Leonard, one of our esteemed clients, needed to hire an assistant. It was rather a senior assistant with the base of close to $90,000 and it was a very important position for the company. He called us last November… yes you heard it right, last November. Leonard tells us that he needs to hire somebody immediately and he is in a big hurry.
We tell Leonard that we can have him some good candidates at the end of the week of when he called. But Leonard says, “no let me look at the resumes and I’ll get back to you. I really want to interview as quickly as possible, but let me look at the resumes.”
We call Leonard for almost a full week…we don’t get him on the phone. A week or so later Leonard calls and tells us he’s really desperate to hire this administrative assistant, but he hasn’t really looked at the resumes yet and get back to us in a day or so. Three or four days later Leonard calls and says he’d like the interview four of the eight candidates that we had sent him. Two of the best candidates that he was interested in speaking with had already found jobs. One person had decided to stay where she was. So, he decided to interview the one of the four that he had left. She went and spoke with him.
Then, at the tail end of the week before Thanksgiving and Leonard says, “well I don’t want to make a decision just based on one interview, I’m going on vacation the week of Thanksgiving, can you line up some other candidates for after Thanksgiving?” We tell him that we can certainly do that, but he would be better off to just let us lineup five or six candidates that he should interview in one, or at the most two days and then he can make a decision. Leonard says that might be a good idea, but he wants a look at the resumes first. We tell him that it’s better for us to just send him the candidates and if he doesn’t like the candidates we send him he can start over. He says that he will “think about it.” We start arranging candidates to get interviewed.
Leonard gets back from Thanksgiving and for a whole week we can’t get a hold of him. He sends an email and says he is traveling for the next week and a half and that he’s going to have a rough time interviewing anyone but he is desperate to hire somebody because he’s having a number of other administrative people do the work of the person that he needs to hire. They are complaining.
By this time, we’ve decided that it’s not really worth much more of an investment of our time and effort, but if Leonard needs to see our candidates we will certainly comply. The week before Christmas, Leonard calls and says that he serious and he desperately needs to find somebody and needs to do it quickly before the first of the year. He says that he is looked at the resumes and that he’s picked four he would like to speak with. Every one of them had found a job.
I really don’t need to go on much beyond this but to tell you it is now January 17 and Leonard is still looking to interview a group of candidates. I will admit that he has spoken to two of them in the first week or so of January. I really don’t know if there are still available, but the point is that Leonard is 2 1/2 months or so into trying to find a good employee and he just can’t seem to do it.
Vincent is the vice president of a company out of Europe. We didn’t place them in the job, but he has been a candidate as well as client of ours for a number of years. He calls us three weeks ago and says that he needs to hire a salesperson. He says to lineup our best candidates over a period of two days. He calls on a Wednesday. He interviews nine candidates over the next Friday and Monday (No resume review, just tells us to send him the best candidates we’ve got.)He picks out two candidates that he really likes and has them back for indepth interviews. The next Monday he has them interview three or four people in Europe via Skype. He decides to hire one but is unsure of the second one. He hires one of the candidates and says that he would like to interview a few more. Notice that he has done all of this within 10 days of when he called.
The next week, Vincent interviews four more candidates, and likes one of them a lot. He has her call and visit with the people in Europe within the next three or four days and hires her. Vincent hired two people…two excellent people within three weeks. Now, how simple is that.
If people were more like Vincent and less like Leonard our fees could be half of what they are. And, people like Leonard would have a much easier life.
