With all of the advertising that we do on LinkedIn, Career Builder and ZipRecruiter, we primarily do it to keep our name out in front of everybody so they know who we are if and when the need us. Certainly, from time to time, we get some good candidates by advertising.
But most of our organization is made up of really recruiters. We go out into the marketplace through as many channels as we can and try to find the most perfect candidate that’s available for a client that needs an A+ player. Most of the companies that we work with are average companies in the United States. They are run by “average” people with “average” foibles as well as “average” quirks. In our heart of hearts all of us know that we are, or should be, amazed at how wonderful America and the free enterprise is to see some of these companies become very successful when we know that the people who run them couldn’t find their butt in the dark with both hands.
I digress a bit because the situation that prompted this doesn’t have as much to do with the goofiness of the people who run companies out there as it does with the sheer number of candidates who are available and think they’re qualified for certain situations.
If you are a candidate either actively or passively looking for a job, you need to be aware of what you are up against. We had a candidate, just last week who made a lot of money selling insurance and when we explained it to him that just because he made over $100,000 selling insurance the past few years, it’s going to be a very hard task to find him a job making that kind of money outside of insurance. In fact, we advised him that he ought to keep the job in insurance. It made him madder than hell. He wrote me a relatively nasty letter condemning our organization and the people in it. His comment was, “But with the economy like it is, certainly somebody wants to hire a great salesperson.”
Well, maybe there’s somebody out there that does. But when companies come to us they are going to pay a lot of money to receive the service. And since they are paying a lot of money to receive that service they want and deserve to get and find a candidate through us that they can’t find on their own. No one pays us $20,000 to get what they can find on their own. We not only understand that, but we totally respect it.
Lots of people though, don’t really understand the challenges we run into. On Wednesday I posted a job opportunity for a vice president of managed services. It’s a pretty narrow job and we described it very narrowly, just as it is. Since Wednesday morning I have personally received 185 resumes from people all over the country. Since reading resumes is one of my favorite things to do…NOT!, I was literally blurry eyed up until 10:30 PM on Wednesday and 11 PM on Thursday looking at resumes. Two of these resumes were extremely qualified… at least by what I can tell (I haven’t met the candidates yet) and the rest, although sincerely interested in the job, don’t appear to be qualified.
We already had within our files five or six excellent candidates (four of whom had been clients of ours at one time or another) So these extra two can round out a very good group of people to present to our client.
Here’s the point of all of this: 185 people (correction, I just got two more) 187 people, all of whom think they are qualified for the job have applied. There is no way that I can personally respond to all 187 of these candidates even if they were qualified to do the job.
So, when you send your resume to guys or gals like me or to employers who are trying to find candidates on their own, realize that they are receiving 187 resumes within two days. They are doing the very best they can, but even if there were three of me I still couldn’t reach out to 187 people and tell them I was very sorry but that their qualifications just don’t match what our client wants. Please be as understanding as you can when you don’t hear from me or someone like me.
This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t keep sending a resume if you are qualified for the job. Just remember that whoever is receiving that resume is getting 186 others that think they are just as qualified as you are.
Thanks for your understanding.
