So You Want To Be A Recruiter?

For most people, recruiting is seldom their first career choice. Many recruiters entered the field in a round-about way or they were down on their luck and lured by the lucrative commissions. Today, the profession is better established, and recruiting is on the radar screen of many young, middle and senior level job seekers. While we've all come into the profession at different times and on different roads, the choice to be paid for performance requires a unique and totally committed individual. You will need to possess a real appreciation of the challenge and excitement of bringing skilled candidates together with employers. "WARNING! Closing the intangible sale is easily the most difficult!"

Recruiters must execute a complicated two-way sale involving the candidate and the employer. Success requires excellent sales and relationship building abilities, strong ethics, honesty, good judgment, and business savvy. Recruiters must carefully evaluate the candidate and the position to ensure that the fit makes sense. The uncertainty and tension between the candidate and employer evoke a measure of drama, calling for a sales technique that often resembles diplomacy.

Although the challenge of deal making hooked me on recruiting, what's made me stay is the long-term independence. The potential for freedom and self direction makes recruiting a haven for entrepreneurial self-starters. Independent recruiting combines small-business values with big-business customers. Both require flexibility and the ability to interact with a wide variety of personalities. Successful recruiters find ways to whether the challenges and enjoy the triumphs.

Unfortunately, along with the rewards comes the potential for failure. Most recruiters find ways to deal with situations in which everyone loses. When the perfect candidate pulls out at the last minute, when a company is forced to close a requisition prior to filling the position: these are situations where no one wins. However, the nature of loose-loose ordeals makes the win-win deals something to definitely savor. As the economic pendulum swings back and forth, clients become candidates and then candidates become clients.

While recruiting continues to evolve, the benefit which initially drew me in, challenge and independence, and the ability to earn uncapped income. The recruiting industry is a fast-moving and perpetually evolving profession. Recruiting will continue to grow and attract intelligent, dynamic people who thrive on challenge.

Good Hunting!
Coach Mark

Networking Works!

"Networking" is undoubtedly the best method for identifying career options, as 70 percent of the senior-level executives we've surveyed credit this activity for their success, and more than half of corporate and search firm recruiters reportedly find candidates this way. But "networking" is a broad term, with differing interpretations, and analysis from the ExecuNet 16th Annual Executive Job Market Intelligence Report found that this activity varies by age group.

Executives over age 50 are more apt to develop new contacts online and in-person and their networking actions mirror those of the overall survey group of 3,600+ senior-level leaders.

Executives aged 25 to 40 are more reluctant to get referrals from networking contacts and expand their circle of connections. Direct connections probably know many of the same people and opportunities as you, so reaching beyond them to "warm leads" is a great method for sourcing new career options. The 41- to 50-year old executives are most familiar with this tactic, and they are the most likely age group to ask existing contacts for referrals.

Contacting search firms/recruiters" is among the least popular job search strategies for all age groups, although 25- to 40-year olds are the most comfortable with recruiter outreach. Some may not know the best ways to reach recruiters is to network into a search firm as you would any other organization. Find out the name of a partner and then do your due diligence to find someone who knows the partner or someone else in the firm just as you would with any other company."

However you define it, "networking" can be both a deliberate or spontaneous act. Researching and seeking out an individual who might be a good source can produce the same outcome as striking up a conversation with a stranger in a car wash waiting room. It may yield some opportunity or just be a friendly way to pass the time. In either case, there are benefits.

Good Hunting!
Coach Mark

What about San Diego?

San Diego may be the quintessential California town of sandy shorelines and perfect weather, but it's not filled with slacker-surfer types. The buisness climate is healthy -- Computers, electronics, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, and venture capital funded start-ups are a few of the industries that push this West Coast paradise into the top 20 cities for five-year job growth, according to the Forbes/Milken Institute.

Residents work hard and play hard, putting to use the city's beaches and Balboa Park, a picturesque 1,200-acre urban playground with 15 museums (aerospace, natural history, anthropology, art, and more), and that famous Zoo.

Add in world-class performing arts (ballet, opera, theater, symphony), pro baseball and football (the Padres and the Chargers), a diverse dining scene (from taco stands to seafood hot spots overlooking the beaches and harbor), and it's easy to see why the city has so many ardent fans.

Paradise does have a price: The median house price is $379,300 so think twice and prepare for sticker shock—San Diego is second only to Boston in cost of housing. San Diegans are always busy and working hard to pay that large monthly mortgage or rent. As they say, "There are 2 classes of people in San Diego - Those that can afford to live here and the mexicans."

Click here for a Photo gallery of San Diego, CA

Good Hunting!
Coach Mark