Recruitment is a portal into the valley of darkness
Posted by Mitch on 6th November 2020
“It depends.”
That’s probably the most common start to an answer I give to any question I get in relation to our copywriting training.
“How long should my job ad be?”
“It depends. Who’s the target audience and how much info do you need to share with them?”
“What tone of voice should I use?”
“It depends. Is the ad aimed at Accountants or Graduates?”
It also extends to many other things in recruitment.
Is everyone a passive candidate? Maybe. Sometimes it can be the difference between catching someone on the same day their boss did something to seriously piss them off.
Is retained better than contingency? Generally yes, but it can depend on the calibre of the recruiter and how realistic the client is about what types of candidate they can attract.
And it is this that makes recruitment such a massive mindfuck.
People.
If the past 5 years have reminded us of anything, it’s that people are very complicated.
How else do we explain why someone might want to go through a 4-stage interview process to get offered a job, just so they can use that to get a counter offer from their current employer?
How else can we explain why one hiring manager thinks a particular candidate is brilliant and another wouldn’t hire the same candidate to mow their lawn?
How else could we explain why millions of poor people can believe that an old man who dyes his hair, wears make-up and takes a crap on a gold plated toilet is going to best represent their self-interests?
Beats me. But that’s people for you. Always complicated. Sometimes interesting. Never binary.
“Mitch, are you a people person?”
“It depends…”