“Bermuda Triangle” in recruitment

Why “Bermuda Triangle”? Due to the fact the entire recruitment process is based mainly on working with people. And knowing that we, as human nature, are so unpredictable, here is how a sinuous relation has been created among: candidate – recruiter – client. Since I have been working in this area have heard, seen and lived all kind of both pleasant and less pleasant experiences.

Unfortunately, at the present time many of us realize in a small percentage or at all what our roles in this equation are. From my own experience I can tell you that the recruiter has the toughest role. This one is the “lever” between candidate and employer. Depending on its successes or failures this one could be either congratulated or insulted. This one is responsible for everything that is going on during the entire recruitment process as well as afterwards, during follow-up phase. This one is responsible when a client or candidate is unsatisfied by the choice they made.

Why “Bermuda Triangle”? Due to the fact the entire recruitment process is based mainly on working with people. And knowing that we, as human nature, are so unpredictable, here is how a sinuous relation has been created among: candidate – recruiter – client. Since I have been working in this area have heard, seen and lived all kind of both pleasant and less pleasant experiences.

Unfortunately, at the present time many of us realize in a small percentage or at all what our roles in this equation are. From my own experience I can tell you that the recruiter has the toughest role. This one is the “lever” between candidate and employer. Depending on its successes or failures this one could be either congratulated or insulted. This one is responsible for everything that is going on during the entire recruitment process as well as afterwards, during follow-up phase. This one is responsible when a client or candidate is unsatisfied by the choice they made.

Sometimes I asked myself: “what should be the qualities of a good recruiter?”. Books and rumour could create an ambiguous picture that represents bit what is really happening in practice. As well as in other areas, I would recommend to take a little from others’ experience and a bit more from our own professional experience. The so-called failures are an integrant part of ourselves, define and complete us as recruiters. And as we all know the joy we have when there is a success could be one of a short-term or long-term.

After that this question turned in “how would look the perfect candidate?”. Why did I ask myself this question? Because there are certain cases when I really do not understand why some candidates apply to jobs. Let me explain: they send their CVs, are scheduled to interviews but do not show up. The worst is either they close their phones or do not answer. Moreover when are called they could have weird reactions like: “why these people keep bothering me, don’t realize I just don’t care?”. In fact when they adopt this negative behaviour they harm themselves. Even though we are in the middle of a recruiting market that is unstable and in a continuous movement, the employers, as well as the recruitment companies are looking for steady employees who will be trustworthy. Well, some candidates succeed to creating a negative self image because of this introvert, close-mouthed attitudes when they are confronted with the recruiter but also with client this one represents.

On the other hand some candidates “accuse” the recruitment companies of being unserious and irresponsible. They are right too. There are companies that call the candidates to countless interviews and testing, and after everything is finished they overlook, ignore or forget to announce the candidates if they have passed or not to the following phase. Indeed it is frustrating because many times these people’s future is based on the positive or negative answers of the recruitment companies.

Nonetheless, let’s not neglect the fact that recruiting companies are being tied by their clients they represent. Some clients could be very decisive and when the final interviews are taking place they could react promptly and efficiently. In exchange other clients would like to analyse all the details, to observe all the candidates in different situations and so on. Or in other cases the clients would give up at the recruiting process from various reasons. Due to all these and many other things, there is the possibility to delay the whole recruiting process. There were moments when I used to ask myself: “and how would look the flawless client?”

At all these three questions I have found similar answers: there is not a perfect recruiter, there is not an ideal candidate and certainly there is not a single type of clients. There are countless types, countless attitudes, countless reactions, and countless experiences. This is where the beautiful part of this relation lies; this is where you will find the real challenge that hides behind the recruiting process.

Instead of a conclusion I would let myself to give some suggestions to all who are involved in this relation, so-called “Bermuda Triangle”:

• Think about what you actually need, what would be appropriate for you: this is both for candidates, employers and also recruiters.
• Carefully analyse the requests, job offers, recruiting companies’ offers, as well as the placed recruitment ads and especially their content.
• Listen carefully and actively what your interlocutor wants to communicate.
• Give correct information and to the point to all the parts involved in this process.
• Ask questions every time you are not entirely enlighten or you feel that receive bit information.
• Make the transparency become a reality not just “something to talk about” during the interview.
• In case of some problems, emergency situations or even if one of the parts changes its mind, make sure you announce this fact to the other involved parties.
• Be yourselves because falsity weighs bit or at all in the eyes of your interlocutors.
• After first meeting, try not to issue radical opinions about your discussion partner.
• Use your empathy. You would be amazed to see what results you could get!