Make Yourself Accessible!!

My thoughts today turn to a pet peeve I have mentioned before but is one that needs to be brought up from time to time. Staffing firms have a huge pool of candidates to look at when identifying candidates for job opportunities. A good recruiter will take a little time to find decent looking resumes before making calls and sending out emails. There is a darn good chance that, if you receive a contact from a recruiter, you are a reasonably good fit for the job at hand!

Time is money and I have a personal rule that I will make every effort to present several qualified candidates to my clients within 48 hours or less of learning of their staffing need. All too often, candidates take five or six days or longer to respond to me. If I wait that long to begin submitting candidates, another staffing firm will likely beat me to the finish line. This is NOT something I like to experience and I make every effort to avoid it.

Candidates will call me a week later and says things like I called their home number but they only check voicemail once a week and I should have called their cell instead. Obviously, I would have called the cell number except it was nowhere on the resume!! Another excuse I get for slow responses is that I used their casual email address instead of the one set up for job searching. Again, how can I write to an address which was not anywhere on their resume?

My rather cold-hearted opinion is that a candidate who does not put the most current or accessible contact information on their resume is not trying very hard to get a job. Some of my critics have told me I am too judgemental but, in my mind, if someone does not take complete ownership of their search I probably would not want to present them to my client companies.

Opinions will be graciously accepted and treated with respect even if I disagree!