldn’t be? This guy was actively punching holes in my presentation. And making me check my information for accuracy. He exhausted me.
But I got home, reflected, and I was impressed. This guy had smarts. I mean, he was always two slides ahead of my presentation. So, I checked with one of my hiring managers about a specific position that we had open, it wasn’t critical to fill immediately, we were waiting for the right person. This position required a certain physical strength, a lot of intelligence, ability to do math, read blue-prints, build scaffolding. You get the picture. Anyway, the manager said "Yup, still looking for someone." I called my rep at the shelter and inquired about the “Diver” that was looking. “Oh, you mean Jeff! I’ll have him call you.”
A little while later a somewhat sheepish voice comes on the phone. It was Jeff. He wanted to know why I was calling, I told him about the job. He responded “Are you offering me a job?” I said “No, I am offering you an interview.” This is an important nuance, recruiters don't offer jobs. They offer interviews. I was not a decision maker. I was more like a wild mustang wrangler, bring them to the pen, and let the trainer pick out the best of the bunch. I'd set the rest free.
Anyway, he showed up the next day for the interview, again a little reserved. Mostly, because he knew how he treated me during the process, which he had brought up to me when we were on our phone call. I had told him that it was okay, I worked in a shipyard, I was used to hard core personalities. Side note: I loved that place.
Jeff had a 15-minute interview, which was a long interview for this particular manager, as most his interviews only lasted 5 minutes. He was offered a job a couple hours later. Got drug tested the next day, and within a few days he was outfitted with PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) and was learning the ropes.
My employer gained a loyal, smart, committed, and engaged employee. Who was not rude or argumentative. He just had to release his pent-up frustration around the frustration of scoring jobs. And can you blame him? Had I not listened, and just shut him down, he’d probably be somewhere unhappy, unfulfilled, and still argumentative.
Finally, what happens if you hire a person, and they are still frustrated? Or you hire a person and they become frustrated right at the first day. I would hope that doesn’t happen, but it does. I know for me personally, I’ve messed up, and I’ve seen disastrous first days, but I’ve learned, boy have I learned.
The first days get a lot smoother if you have the ability to delegate to a lower team member. Have the delegate get their desk ready. If you can give that delegate a budget per new hire, even if it’s 10 dollars, do it. Make sure the desk is clean, and there is a standard of pens, pencils, various tablet types, and clean drawers. Let your delegate be creative on what they put on the desk for the person. Maybe it’s a new coffee mug, with a candy bar, and some funky sticky notes with a nice personalized note. Or maybe a few personalized notes from the team. The effort speaks loud, so don’t miss that. As you grow and your company budget grows, so will your welcome package. I used to have 50 dollars a person, and I got creative based on who the new hire was. For instance: I hired a guy who had been an LDS missionary (I knew this from specific wording on his resume), and through the interview process I learned he sunburned easily. Armed with that information, he got a shirt and a baseball cap, but he did not get a coffee mug. Most new employees there got a coffee traveler and a shirt. Tying in a little of who they are, really plays out well. And changing it is fun, as it causes natural conversation among team members about what they got their first day.
If it’s not in your culture to do welcome gifts, don’t worry about it, just get the desk clean, and free of dust bunnies behind the monitor. This next part is even more important.
Make sure in orientation you reiterate the company values, and how they play out in day to day expectations of the company interactions and the position specifically. Give examples of how this information will be crossed referenced in evaluations. Hint: evaluations don’t have to be formal for this to work. Reinforce information, tell the new hire the values you saw displayed in them through the interview process and how that led to them getting a job with your company. Basically, reinforce, reinforce, and reinforce some more. The first day doesn’t have to be perfect, the coffee mug may have been forgotten, there were dust bunnies behind the monitor, but you can still continue to build that emotional capital for the person to understand their path with the company.
If you’ve done everything right, and a person is still frustrated after all this, it’s not you. I promise you. They have deep seeded issues that are better dealt with through your EAP, or at another company with another boss.
That's it for today. I hope you can use some of the tools we spoke about. Try out one or two methodologies and report back what happened.
To revisit what we spoke about today.
1. At the application level don’t expect candidates to act like you’re special, without giving them necessary ammunition to treat you like you’re special.
2. At the interview level, should they be frustrated, stop the process, ask questions, and listen.
3. During orientation, it doesn’t take extra money to reinforce the values you see the candidate has, and how they align with the company. Everything else is just the cherry on the sundae.
Put these processes in place, and see what happens on your team.
And that’s a wrap for today on the topic of Listening Through Frustration.
As always, I’ll be bringing you new information weekly. Be sure to subscribe wherever you are listening to this. Feel free to comment, rate, and review what you hear. Share this podcast with other leaders that may be building “out of this world teams.” You can email me with your thoughts or questions. I may use your subject matter in upcoming shows.
It’s great to meet you and thank you for listening. I know you only have so many hours in the week, and I am grateful to spend this time with you. Until then, make it a great day! See you on the flip side.