Recently, I saw a post on social media of a large international company about the training they organized for their leaders called "Values-based Recruitment". It is an interviewing technique in which employers and recruiters as their representatives are focused on hiring individuals whose personal values, behaviors and beliefs match the values of their company. This approach makes it possible to assess the candidate's fit into the culture of the organization.
I’m not a big fan of this approach, so I want to focus on different kind of value.
In a recent survey on LinkedIn, I offered two examples of the initial message sent through this network to professionals recognized as potential candidates for a position.
1. The first example is an example of a typical message that ends up in our inbox, sent by recruiters. It abounds in terms that are ubiquitous and extremely popular in the business world, it tells a lot buts says nothing. Classic "teaser".
2. The second example focuses on the candidate and aims to influence on the candidate to recognize the value for himself/herself and motivate him/her to participate in the selection process.
I asked a quite simple question - which message would you rather reply to?!
Here are the results
Survey Results
What the survey results (and participants' comments) tell us?
42% of respondents who voted for example one made a decision based on short and clear communication, i.e. teaser form.
58% of respondents chose example two, because they concluded that the recruiter made an effort, reviewed the profile in detail, targeted the very specific qualifications of the candidate, set clear expectations and delivered a personalized message.
Of course, choosing one of the two examples largely depends on your personal communication style. Although even they were not asked, I believe that these 42% of survey participants expect to hear something valuable for themselves during the first "live contact".
Most respondents believe that the value for them in the first message, increases the chances to respond to it and to engage in the process of recruitment and selection.
The recruitment pipeline is almost no different from the sales pipeline. Your target group are candidates with specific knowledge, skills, and experiences. The higher the response ratio is, the higher the chances are of finding the candidate who is the best for the position.
Therefore, when defining the message, it is important to answer a few questions / expectations of your potential candidates, so that the person you are addressing sees the value of communication you are starting.
The questions / expectations you need to answer are:
- Who are you and what is your role?
- What do you know about me? Why are you writing to me?
- What is valuable there for me?
- What do you want us to talk about?
- When, how and for how long do you want us to talk?
- Do I have a saying?
This is just a beginning, you create value for the candidate from the first interaction, and you keep building it during the whole process. In case you need help, get in touch…
Dragan Vukosavljević
People development consultant
Value(s) as the key criteria