You can respond to work the recruiter by the superficial questions they ask and the lack of understanding of your answers.
On this podcast, I encourage you to act like a rookie recruiter, learn and grow.
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Years ago, I used to train beginning recruiters–
You know, little puppies who never did the job before eager wanted to do the right thing. Always asking me, “what do I do now? What do I do now?” Like a big sheepdog… loveable . . . You would like them and they want to do the right thing . . . They would get on the phone and sound horrible! They we get off the phone very depressed.
“I did a terrible job on this one.”
I would pack them on the head. “This is your time to make some mistakes. I’m going to give you a list of firms to call and I want you to practice saying what I tell you to say and with time you are going to get better. You’re going to have to make your mistakes and get used to the fact that at the beginning you just don’t know what you are doing.”
“When you interview job applicants, I’m going to give you some basic questions but, at the end of the day, you don’t really know what you doing yet. You will only collect basic information and, from there, I will send you back for more.”
They would follow my instructions and, from there, they would get more confident and get further down the interview Road. If they were doing business development, they would get better at it because they were learning along the way. From those experiences, they would develop more confidence and more expertise.
You know where I’m going with this one, folks?
I’m talking to you. There are times you just got to make your mistakes. I want you to call firms and talk with them about opportunities. Don’t start with the “A” organizations That you really want to work for. Start with the “C’s,” the ones you don’t really care about that much.
Just get on the phone, call them and talk to the hiring manager. Making mistakes and get better. It’s not going to take you all that long, just like a dozen with these people.
With the rookie recruiters, they usually don’t even know the feeling that they’re working in. Thus, in IT, they had to learn the basics of technology in order to discuss it intelligently. They have to learn the tech terminology. You wouldn’t have to do that, would you?
Of course not! You would have to learn the sales stuff just like they had to learn. It doesn’t take long and you start to get better as you start to have successes.
That’s really my advice for you– start getting on the phone. Start calling people. Introduce yourself, tell them what you are trying to accomplish and start to promote yourself. Start getting information about you out there. Reach out to people, ask for advice. Make your mistakes (yes I want to practice before you call, like I would with the rookie recruiters. I expect you’ll become fearful like most people do at the beginning but then, after the call you all grown and say to yourself, “That was awful. That was terrible.”
Then, I will ask you to ask yourself, “What could I have done better? Where was the mistake? How did it break down? What can I do differently next time?”
This is a learning process.
You see, you’ve been trained out of this industrial mindset to be perfect. You’re not. You won’t be. But, I want you to start getting better.
The only way you can get better is by practice, repetition, making your mistakes and not really worried about the consequences of it. Do you think this hiring managers going to say, “Hey! I spoke to this one. He’s an idiot!” Do you think
He’s going to say that to you? Do you think she’s going to insult you over the phone? Do you think she’s going to yell at you, “What is wrong with you?”
Of course not. So what are you afraid of? Just start talking to people, like working recruiters for 20 years old and no less than the door and just are making your mistakes.
You are not going to make many in the basic mistake you’re going to make is going to come from the fear. The way you overcome fear is through practice and repetition.
So practice, then repeat. Practice. Repeat. Get better things and then, lo and behold, you will have great conversations with people
Should you expect it to be your first call? Probably not. Do you think you will get better by the fifth or sixth call? Probably. Are you going to be perfect? No. With time and practice you will be getting better..
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Do you think employers are trying to help you? You already know you can’t trust recruiters—they tell as they think you need to know … Read more about this episode…