• 
• Training
• Consulting
• Resources
• Events
• About Us
• Store

• » Articles
• › The Official Rules for Hiring Top Talent
• › Newsletters

Articles - Recruiter Hot Tips

RSS Feed

Hot Tip #29 - Humongous Techniques to Boost Your Recruitment Advertising Efforts

Lou Adler, September 18, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiter Training, Recruiting, Sourcing

I've just finished reading Dan and Chip Heath's Made to Stick - Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. This is a great book on marketing and how to influence others, and many of the ideas can be directly applied to recruiting in general and recruitment advertising in particular. When you combine this with Hire With Your Head you'll be finding more top candidates and making more placements before the week is out.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #29 - Humongous Techniques to Boost Your Recruitment Advertising Efforts"

Hot Tip #28 - The Anatomy of a Great Ad

Lou Adler, September 11, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiter Training, Sourcing

If you want to attract top people online, your ads need to be outrageous, compelling and found. To prove it we're launching our first annual outrageous ad writing contest. To win a fully-paid scholarship to Recruiter Boot Camp Online (a $1200 value!) you need to follow these guidelines on how to write and post ads that really pull in top people. We'll also award a second scholarship if you can get better results doing it a different way, but I personally wouldn't waste my time. With that said, here's the template we've used to write ads to successfully attract great candidates from entry-level to executive.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #28 - The Anatomy of a Great Ad"

Hot Tip #27 - Double Your Placement Rate in Half the Time

Lou Adler, August 28, 2007

Topics: Interviewing, Networking, Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiting, Sourcing

Let's start by identifying some of the biggest yield losses in the recruiting process and begin improving these. Starting with the worst, here are just basic metrics you might want to consider to achieve our goal:

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #27 - Double Your Placement Rate in Half the Time"

Hot Tip #26 - A Partial List of the Ten Commandments of Recruiting Passive Candidates

Lou Adler, August 21, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiter Training, Recruiting, Sourcing

There's a great article about recruiting in the September 2007 issue of Fast Company - "The Inevitability Of $300 Socks." Actually, it has nothing to do with recruiting unless you read between the lines. And what a great story is told between those lines! Chip and Dan Heath, the authors of the business best seller Made to Stick - Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, make the point in their article that some basic products attain premium pricing when they're seen as ideas rather than mere commodities. The Heaths cite alcohol, jeans and spa treatments as idea-based products and oil changes and fax machines as idea-free. You obtain premium pricing and margins with idea-based products and basic market returns with basic commodities

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #26 - A Partial List of the Ten Commandments of Recruiting Passive Candidates"

Hot Tip #25 - A Partial List of the Ten Commandments of Recruiting Passive Candidates

Lou Adler, August 14, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiter Training, Recruiting, Sourcing

Here's a modified version of an earlier article that's worth considering today more than ever. Over my 25 years of recruiting experience, I've learned a few important principles about how to effectively recruit passive candidates. Most were learned by trial and error, and while they might not all be applicable to your specific situation, collectively they offer a pretty decent road map of what it takes to hire more top passive candidates on a consistent basis. Here are the first five of my favorite ten commandants for recruiting passive candidates. The next five will be covered in next week's Hot Tip article.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #25 - A Partial List of the Ten Commandments of Recruiting Passive Candidates"

Hot Tip #24 - These Six Techniques Can Improve Your Productivity by 100%!

Lou Adler, August 7, 2007

Topics: Assessment, Interviewing, Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiting, Sourcing

Most recruiters waste too much time doing unnecessary work. The solution is not reducing your req load, it's cutting your sendouts/hire in half. This will increase your productivity by 100%. In the process you'll start hiring more people who are top performers, but not great interviewers, and you'll stop hiring people who are great interviewers, but not top performers. Here's how to pull off this amazing feat:

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #24 - These Six Techniques Can Improve Your Productivity by 100%!"

Hot Tip #23 - How to Prep a Candidate

Lou Adler, July 31, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips

We all know that most hiring managers don't conduct broad-based, evidence-based interviews. Many base their judgments about candidate competency on some combination of first impressions, technical knowledge, academics, and smarts. One sure way to improve your hiring batting average (sendouts/hire) is to prep your candidates to cope with whatever questions or circumstances arise. If you handle the candidate prep well enough, you can also prep your clients without them even knowing it.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #23 - How to Prep a Candidate"

Hot Tip #22 - Sourcing Passive Candidates is More than Lead Generation
Are You Wasting Major Time on Minor Stuff?

Lou Adler, July 24, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

Here's my minimalist definition of sourcing: presenting qualified and interested candidates within a reasonable period of time to a hiring manager, and have 100% of them be interviewed.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #22 - Sourcing Passive Candidates is More than Lead Generation
Are You Wasting Major Time on Minor Stuff?"

Hot Tip #21 - Talent Hubs, Mashups, and Widgets

Lou Adler, July 17, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiting, Sourcing

The fundamental sourcing strategy for any major corporation should be the building of the biggest proprietary database of resumes, contacts, and leads as possible. From this database candidates should then be culled and contacted based on specific job needs. Building the database and keeping it warm are two separate tasks. For this article, let's address the building of the database.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #21 - Talent Hubs, Mashups, and Widgets"

Hot Tip #20 - Stop Googling and Start Networking

Lou Adler, July 10, 2007

Topics: Networking, Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

A piece of data worthy of note: some old friends just told us that their daughter - a very talented Gen Xer - has just joined a professional business network weeks after landing a new job. The only thing unusual about this was that she told her parents she was using this network to plant the seeds for her next job.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #20 - Stop Googling and Start Networking"

Hot Tip #19 - Passive Candidate Recruiting Requires Professionalism and Product Knowledge

Lou Adler, July 5, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

If you do any passive candidate recruiting you should go to LinkedIn.com and link to me using my lou@adlerconcepts.com email address. Of course, I won't give you a pass-through to any of my one million plus first and second degree candidates unless you clearly understand real job needs (here's an article on how to take the assignment and using performance profiles that you must read first) and have sent me a compelling email as to why this is a great job for a great person. Of course, that's not the purpose of this article, but it's a good introduction to my real point on how to contact and recruit passive candidates.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #19 - Passive Candidate Recruiting Requires Professionalism and Product Knowledge"

Hot Tip #18 - On the Sourcing Edge - New Ideas for Passive Candidate Development

Lou Adler, June 26, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

I've recently created a ning.com business networking site called Sourcing Strategy. You should join it if you want to hear about the latest techniques in Internet sourcing. We'll be using this site to share, discuss, and create some great new ways to attract top people to a company's career website. The most obvious "in your face" idea is the use of a business networking site like this one to find and recruit top talent. I suspect some recruiters are already calling other recruiters who post clever, practical, and innovative ideas. Those who philosophize and pontificate are quickly shunned.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #18 - On the Sourcing Edge - New Ideas for Passive Candidate Development"

Hot Tip #17 - Googling for Resumes Using Performance Terms

Lou Adler, June 19, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiting, Sourcing

When cold-calling passive candidates or searching for names, lists, and resumes on line, I make a point to maximize my time by only talking with high performers. This way, even if these people are not perfect for the assignment at hand, they know other top performers who are. Of course, to be a successful full-cycle recruiter you have to be very good at getting these top people to call you back, then recruiting them and then getting the referrals (we show you how to do this in Recruiter Boot Camp Online). To save time at the front end you must limit your calling to only top people. You can do this by adding recognition terms, honors, and awards into your online searches.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #17 - Googling for Resumes Using Performance Terms"

Hot Tip #16 - Six Simple Ways to Increase Interviewing Accuracy

Lou Adler, June 12, 2007

Topics: Assessment, Interviewing, Recruiter Hot Tips

1. Make sure everyone who has a vote knows the job. If an interviewer isn't sure of the real job, he'll overvalue his intuition, his perception of the job, and the candidate's first impression and communication skills to make the assessment. As a result the assessment will be about 50% accurate for a yes vote, and a bit worse on the no vote side. Interviewers need to know real job needs in order to have a chance of making the right hiring decision. I won't take an assignment unless everyone on the hiring team knows what the person taking the job needs to do to be successful. Neither should you. Preparing a performance profile with the hiring team will help.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #16 - Six Simple Ways to Increase Interviewing Accuracy"

Hot Tip #15 - The Second Part of the Two-Question Interview

Lou Adler, June 5, 2007

Topics: Interviewing, Recruiter Hot Tips

If you want to better understand a candidate's thinking, planning, and job-specific problem-solving skills, just ask this question: If you were to get this job, how would you go about solving this typical problem (describe the problem)?

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #15 - The Second Part of the Two-Question Interview"

Hot Tip #14 - Why You Should Hire People Who Are Weak Interviewers

Lou Adler, May 30, 2007

Topics: Interviewing, Recruiter Hot Tips

There is good news and some bad news on the hiring front. First, I'll give the bad news. There are three big hiring mistakes many people are now making in greater numbers than ever before:

1. Hiring someone you shouldn't have. The person interviewed well, but underperformed once on the job.


2. Not hiring a great person because the person didn't interview well. Many top performers are not great interviewers. In fact, this might be the easiest person to hire since no one wants them.


3. Not attracting a great person who did interview well. Talented people who interview well are the hardest to recruit since everyone wants to hire them.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #14 - Why You Should Hire People Who Are Weak Interviewers"

Hot Tip #13 - How to Use the Phone to Get Referrals

Lou Adler, May 22, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

I'll take Kevin Bacon's Six Degrees of Separation to a minor extreme, I suspect that with just the names on ZoomInfo, LinkedIn, or a simple Google search you are only one person removed from everyone in the country. (P.S. You can connect with me on LinkedIn using my email, lou@adlerconcepts.com. Everyone who buys my book can also connect with me and share advanced recruiting ideas like these on my Ning Recruiting Tactics site.)

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #13 - How to Use the Phone to Get Referrals"

Hot Tip #12 - Use MySpace to Get More Employee Referrals

Lou Adler, May 15, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

If you don't have a MySpace page, get one so you can see how it works. Once you have the page start linking to all of your friends, then start adding other recruiters to your Friends List. If you go to MySpace find me via email (lou@adlerconcepts.com) and send me your link, so I can add you to my Friends List. Of course, that’s not the point of this hot tip. Leveraging technology is the point.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #12 - Use MySpace to Get More Employee Referrals"

Hot Tip #11 - Time is Your Most Valuable Commodity - Don't Waste It

Lou Adler, May 8, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Recruiting

Use the idea of leveraging time to your advantage whenever a candidate decides to opt-out of your process - under the contention that your job is no better than others she's considering. Here's an example of how this scenario plays out.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #11 - Time is Your Most Valuable Commodity - Don't Waste It"

Hot Tip #10 - New Weapon Now Available to Win the Talent Wars

Lou Adler, May 1, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

Stalemate.

If every recruiter and every company builds compelling talent hubs, creates search engine optimized career sites, runs exciting ad campaigns, implements a proactive employee referral program and uses the latest name generating techniques, all you'll get are average results. With a finite supply of top people what else could you expect? Of course, if you do all of these things first, or better, you will get exceptional results for a short period of time, until diminishing returns sets in. However, there is still one weapon that is more important than all of the rest combined - that few companies use to their advantage - the hiring manager.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #10 - New Weapon Now Available to Win the Talent Wars"

Hot Tip #9 - Use the 30% PLUS Solution to Close More Deals

Lou Adler, April 24, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips

Hiring the best is getting more and more competitive. To ensure you're hiring the strongest talent available you need to plan on offering them at least a 30% increase. However, this increase doesn't need to be all compensation. From what I can tell, more candidates are shopping their offers around and accepting counter-offers. If you find yourself in this squeeze-play, you'll need to reposition your offers as more than compensation.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #9 - Use the 30% PLUS Solution to Close More Deals"

Hot Tip #8 - Don't Get Snowed by Generalities

Lou Adler, April 17, 2007

Topics: Interview Training, Interviewing, Recruiter Hot Tips

I advocate the use of a one-question performance-based interview. The essence of this is to ask candidates to describe significant projects followed-up by detailed fact-finding. If you do this type of questioning for 3-4 projects over 3-10 years you'll obtain a trend line of performance. Then compare these accomplishments to the performance profile you prepared when you took the assignment to assess job fit. The key to success here is to get details about each accomplishment, not accepting the candidate's initial responses at face value. An example best illustrates this point.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #8 - Don't Get Snowed by Generalities"

Hot Tip #7 - Problem of the Week: Hiring Managers Making Superficial Judgments.

Lou Adler, April 10, 2007

Topics: Interviewing, Recruiter Hot Tips

Last week I saw the play 12 Angry Men starring Richard Thomas and George Wendt. This is a great play to see if you want to become a better recruiter and be entertained at the same time. From a recruiting perspective, you'll quickly learn what it takes to defend your candidate from dumb decisions. This is very important if your clients or those on the interviewing team have ever made incorrect assessments using superficial information, wrong information, or on the quality of the candidate's interviewing skills.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #7 - Problem of the Week: Hiring Managers Making Superficial Judgments."

Hot Tip #6 - Problem of the Week: Candidates rejecting offers or delaying their decision

Lou Adler, April 3, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips

This week's problem is one that most recruiters experience on a regular basis - candidates either rejecting an offer outright or saying something like, "I have to think about it," after getting an offer. This problem is easy to solve - never make an offer formal until the candidate has committed to accepting it, either on-the-spot, or the next morning.

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #6 - Problem of the Week: Candidates rejecting offers or delaying their decision"

Hot Tip #5 - The Adler Group Recruiting Hot Tip of the Week - March 27, 2007

Lou Adler, March 26, 2007

Topics: Recruiter Hot Tips, Sourcing

This week's tip relates to the emergence of Google Base ads showing up more frequently in candidate searches. As you're aware (hopefully) there is an increase in candidates using Google to look for jobs before going directly to a company career site or one of the major boards. A typical string would include the job title, a location, a keyword or two and the term jobs. "Dallas jobs sales" would be a typical example. While it doesn't always happen, more and more you'll see an unusual search box appear at the top of this listing. Here's what it looks like:

» Continue reading "Hot Tip #5 - The Adler Group Recruiting Hot Tip of the Week - March 27, 2007"