It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair….Charles Dickens
Our candidate was unquestionably an “A player.” He had been a winner at every place he had ever been and was looking to leave his organization for very good reasons. He was ideal for one of our clients who had, in the past, been able to attract “A players.” When we called our client, the hiring authority reminded us that it now took at least three weeks to hire anyone, no matter how good the candidate was. We knew this, because the client had already lost two candidates. One of them got halfway through their process and got another offer and the second one simply said that he was not interested in going through five different interviews as well as making a presentation to a group of people (which was part of the process). His rationale was, “I’ve been successful at what I’ve been doing for 20 years, and it makes no sense for me to make a presentation to a group of people.”
We had informed our new candidate about the process of the company in the beginning. The first two interviews with the candidate took place within three days, via zoom. The third person who he was supposed to interview with, however, was out of the country on business and wasn’t going to be back for another week. So, now we were set back a week. After getting back into the country, the third person involved in the interviewing process couldn’t get around to speaking to the candidate until after he had been back for four days. We are now three weeks into the process. Unfortunately, this interviewing authority even made the comment to the candidate that he didn’t feel like he was that important to the interview process and that they could have moved on to the next phase of the process without him. Of course, that made the candidate feel really warm and fuzzy.
The next step was for the candidate to have zoom meetings with a number of people in the California corporate office. He was also instructed that, at that time, he would make a presentation to a group of managers and this was part of the process for everyone who got hired. Of course, and unfortunately, it was going to be another week before all of the “leadership team” in corporate was going to be around at the same time. So, by the time the candidate gets to the corporate “meetings,” we are into our fifth week. He does well with the corporate zooms and everybody tells him they’re going give him a “thumbs up.”
On Friday of the fifth week of this process, the immediate hiring authority tells him that they’ll reach out to him on Monday and they would really like to hire him and they’d like to put together an offer. Wednesday of the sixth week rolls along and the candidate still hasn’t heard from the hiring authority. The hiring authority was traveling and very busy. Meanwhile, our candidate is obviously getting frustrated and irritated with the whole process.
That Wednesday, a new client, who had been referred to us, called in and asked us to search for an “A player” in Dallas for them. When we informed them of the candidate’s availability, they suggested a zoom conversation the next day. The regional vice president talked to the candidate that Thursday and the executive vice president flew in to interview the candidate that Friday. By Monday our client had lined up a third interview with another regional vice president. The candidate requested to be able to speak with two or three of the employees which took place that Tuesday. The next day, we checked the candidate’s references and by Thursday… one week after they initially interviewed the candidate… the hiring company made a job offer.
The hiring authority of our first client finally reached out to our candidate by Friday of that sixth week, explaining that he’s just been really busy traveling, etc. and that they are still intending to make an offer. Monday of the seventh week rolls around and our first client’s HR Department insists on checking the references. We explained that we had just checked his references and we’d be more than happy to pass them along, but they insisted that they had to do it. Unfortunately the person that checks references wasn’t going to be in until Wednesday.
We explained to the hiring authority of the first client that the candidate was fast tracking with another organization. He informs us that “their process is their process.” So, the HR department checks the references on Wednesday and the next day, Thursday of the seventh week, they offer our candidate a job.
The offers really weren’t much different. And the quality of the organizations may not have been much different. However, our second client just looked so much better to our candidate. It appeared that hiring was a high priority. They made our candidate feel like he was joining a first-class, decisive organization. They interviewed him three times in four days, via Zoom. Knowing he was being courted by another firm, two V.P.’s and an Executive V.P. called the guy. They really let him know that he was a very high priority. They discussed the future he might have and simply asked him, “What is it going to take to get you to come to work here? Within reason, we’ll do it!” They simply made the guy feel great about going to work there. He went to work for our second client. The first client is still searching and if they keep doing it the way they are, they’ll be doing it for a long time.
It was the best of times for our second client because they got an “A player.” It was the worst of times for our first client. They even got mad at the candidate because they felt like he had strung them along.
Oh, brother…certainly the age of foolishness.
