Some Invaluable Lessons in Recruiting

I’ve recruited some really challenging roles and in really challenging industries in my career. I was reflecting on those at a conference I facilitated a session at recently. Why? Because I saw the barista. Weird but true.

I’ve learned some invaluable lessons in recruiting over my career, and I am sharing some of them below.

Many years ago, I was working in the pharmaceutical sector supporting the medical division. We needed to recruit biostatisticians, and they needed to be a good cultural fit (although these days I would call it culture add). One of my colleagues saw that there was a statistics conference in New Zealand in a few weeks’ time and before I knew it I had my urgent passport organised and off I went with all the swag the marketing team could muster at late notice.

Swag and a booking for a barista and coffee cart.

And not just any barista, we chatted while he was setting up and got to know one another over the next two days. He was my secret weapon! Not only did he have ESP about when I needed another coffee, he asked me who had caught my interest from a recruiting perspective and made their coffees a little more slowly than others, giving me time to chat casually. Genius!

I hired two people. The two I had set my sights on. And I have watched their careers progress ever since – at the company I hired them at and beyond. What a delight!

Lesson: Think outside the box, be creative. These candidates would never have applied directly. Who could be an asset in supporting you finding great people?

On another occasion I received a resume for a Clinical Research role on a Friday morning. Another hard to recruit role at the time. They had interviews scheduled for the Monday already. So, I stayed back, interviewed them late Friday afternoon and had all the checks done by Monday morning. I had them hired by about 4pm, before their scheduled interview with a competitor.

Lesson: Act quickly if you’re interested, especially when you’re in a tight market.

I also worked in Allied Health, which has quite a reputation for difficulty in hiring. We were doing a lot of work to identify people we could hire when I looked at marketing principles and identified some persona. After that, things got easier – we could target our messaging and where we recruited. We also changed the process, so it was very personal and high touch. We had candidates tell us how much they loved that.

Lesson: What / who are the persona you are targeting? What do they want? And need? How does your process support or detract from that?

The other sector that was challenging was engineering – especially as they wanted to increase the number of women in the organisation and in ‘non-traditional’ roles. I’m no longer in that sector, although past colleagues are. I saw LinkedIn posts about an overseas conference recently, a conference targeted at women engineers, and thought bingo! That’s where I would put my recruitment dollars – approval to sponsor working visas and a booth at that conference in future.

Although I also always recommended playing the long game – get into schools and show the young people what career options there are – and early, when they are choosing subjects for years 9 and 10 as well as 11 and 12.

Lesson: Plan ahead. Have a strategy for a short as well as long game.

I also worked in a membership organisation for a while on a short-term contract. An organisation that had great flexible working options long before they were a ‘thing’. They were hiring accountants and doing pretty standard advertisements. I was a little shocked that they weren’t really focused on what I thought was an outstanding Employee Value Proposition.

I made some suggestions, and they gave it a go – really focusing on the benefits more than the remuneration. We hired some outstanding accountants – all of whom wanted the flexibility, the remuneration was a lower priority at the time for them.

Lesson: Sometimes we are just too close to see what the opportunities truly are. Who might have a different lens? 

There are all sorts of ways you can be creative in finding people who will add to your team. Sometimes we are so in the weeds we cannot see what others can. If that’s you, reach out, our ‘People Boost’ might be just what you are looking for.

A woman thinking deeply about the opportunities for your business.