Ask Steve – EP 5 – How do I handle getting back to all the candidates that have applied to my jobs?
Hello everybody! Steve here from Recruitment School and welcome to another episode of Ask Steve.
Today’s question comes from Nathalie in WA and Nathalie has asked the question, How do I cope to getting back to all these candidates?
So when I say, when she says all these candidates to all these people who have applied to her role or roles. Natalie has only been in the industry for a short period of time for three, four months. And she’s trying to do the right thing. She’s obviously trying to get back to all the candidates because these people have taken the time to apply and she’s trying to get back to them and let them know what’s actually going on. So Nat what I’m gonna do is is run through some Mathematics for you today. I’m gonna be a bit hard and you may or may not like the answer to this question but we’ll see how we go. And at the end of the day. I don’t really mind if you don’t like it but it is reality this is the way the industry works. So let’s go through. Nat has probably come from outside the industry and thought to herself. Well, one of the things I’m going to do when I join the Recruitment industry is I’m gonna get back to every single candidate that’s what we need to do. We need to get back to them cause they deserve it. And lots and lots of people come into the industry thinking like that because if you go and ask anybody their thoughts around the recruitment industry. They all have a gripe around the recruiter not getting back to them. Like I applied to this role in this role I applied to hundred and twenty roles and I never heard back from anybody I got the I received the traditional automatic email saying I haven’t been successful but nobody actually calls me and tells me what’s actually happening and that just annoys me because a recruiter should do that right? That’s what they’re telling us. That’s what the market tells us all the time right? That the recruitment industry is horrible around this sort of stuff and we are and we are but let’s break this down a little bit.
Let’s say Nat has or Natalie has 10 jobs on at the moment we’re gonna keep mathematics really simple. She pushed out an ad for each of them and she’s pushed out so that’s 10 ads straight away. Let’s say she’s had I don’t know. Let’s call it 100 people apply for every single one of the ads. Let’s say they’re 10 totally different roles and she’s had 100 people apply. Now the reason we have 100 people apply for these roles at the moment Natalie is because to get the unemployment benefits in Australia we need to if I’m unemployed, I need to show proof that I’ve actually applied for roles and I didn’t get anywhere. So people will apply for roles all the time and this is a cynic in me but people will apply for roles all the time. Knowing very well that they’re not gonna get the role but then they can go into Centrelink or whatever the department is called now and say hey these are the roles I’ve applied for you can see them there and I haven’t heard back from any of them. They go well done Johnny. Congratulations! You’ve applied for your job here’s your jobs. Here’s your money for the week the month of Fortnite. However it works, right? That’s how the unemployment benefits work so people are applying for these jobs thinking I will give it a go anyway it’s probably not ideal for me but I’ll give it a crack you know because Why not?
So what that means for you though is that you have 100 people that have applied for the role. 100 applications that are sitting there. There’s probably only 10 people out of the hundred that you should be talking to. Let’s use that number so here’s a job. You’ve had 100 people apply for the role there’s 10 people in there somewhere that you need to talk to. What that means is? You got to go through every single one of these candidates and find out with the 10 that need to be spoken to right so you’ve done that. You’ve gone through you found your 10. You put three people forward for a job and one person’s being placed right. Now this is these are contingent roles they’re not retained and not exclusive they’re contingent which means this is a speed to market and you need to make it happen quickly. So you’ve found your people, you’ve put three people forward one person got the job that’s fantastic, Now out of the 10 you spoke to that means there’s nine left. Now that nine you should be able to use them again so they should be entered nine left. Now that nine you should be able to use them again so they should be entered into your database right? And you should be floating those people and getting them out. However if you are trying to get back to the other 90 like me and say sit down and say, Hey Steve just want to let you know that I really appreciate your applying but I didn’t go through with your application because your CV is missing this.
Now that I’ve got you on the phone I wanna have a proper conversation. So this isn’t gonna be a one minute conversation or a two or five minute conversation. I’m gonna push you out to be a 10 minute conversation because I wanna talk about my career. I wanna find out what I need to do to actually get this job or the next job or whatever it maybe assuming that I’m not part of the people who are trying to chase unemployment benefits. So let’s say there’s 90 people. Let’s say 50 of those are genuine applicants that means 50, 10 minute conversations. 50 times 10 That’s 500 minutes. If I pull out my trusty calculator here and I go looking for 500 minutes and divide that by 60. That’s eight hours that you are spending calling everybody back now you have 10 of these jobs. Let’s just assume the same thing happened all the way through that means that there’s 80 hours of you calling back every single one of these people. You don’t have time to do that Natalie. You’re in a contingent very competitive market. You need to hustle you need to move. So this is the reason why you don’t call them back. You don’t have time to call all these people back as much as it would be nice to do you don’t have time to do it. I’m sorry because somebody is above you. Your boss. Your team leader. Your branch manager whoever it is and they’re sitting there saying, Hey Nat I need you to cover your cost. I need you to cover your cost. I need you to cover your cost. I need you to cover your cost. I need you to cover your cost why? Because that’s the way recruitment industry works.
I know it’s a tough one but it’s the fact that we’re a people based organization we need to get a return on the investment in the people okay? So If you’re sitting there calling all the people who were not in the shortlist even you’re not gonna be able to generate the money that you need to be able to generate. So Natalie I hope that helps. I’m sorry, it’s not the answer that you probably wanted but it’s reality right just the way it is so next time somebody says to you I hate the way the recruitment industry doesn’t. Never gets back to you. That’s the reason why. If only people applied for the role that was suitable for the role. We would probably have time to get back to everybody but we don’t. Do I agree with it? No I don’t I don’t agree with it. I’m one of those people that I think we should try and get back to as many people as possible they’ve taken their time to apply to the role we should take our time to get back to them but there’s just not enough hours in a day to do that.
So Natalie hope that helps. if you have any other questions please go to recruitmentschool.com.au Click on the Ask Steve button and go and fill in the form. It’ll come through to us one of our team will take it and then turn it into a Ask Steve episode for you to have a look.
Hey thanks for your time. Look after yourself. Take care of others, be kind and I will talk to you soon.
