Staying positive while doing challenging work is tough, especially when you’re in a production-oriented role like recruiting. How do recruiters find ways of staying upbeat when a lack of available talent (and candidate responses!) is bringing us down? Here are some tips I’ve picked up over the years that might help!
Experiment. Anything that gets you better results will help you relish the positive over the negative. If you receive more responses texting candidates than when calling or emailing, send MORE texts! Reduce the less successful methods for greater results.
Get AWAY from the computer for lunch some days. Take a walk or practice yoga, biking, or even skateboarding if that’s more your scene. Fresh air will help your mood especially during a time when you feel isolated working remotely. During a Global Pandemic, we are not seeing as many people as usual. For me, I’m happy to walk outside, and look at my garden. I don’t do any hardcore weeding in the middle of a workday, but I like to check out the flowers and watch the pollinators attracted to them.
If I have more time, a quick yoga video or a walk make me feel like a new person after a break like that.
We experience so many ups and downs daily that if we don’t practice self-care, we’ll burn out fast. Prioritizing daily tasks and activities is a great way to help ensure a work/life balance. Plus, checking items off my lists feels so good! Having a great start to the workday helps guarantee a great day in other ways too. Music helps me keep focused on tasks. I just find some tunes that keep me moving, in between calls, get into a rhythm, and I find my sourcing goes quicker to some great music, IMO.
Personally, one of my personal favorite pastimes to break up my day is walking outside and checking my garden. My bromeliads don’t always flower, however, this week, when three of my new hires started on Monday, I noticed they had JUST BLOOMED! I like to think this was nature’s way of reflecting the positive.
My other flowers aren’t in bloom now, but soon they will be out in full force. Focusing on the positive, I believe those new blooms will reflect my next group of new hires!