On useful info to share with candidates & how to build generosity

Are you ready to discover the next recruiting topic in our bi-weekly video series for recruiters – The Tea on Recruiting? You’ll find the video of episode twenty four right here. In the section below, we also include a transcript of this episode so that you can always review it whenever you need. Enjoy!

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Transcript

Hey, there. How are you doing on this fine day? Today’s episode is all about questions! That’s right, the two main topics we’ll talk about are promoting a culture of generosity at work and what your candidates should ask you. Welcome back to the Tea on Recruiting, where we share insightful and thought-provoking content that can help you shape you recruiting career!

Here’s today’s first piece of content!

5 questions candidates should “have the guts to ask” during job interviews

We read the article “A career expert shares 5 questions she wishes more candidates ‘had the guts to ask’ during job interviews”. The piece was written by the Director of Kellog’s School of Management’s Career Management Center. And these are the questions she thought should impress you, as a recruiter:

1. ‘What are the biggest challenges I’ll face in the first 90 days, and how will success be measured?’

2. ‘Is there anything about my background that makes you hesitant to move me forward in the interview process?’

3. ‘How does my background compare to other candidates you’re interviewing?’

4. ‘I know the pandemic has caused unprecedented disruption for many companies. How are you, as a manager, doing?’

5. ‘Reflecting on your own experience, what have you seen the company do to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion?’

Well… Are you impressed? If the candidates don’t ask you these things, you might want to share them nonetheless since you want to make the right hire. The answer to the question about the challenges they’ll face in the first 90 days is particularly important for you to share since the first 3 months a candidate spends with you have a huge impact on determining how long they’ll stay.

I’d love to hear what you think about this – so why don’t you jot it down in a comment? How would you react to these questions, and are there other things that you’d like for candidates to ask you?

And now, are you ready for our second article?

How to Build a Culture of Generosity at Work

A culture of generosity translates into:

• Better performance and more creativity among your talent

• More employee satisfaction

• Your employees having stronger work relationships, being more committed, and less likely to leave your organization

• Your company saving money and being more profitable

We read “How to Build a Culture of Generosity at Work”. What did we learn? The secrets to generosity are that:

• 70-90% of the time, help is given when asked for

• You need to ask for what you need

• Your participants don’t have to believe it’ll work, they just need to engage for it to be successful

CEO? More like CHS. Chief Help Seeker. You need to be a role model of the behavior you want. Others should ask for what they need, and you should too, so that your employees can feel comfortable speaking up and being vulnerable.

If you’re looking for ideas on what to do:

• Check out the Troika Exercise: Get into groups of three, then everyone, in turn, makes a SMART request, so: Specific, Meaningful, Action-based, Realistic, and Time-bound. Two people need to then think about how they could help.

• Huddles! A formal huddle’s a weekly meeting at the same time and on the same day of the week. You then reserve time at the end to ask for help and give help. An informal huddle’s scheduled whenever needed.

• A daily standup! Everyone gathers at the same time every day. Everyone talks about what they worked on yesterday, what they’re doing today, and what help they need.

• Share complex issues asynchronously. You could use a Slack channel or a whiteboard.

• Hold a cross-collaboration workshop.

Now onto the…

CandE Crash

The more barbaric your treatment of candidates, the more demonic their reviews on your Glassdoor page.

Shoutout to a company we won’t name. Let’s read this quick passage.

“He also went on vacation after the second interview. That was unprofessional because he could have at least given a response prior to going on vacation instead of making me wait like a child for a prolonged period of time. He misled me into thinking I had a job, but I had my hopes up for nothing. Regardless of how passionate I was about games and sales, it was ulikely he would have hired me. I asked him why he refused to hire me, but I received no response. I was also told to reapply in 90 days. Even if I reapplied in 90 days, I doubt he would have offered me the job. But I probably won’t reapply in 90 days. How would waiting 90 days improve my chances of securing the job? Am I magically more qualified for the job by waiting 90 days?”

The recruiter was apparently passionate about games too – just, a different kind. See how important communication and honesty are? You don’t want your candidates to feel this way, do you? Yeah, I didn’t think so.

Today we learned about asking for what we need, so here’s my message to you. Do you have an idea of something we should address or dive deeper into? Why don’t you drop me an email or a message on LinkedIn with your idea? If we’ll go for it, we’ll make sure to mention your name in the episode you inspired.

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