A Long Overdue Recruiter's Rant - Part 2

Following on last Friday's rant, here are some case study examples to give you some insight, perhaps you can relate to my experience, or perhaps you can avoid making the same fatal mistakes as a job seeker:

CASE 1: CAN YOU ENDORSE ME?

This guy, we will call him Super Senior, So Super Senior here, sends me an invitation to connect, on October 12th, 2011, I accepted, since his profile was smart enough, and I do regularly get clients within the IT industry, and Super Senior does actually work at a Super company that I personally admire. you never know when you're going to need to consult with or recruit a Super Senior. Anyhow, Early this month, our Super Senior boy here, sends me a CAN YOU ENDORSE ME? request on LinkedIn.

The Facts again: I never met Super Senior in person, I never exchanged emails with Super Senior, I never worked with Super Senior online or offline. Yet here he was, 8 weeks later, asking for an endorsement. I mean he has presented his case and request so brilliantly, how can I refuse? so here is my Endorsement just for you Super Senior:

Super Senior Boy, is very easy going, and builds relationships quickly with total strangers, he's an asset to any team, for he's a senior process associate, way ahead of his peers, his unique Senior processing skills allow him to eliminate the natural and lengthy course of building any business relationship, he believes strongly in building trust in a matter of weeks, with minimal interaction, he is well known to cut to the chase . a go-getter and nothing will stand in his way!

Now, Do you really want to be that guy? 

Please, a pretty please decorated with dandelions, choose carefully whom you request an endorsement from.

DO Request Endorsements from:

• People you know well.
• People you worked with (colleagues, bosses, supervisors and clients)
• People you trust to be fair and have integrity. 
• People who are not family or friends.

CASE 2: GET ME A JOB, that's an order

This brilliant project manager, is polite, he uses the word PLEASE. The fact that he is currently working in a limited liability company in Dubai is qualification enough to get him any job, NO?. 

At least other job seekers, might add another line referring to their LinkedIn profile, or include a little introductory paragraph of what they can do and what they are looking for in a job, some might offer to send their CV.

Note dear reader, that both cases occurred on the same day, and that's just from LinkedIn, my business email and Gmail are another story altogether.

In a trivia survey years ago, that a colleague sent me, I answered a question of what is your favorite sport? my answer was watching my inbox download. Seriously, you never know what to expect! 

Am quite fond of emails that have NO subject, no email body, and attachment titled mycv.xxx , CV1.xxx, or CV[1].xxx.  Yaaay for me, a guessing game!

I especially like job seekers with a great sense of personal branding: the attachment will hold their name! WOW! just their name blows me away, how can I pass such a resourceful and talented candidate?  I want to hire them on the spot! At least that's what they think.

Yes, some actually do have something in the email body, some of what I see daily in my mailboxes :

see my CV

I am looking for job, attached is my cv

Please find the attachment word file

Dear Sir, Please attached my cv for any suitable jobs

Just brilliant! sometimes, I do open the attachments when I have the time, and actually have a job order to fill, and to my surprise, the majority of those people are not entry level or fresh graduates, many of them have years of experience and at least a certification of some sorts or a post-graduate degree! (sometimes PhDs even)

Dear Job Seeker, 

If you have the wits to attain any degree beyond high-school, then it is expected that you know how to apply for jobs properly, it is expected that you introduce yourself adequately and clearly, it is expected that you do your homework before you apply for any job. Be professional, be creative, encourage us recruiters and hiring managers to be interested to at least to review your application. That's the first step, and a very important step for you, that's what you need to worry about. Don't worry about us, we know how to find the people we need, we don't really rely on unsolicited applications, but if that's what you want to do, you really have to stand out (get short-listed, that's your second step), and make us want to interview you, (that's the third step). 

regards,

a concerned recruiter

P.S. Don't get me started on your un-professionally sound email address. 

Pinky19xx@domain.com

theman@domain.com

sexylady@domain.com
cdght.dgfdfj@domain.com
smartboy@domain.com
....
....
....
the list is a mile long

The moral of the story is, use your real name as your professional email, show confidence in who you are, there is no need to show how sexy, clever, mysterious and unreliable you are when creating your professional email address! AND

Don't use another person's email to apply, always use your own. 

Read  A Long Overdue Recruiter's Rant - Part 1

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A Long Overdue Recruiter's Rant - Part 1

(a WARNING: this is a rant of the recruiter in me, Technical Writer mode is switched OFF at the moment of RANTING)

Dear Job Seeker,

Yes, am a recruitment consultant, I cater to hiring managers and their companies.
Yes, I can give you free advice on how to improve your resume. 
Yes, I may know someone "in" the company you want to work for...
Yes, I can coach you and help you prepare for interviews...and plan your career path
Yes, do send me your CV or resume, I'd love to see it in case a match comes up

NO, I will not recommend you, just because you are in any one of my social media networks, DO I KNOW YOU? I cannot recommend you and endorse you on LINKEDIN or write a recommendation letter of any type, if I haven't worked with you! I cannot attest to your character if we never met in person and never had a long-term social or business relationship.

NO, I will not write your resume / CV / profile if you don't hire me, neither expect any of my recruiter colleagues to do so, this is what we do for a living, not for charity. 

NO, I don't influence hiring decisions in companies or the hiring managers there who are not my clients! even if I know them. You see, I get paid by the client and not you my dear job seeker, as most of my fellow recruiters do. Even then, and even if I have hiring decision making power in most cases, all that I can do is recommend you based on your passing your interview evaluation with me. After-all, I'd be recruiting on behalf of the client.

NO, Don't email your CV with no cover letter what so ever! It doesn't have to be something fancy, or another attached file for that matter, just write a short paragraph (5 - 8 sentences long):

• introduce yourself, 
• tell us what position(s) your are applying for or are interested in
• give us a reason to open and read your resume
• distinguish yourself from the tens and hundreds of applications we receive daily
• make sure you have your correct contact information on your resume and in the body of your email too (add it after your signature)
• Give us something to work with for your sake!

Again NO, recruitment consultants don't run  charities; money is on the clock, yes we want to help, but for us to spend hours on hours working with you on your career or interview skills without compensation is not something we do if the client is paying us to find them the right candidates. 

There are specialized recruiters that will work with you, to develop your career and help you with leads to job opportunities; and yes, you have to pay them a percentage of your annual salary or a retainer. Seek them out, Unfortunately for you am not that kind of recruiter, but; ...if you want my help you can hire me as your career coach, but you really got to invest time and money in yourself and actually do most of the work yourself. You see, if you don't then after you are hired, this is what will happen YOU'LL GET FIRED eventually! and that's not good for either one of us! don't you agree?

We really want to hire people, and do our best to review all applicants, but can you please, a pretty please decorated with dandelions, can you just use the reference code we asked you to use in the subject line for any advertised vacancy? 

After going through hundreds of applications each day, we may as well, just overlook you because you already have demonstrated that you lack certain important skills, you didn't pay attention to details and you are unable for the life of your CAREER follow simple straightforward directions. You already have lost our attention, and probably would be moved to the Dump file, instead of getting shortlisted for second screening.

It is in the second screening mostly that a decision to call you in for an interview is made. SO please, a pretty please decorated with dandelions, Pay attention to details and follow instructions. 

If you don't meet  50% - 80% of the job requirements, please try and explain why you think you'd be the right candidate for the job? We really want to know what makes you the right choice. If you don't even meet 50% of job requirements, then, don't apply. Seriously, don't bother, because we won't!

please, a pretty please decorated with dandelions, help us help you

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Taking my own advice - a moment of truth

This October is indeed a very busy month for me and my company! Although the business is doing well considering the multitude of challenges I had to face since Decapolis Consulting's inception; from financing to buying out a partner, from building my teams to networking, from acquiring new clients and retaining existing clients - I haven’t  been able to meet all of my goals as well as I could have.


As this month marks Decapolis Consulting one year anniversary in business, and since business has been slow for quite some time now, and in a moment of truth; I have decided earlier this month to hire myself and my team to conduct a Current Situation Analysis, to figure out why we haven’t met our set goals.

Our findings were surprisingly simple, yet crucial. Which I will share with you in a moment, after I shed some light on the background dynamics that led to my decision to hire our very own services.

As I said earlier, business has been slow for quite some time, and I found myself with some free time, so last May I joined Mowgli Foundation as a mentor, gave out free coaching packages to a number of individuals, and I just recently volunteered with Injaz’s Company Program.  The experience of volunteering and  helping others is its own reward. But I was pleasantly surprised that I have gained a lot too!  The insight into my own self and into my business alone which came through my involvement with Mowgli Foundation and the wonderful people I met through the program, is priceless. I started asking myself questions like what is my story?  What is my company’s story? Where am I going with the business?  What am I missing?

Questions that every entrepreneur should ask themselves, but sometimes just get too caught up with building and operating day-to-day business that we miss paying attention to the big picture, we forget our story, or worse yet we get emotionally attached to our story. 

I directed my team to be objective in their analysis, and to be emotionally detached upon making recommendations. It wasn’t easy, but we managed.

As simple as the reasons were, the result recommendations were brutal. They were brutal because we were very emotionally attached to the original story. You see, circumstances have changed; mainly due to the dissolving of partnership and incurred additional financial commitments as a natural result of buying out a partner. We went from a partnership to a sole proprietorship, but our message and story didn't change, and we realized that potential clients were confused and overwhelmed with our many offerings that didn't seem to tie well together in light of our new situation. Our story was amiss and a mess!

Our own recommendations for ourselves can also benefit all entrepreneurs who find themselves a bit too emotionally attached to their startups:

1.     FOCUS and Niche Our Story

2.     Modify and Restructure our services to fit our target niche

3.  Redo our business & marketing plans to align with our new modified business

4.  And as a result of all of that, the company profile, website and other promotional content will be rewritten.

5.  Add to the team: starting with hiring (aggressive) marketing and sales professionals for each service line; adding more consultants to our support teams. (yes we are hiring)

6. Put in place a new Action Plan with SMART goals with emphasis on measurable and objective evaluation mechanisms.

Taking our own advice,  we have decided that Decapolis Consulting will Focus on providing management support services and consultancy to SMEs and we will continue to support other consulting firms as their backhaul support kitchens.

We are currently restructuring our offered service lines and some lines will be discontinued altogether. The next step remains to present our recreated story through our website and promotional material. So stay tuned, as we would love to have your feedback!

Life is About Choices & Decisions We Make

There are long and short roads in life; smooth and rocky roads; crooked and straight paths. Many paths shall come our way as we journey through life. There are roads that lead to a life of marriage or living single. There are also roads that lead to fame and fortune on one hand, or isolation and poverty on the other. There are roads to happiness as there are roads to sadness, roads towards victory and jubilation, and roads leading to defeat and disappointment.

Just like any road, there are corners, detours, and crossroads in life. Perhaps the most perplexing road that you would encounter is a crossroad. With multiple roads to choose from and with limited knowledge on where they would go, which road will you take? What is the guarantee that we would choose the right one along the way? Would you take any road, or just stay where you are: in front of a crossroad?


There are no guarantees.

You do not really know where a road will lead you until you take it. There are no guarantees. This is one of the most important things you need to realize about life. Nobody said that choosing to do the right thing all the time would always lead you to happiness. Loving someone with all your heart does not guarantee that it would be returned. Gaining fame and fortune does not guarantee happiness. Accepting a good word from a superior to fast-track up the career ladder is not always bad, especially if you are highly qualified and competent. There are too many possible outcomes, which your really cannot control. The only thing you have power over is the decisions that you will make, and how you would act and react to different situations.

Wrong decisions are always at hindsight.

Had you known that you were making a wrong decision, would you have gone along with it? Probably not, why would you choose a certain path when you know it would get you lost? Why make a certain decision if you knew from the very beginning that it is not the right one. It is only after you have made a decision and reflected on it that you realize its soundness. If the consequences or outcomes are good for you, then you have decided correctly. Otherwise, your decision was wrong.

Take the risk: decide.

Since life offers no guarantee and you would never know that your decision would be wrong until you have made it, then you might as well take the risk and decide. It is definitely better than keeping yourself stuck in confusion and indecision. Although it is true that one wrong turn could get you lost, it could also be that such a turn could be an opportunity for an adventure, moreover open more roads. It is all a matter of perspective. But take caution that you do not make decisions haphazardly. Taking risks is not about being careless and stupid. Here are some pointers that could help you choose the best option in the face of life’s crossroads:

1. Do Your Research: Get as many information as you can about your situation. You cannot find the confidence to decide when you know so little about what you are faced with. Just like any news reporter, ask the 5 W’s: what, who, when, where, and why. What is the situation? Who are the people involved? When did this happen? Where is this leading? Why are you in this situation? These are just some of the possible questions to ask to know more about your situation. This is important. Oftentimes, the reason for indecision is the lack of information about a situation.
2. Identify and create options. What options do the situation give you? Sometimes the options are few, but sometimes they are numerous. But what do you do when you think that the situation offers no options? This is the time that you create your own. Make your creative mind work. From the most simple to the most complicated, entertain and explore all ideas. Do not shun anything out when an idea comes to your head. Sometimes the most outrageous idea could prove to be the right one in the end. You can ask a friend to help you identify options and even make more options if you encounter some difficulty, but make sure that you make the decision yourself in the end. Even if you've hired a coach, at the end of the day, you'll be making your own decisions.
3. Evaluate; Weigh the pros and cons of every option. Assess each option by looking at the advantages and disadvantages it offers you. In this way, you get more insights about the consequences of such an option.
4. Trust yourself and make that decision. Now that you have assessed your options, it is now time to trust yourself. Remember that there are no guarantees and wrong decisions are always at hindsight. So choose… decide… believe that you are choosing the best option at this point in time.

Now that you have made a decision, be ready to face its consequences: good and bad.

It may take you to a place of promise or to a land of problems. But the important thing is that you have chosen to live your life instead of remaining a bystander or a passive audience to your own life. Whether it is the right decision or not, only time can tell. But do not regret it whatever the outcome. Instead, learn from it and remember that you always have the chance to make better decisions in the future.

Take a risk, decide how to live your own life.