What’s the Secret to Great Recruiting?

Our recruiting clients don‚Äôt hire us to help them find the best talent for their organization because it‚Äôs easy.  

If it were easy, Kinetix wouldn’t exist, and I would be writing this from my parents’ basement. The reality is that whenever I talk to new clients about their hiring needs, they always ask the same thing:

“Where are you going to find these people? What’s your secret?”

Without fail, it always happens. I don’t blame them for wanting to know: they have a lot on the line that depends on us being able to do our job (and doing it well). I even used to ask myself those exact same questions. I would constantly be racking my brain to figure out where to find the best candidates, especially for tough to fill positions that are Kinetix search-worthy.

What website/channel is going to provide the hundreds of skilled candidates I need to fulfill my clients’ needs?

And do you know what I realized?

There is no website, and there is no secret. 

There is no magic Boolean string, job board, or LinkedIn group that is going to provide you with all of the candidates you need. Don‚Äôt get me wrong, it always helps to have the right tools in your arsenal to give you a boost‚Äì but you have to put in the work. 

You have to put in the hours to build your funnel with hundreds of valuable potential candidates. You have to review the hundreds of resumes that come in for a specific job, then you have to email/call/text those candidates until you get a “yes” or a “no.” Even after the acceptance, you have to stay in contact and be there to support your new placement up until they show up on day one.

A recruiter is really just a professional stalker (a stalker with the best intentions, of course). After the cycle ends you have to rinse and repeat, over and over again, until you find the candidates you are looking for to fill each open req on your desk. That‚Äôs it, that‚Äôs the big secret‚Äìsimple, but not easy. 

You have to do the work, and it has to be sustained and consistent. It’s not always fun and it can be a grind. No one likes to review resumes until their eyes start to blur or get hung up on for the hundredth time as they cold-call through a list of candidates–but that’s how you get results. It’s a lot like working out. If you work out once then immediately go home and look in the mirror, I guarantee you’re going to be disappointed. But if you hit the gym 3-4 times a week over the course of 6 months, you’re going to see dramatic results.

The same goes for recruiting. 

You can‚Äôt email 5 candidates once and think you‚Äôre going to find the right person for the job. If that‚Äôs your strategy and you miraculously find a good candidate, you should pick up a lottery ticket on your way home because you‚Äôre one lucky SOB. 

Successful recruiting is only sustainable when you routinely fill your funnel, cast a wide net, and then narrow that funnel by reviewing and contacting hundreds (sometimes thousands) of candidates. Again, it’s not exciting, it’s not sexy, and it’s not always quick, but it works. The more you go through the process, the bigger pipeline of qualified candidates you will have. That means you now have relationships with quality people that you can send on a moment’s notice to a new client.

It all comes together when you put in the work–as I said before, simple, but not easy.

That is the secret.