Art of Recruiting
Art of Recruiting
Telling Your Story & Helping You Win
by Ross Fletcher 6/4/24 Storytelling is one of the most important tools we have to help find your next top talent. Crafting a compelling narrative of your company and its specific needs is a no-brainer in attracting the right caliber of person to help you move forward. That’s where Herd Freed Hartz excels, and it’s…
Upgrade Your Job Description
Do your job descriptions attract talent like a magnet? Do you stand out from the pack and inspire candidates to check out your company over the competition? As retained executive search recruiters, we have a front-row seat to see what works for companies trying to attract top talent. Using our 20 years of experience as…
INSPIRING
OVERVIEW: The talent you are interested in wants to feel inspired by your company and the role. Make your company story more exciting and inspirational will cause candidates to lean in with their hearts. This is the emotional side, or the “sizzle”. Talk about your exciting mission and why people love working at your company…
DIFFERENT
OVERVIEW: Proactively explain what key facts and details your company does, or the “steak”. This helpful insight will answer common candidate questions and save you time in answering the same questions with candidates. Example: Description of your product/service, typical customer/customer logos, how you make money, office location, team size and investors. WHY IT MATTERS: 1) Respect…
AUTHENTIC
OVERVIEW: As a company, you build trust and rapport by having a conversational tone and sound like a real person. If you read your job description out loud – is that what you would say to someone over a coffee? If your job description feels just like you are talking with someone in-person then you…
TITLE & OVERVIEW
OVERVIEW: Revisit the job title so it makes should make sense to external candidates. For example: “Sr. Network Engineer II” isn’t helpful, but “Sr Data Network Engineer (Cloud Platform)” is more interesting. Then you want to include a quick role summary (2-3 sentences) like you’d describe the job if you met someone in-person. The overall…
KEY OUTCOMES
OVERVIEW: List the Top 3 outcomes that would make this role a hero in the first year. A common mistake is most job descriptions just focus on being busy doing typical day-to-day “activities” vs. showing specific and measurable “outcomes”. Getting clarity on this prior to interviewing, helps focus your time and also helps with onboarding…
ROLE ACTIVITIES
OVERVIEW: Describe your role activities and responsibilities that will answer common questions about the job. You do not need an exhaustive list of everything the role does – just cover what matters to explain the job. Less is more. Examples: Key responsibilities and activities. Describing a “typical week” and what % of the time is…
QUALIFICATIONS
OVERVIEW: You want to have measurable candidate criteria to screen a potential candidate for this job. Avoid having too few/vague qualifications (“everyone is qualified”) or having too many qualifications where it’s not clear what is really important. Examples: Screening criteria are specific and measurable and a clear difference between “required” and “preferred”. Don’t fill up…
CALL TO ACTION
OVERVIEW: You have worked hard to inspire someone by your company the open job – so make it clear and simple on what the next step looks like. Use “Learn more” vs. “Apply” to attract people not actively looking. Avoid candidates feeling like they applied to the “HR Black Hole”. WHY IT MATTERS: 1) Action…
How Job Title Buzzwords Help You Attract Talent
Paul Freed, Managing Partner & Co-Founder of Herd Freed Hartz, was interviewed for a UK article around the trend with companies using new creative buzzwords to attract talent using non-traditional job titles such as “Ninja”, “Rockstar” and “Guru”. See full UK article (published March 2, 2018) HOW JOB TITLE BUZZWORDS CAN HELP YOU ATTRACT TALENT…
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Art of Recruiting Storytelling
We love epic stories like Lord of The Rings, Star Wars and The Matrix. They are timeless and epic because they go beyond entertainment. They invite us into a bigger narrative and an important quest. Likewise, I believe the world of recruiting needs better storytellers. For a candidate, it’s the difference between a decent job…
Create an Excellent Candidate Experience
By Karen Bertiger / Special to The Seattle Times Jobs (published in June 2016) It’s no secret that today’s talent market is highly competitive, but perks and sign-on bonuses aren’t the only way to attract top talent. Creating a positive interview experience can strongly influence a candidate’s interest, as well as create a long-lasting impact…
Hook job candidates with your “company sizzle”
(By Karen Bertiger – 2/18/17 published in The Seattle Times) Most company pitches to job candidates tend to start out the same way: either with an innocuous question (Do you want to make a difference by working for an exciting company?) or a dry statement (Company X is a $100M company in the aerospace industry).…
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5 Ways Ineffective Recruiting is Hurting Your Business
You rely on your employees to keep your business running and your customers satisfied, which makes finding the right candidates critical to your success. But let us remind you, in the U.S., managers have an average hiring success rate of only 50%. That’s far too many missed opportunities, and too many unfortunate consequences as a…
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How to Strike through the Competitive Talent Market in Order to Find the Right Candidate
The current competition within the job market is pretty steep, for both employees and employers. Everyone is out there looking for the best candidates, and likewise, candidates are searching among employers to see where they fit best, and fit involves everything from job title, to salary, and more recently, company culture. In many ways, employers…