Playing favorites with Recruiting Tools

Any time two or more recruiters are in a room together, the subject of tools comes up; tools for sourcing candidates, tools for tracking candidates. One of the challenges of being a recruiter with a pretty visible profile is that you get inundated with requests from tools companies to try their thing: "free trial", "I'd like to schedule some time to explain to you the benefits of <some tool with a Web 2.0 name>". I don't even have to open the e-mails now to know what lies inside.

In my world, and in Staffing at Microsoft in general, managing ones time is a daunting task. Those that are successful time managers have mastered the art of leveraging others and saying no. I've blogged about the art of saying no before; a highly underrated business skill. The two year old that lives next door to me has got it down. She defaults to "no" in any situation. Sometimes it means yes, but "no" is more fun. Also, "Dora" and "papa", but first, "no".

One scenario where I invoke my talent for saying "no" is those tools calls/mails. If the tool sounds interesting, I'll log on, poke around and try to understand the value proposition. For example, I was contacted by a company that gathers business cards at industry events, loads them into their database and then sells you access. I went in, did a search of a competitor company name and marketing and found nothing. I tweaked the search to go broader, nothing came up and that was that. When I let the account rep know, he wanted to spend more time with me on the phone crafting a search (something that any sourcing recruiter is an expert at and also, crafting the search in a tool like that should be easy). My response: no. OK, well actually, it was "no, thanks".

People in the staffing industry really can get all gaga over tools. This type of focus on the technology of recruiting is pretty common among visible recruiters.  I've seen a lot of people really geek out over tools, but it's more the promise of what the tool COULD do than what it actually does do. That's why I think customer references are something I want before I even consider using a new tool. And when I talk to the customer, I want to know about results, meaning hires, that can be attributed to the tool. It's amazing to me how skillfully an account rep can sidestep that question. And how often many of us neglect to ask sponsoring recruiters "have you used it?" and "have you made hires from it?".

I have actually become significantly engaged with 2 tools companies over the past year or 2; one for the prospect of what it could provide, in terms of results, one because of what it does supply in terms of results. I started talking to Jobster because I like the idea of making job postings viral. I've tested it out using a few different scenarios and have not yet had any hires. I'm going to give it another shot, keeping in mind that there's a point of diminishing returns when it comes to tools projects. I just want to make sure that I am selecting the right scenarios. And that the tool actually makes hiring easier or more efficient. And I also need to consider that what works for other people might not work for me. Our challenges staffing Microsoft are different than many other companies, especially here in the marketing space.

The other company that I have done a lot of work with, as you probably know, is TheLadders. My team has made a significant number of hires through them this year. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Plus, who else loves the fact that their leader, Marc, refers to his company as "not Web 2.0". He's right, it's totally not, but who cares? Web 2.0 is overrated as a staffing enabler in the absence of actual results. If I thought the most effective way to hire someone was to send smoke signals, I'd be outside stoking the flames. Plus, there's this new fangled thing called e-mail, and it's predecessor, the phone, that work fantastically. Anyway, TheLadders works for me. And I think that flipping the job board model is brilliant because recruiters have lots of choices of places they can post jobs so free postings puts your tool at the top of the list.

I guess I wanted to get this out there since I see a lot of fanboy worship of tools without the discussion of whether the person has ever used the tool (seriously!) and whether they have made hires from it. I think the tendency for the industry to pat some tools companies on the back without some critical analysis of whether they work well (or even where they work), but rather because they represent the shiny promise of "web 2.0" (gag) is not really that wise. And I want to justify my avid support of TheLadders by saying that yes, we make lots of hires through them. And I like the way they think and work. And I want to support them because they do good work and they make my job easier. And since I don't pay them for anything, all I can offer is my endorsement.

When it comes to the other tools (oh so many of them), the reason you don't see me talking about them is...well, there could be a lot of reasons:

1) they don't solve a business problem we have (for example, assessment tools don't interest me because my team doesn't do assessments)

2) they have been tried here by others and I've received feedback on their efficacy

3) I've tried them myself and they don't work well/don't provide what we are looking for/are too cumbersome/replicate a process we can accomplish better in another way.

I'd been thinking that the readers of my blog (or at least the intended readers) wouldn't be interested in this kind of stuff because they aren't really in staffing. But then I thought that anyone doing a job search probably is interested in the tools recruiters are using out there. There's so much going on and it's hard to get to the nucleus of tools companies that are effective and sustainable. I can't really say what works for other people, but for the recruiters out there: cut through the hype and take the time to understand which tools have track records of success and will work for your business. To the job seekers out there: find out what the recruiters are really using.

That is all.

Comments

• Anonymous
  January 26, 2007
  Heather, here's my take on tools: When one becomes so good at using a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail. Tools may yield names, make it easier for resumes to be placed into a database, or enable a recruiter to test people online before coming in for an interview...but they don't necessarily enable a recruiter to call someone back when promised, to tell a candidate that they're not a fit, or to learn about the content of the position before heading off to recruiting land in search of the perfect candidate. So Candidates, definitely ask recruiters what tools they use - this is a perfect way to engage them (what's ATS do you use at Microsoft? What are your three favorite ways to source candidates?) - you might even find that they like you more after the exercise. But don't forget that no 2.0 tool can make up for recruiters who don't follow through...

• Anonymous
  January 29, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  January 30, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  January 31, 2007
  You know, come to think of it, I do recall spending a lot of time filling out a lot of online forms at Microsoft.  In some cases, the directions for these forms had 10+ steps, and some of those steps were themselves lists of steps. I even commented to the hiring manager that it seemed like the application process ensured three things about me as a candidate:

1. My interest in the job was very serious (if it wasn't, I would have quit halfway through the process of filling out these tedious forms).
2. I had some basic computer literacy (which I presumed was necessary at Microsoft).  After all, many of the steps mentioned above required going to some link, and many of those links sent me to other links, etc.
3. I could follow a semi-complex set of instructions to successful completion (again, presumably a necessary trait for someone at a software company where everything - EVERYTHING - is a process and thus involves instructions).

• Anonymous
  January 31, 2007
  Bad-Brad, funny that you mention that. I just sent mail yesterday on what I thought could be improved about our careers site. I'm sure open to additional recommendations that I would be very happy to collect into a document and pass along to the appropriate people. My biggest concerns are:

1. We try to put everything on the US jobs page. Way too many links on the left side
2. No flow to the site. It's more like a spider with pages springing from it than one from which a user wuld flow from one site to the next (I am sure that there's a more articulate way to explain that).
3. Limited expectation setting with candidates
4. We have all these different job descriptions but no real way to explain how different groups fit into MS and how these jobs fit within the groups. The verbiage we have sounds more like marketing speak
5. We need to have videos on the site...people talking about their work so users can hear their passion and excitement. How did I do? What more would you add? ANyone out there want to give constructive feedback on our career site, let me have it; either here or send me an e-mail: heathham@microsoft.com.

• Anonymous
  January 31, 2007
  Heather, I hope these comments will be deemed Constructive and a couple play off of some of the things that you mentioned above.  Specifically, #4 which I think would be the most helpful to me.<br><br> First let me say, just so you have some background info, that I have 12 years in Market Management, program development, product development and strategy.  I also have been a viability analysis consultant, started and sold a software company and an internet classifieds company.  I have  Masters Degree in Organizational Leadership and 3 Bachelors degrees.  I have been a Senior Manager at a fortune 50 company, a VP at a small software company and a director at a medium-sized Direct Marketing company.  Based on these things, I feel like a I have a lot to offer a company like Microsoft.<br><br>

1. I have 2 "agents" that send me jobs that are posted on the Microsoft site that meet my criteria...Sort of.<br><br> I want to find out about marketing, program management, product management and evangelist jobs (in a couple of different cities, Minneapolis and Kansas City), however, the jobs that are posted on the site that fit those general descriptions could fall in any number of different categories.  For instance, the most narrowly defined agent that I have sent me 31 hits today that range from "Architect Evangelist" to "Marketing Manager"  My other Agent, which includes Redmond, came back with 630 hits.<br><br> Clearly I am not going to be a great fit for most of these jobs, but in order for me to find out about any of the jobs that I might be a great fit for I have to wade through a sizeable chunk of them.  I have learned, through trial and error, not to even look at anything that says "technical" in it given that I am a marketing person and not an engineer, programmer or Software developer. <br><br> I wish that there were a site that I could go to that explained all of the different renditions of a marketing manager at Microsoft.  Seriously, I know that is asking a lot, but when there are thousands of jobs that look alike, on the surface, it would be cool if there were  way to narrow the search based on my actual experience.<br><br> Also, even most of the jobs that I feel I am qualified for I don't apply for since I often don't understand the unelievable littany of acronyms that are often listed in these job descriptions.<br><br> Maybe that means that I am fooling myself into believing that I am more prepared for a job at Microsoft than I am, but it could also mean that whoever wrote the job description really wasn't interested in anyone outside Microsoft applying for the job.<br><br> It could also mean that said hiring manager may not even realize that they are using unfamiliar terms because they use them so often in their daily work that everyone that they deal with actually knows what they mean.<br><br> In short, I think I am a qualified candidate, but without writing a 3 page cover letter I don't think I can get that message across to a recruiter.

• Anonymous
  January 31, 2007
  crawdad13 - those comments are totally constructive and I will make sure that they are shared with the right people. One of the big challenges is that the categories are selected by the admin that enters the job into the system. I don't think that ther admins are trained to know the difference betwwen the categories and pipes. It's much harder than it sounds. We get a lot of program management jobs in the product management category, for example. And a marketing program manager, which should be listed as a martketing position, may end up in program management. I use the agents for some of my work as well and it's not clean. So from what you are saying, there are 2 problemts:

1. the categories aren't an effective means of selecting the positions that you want to hear about
2. there's a lack of content that would help you better understand the categories and how we interpret them at Microsoft as well as some of the cryptic verbiazge in the job description (which isn't supposed to make it in there inthe first place). Did I get that about right?

• Anonymous
  January 31, 2007
  Heather, you are exactly right and much better at stating it succinctly than I am.  Ithink that maybe reducing the sheer number of options is the most logical fix for this issue. I want to be clear that I am NOT piling on here, Quite the opposite, you might be the very first hR person that I have ever talked to that has a really clear understanding of how frustrating it can be for an applicant to want to put his best foot forward and not being able to figure out how to do that. With that said, here is a list of jobs from one of my agents categorized in what seems to me to be logical groups, the problem is, I have no idea at all whether many of these jobs titles perform the same functions or if they are completely different.  Take a look and tell me if I am just being goofy or if there really might be a good reason for me to be confused. One more thing; I freely admit that there are at least a few of these titles that I honestly couldn't tell you what they mean to Microsoft, I am just guessing based on what they sound like they mean. Internal Product Manager Internal Product Manager Management Product Manager Product Manager Management Marketing Product Manager Marketing Product Manager Management Marketing Product Planner Marketing Product Planner Management Product Planner - Marketing Product Planner Management - Marketing Product-Solutions Marketing Manager Licensing Marketing Manager Industry Manager Industry Marketing Manager Industry Marketing Manager Management Segment Manager Segment Manager Management Segment Marketing Manager Segment Marketing Manager Management Services Marketing Manager Internal Program Manager Internal Program Manager Management Program Manager Group Program Manager Program Management Office Sales Program Manager Branding Manager Branding Manager Management Engagement Management Audience Marketing Manager Audience Marketing Manager Management Customer & Partner Experience Manager Competitive Strategy Manager Market Intelligence Manager Market Intelligence Manager Management Communications Manager Marketing Communications Manager Mgmt Marketing Manager Marketing Manager Management Field Marketing Manager Field Marketing Manager Management Developer Evangelist - Academic Developer Evangelist Evangelism Management Partner Development Manager Partner Development Marketing Manager Partner Engagement Manager Partner Account Manager Management Senior Consultant Advisor Management CRM Manager CRM Manager Management Data Marketing Manager By the way, I am posting as Crawdad13 but I also occasionally post as Darren Cox Thanks for all your help and for your tireless efforts to help the rest of us understand Microsoft.  You are a great ambassador for the organization.

• Anonymous
  February 27, 2009
  Heather, I am trying to decide between using theLadders or RiseSmart. They both seem to offer the same things but RiseSmart is about $10 more. RiseSmart claims they have more personalized service with their "reception." Have you heard of them? Is this legitimate? What do you think? Thank you, I read your articles and really value and appreciate your feedback. ryan

• Anonymous
  February 27, 2009
  Hi Ryan, I haven't heard of them. I wish I could offer more help. I'll ask around to find out if some of my cohorts have heard of them.