Job application woes -- what is a lie and what is an omission?

 

I have had a couple of cases recently where an inaccurate job application cost the candidate the job.  One was a simple misunderstanding and the other was a little bit more misleading.  At the end of the day the employers did not attempt to define what was intentional and what was not.  It is a black and white issue and you have to be on top of your game when completing an application.  Whether it is the first step or the last step, this is something to do with care.  It becomes part of your permanent record with an employer.

Here is the problem - many companies do this online anymore.  Which leads to someone completing the application at 11:30 pm once they have tucked their kids in, done household chores, and have an empty gas tank from an exhausting day.  This leads to missing a small detail.  Or putting in the wrong information regarding your base salary from three jobs ago.  Or having the incorrect job title for your most recent employer.  This stuff matters and it matters greatly.

Oftentimes candidates wonder why this is even a necessary step, especially if it is the first step.  My response is black and white, just like the employers will view it.  It does not matter why, but it does matter how.  Spend some additional time to track down the correct information and be meticulous when completing an application.  Take an extra day to call an old employer's HR department to absolutely certain you have the right information.  Check your W-2's from the previous year to put in salary information down to the penny.

What really drove this idea home for me was my wife's comments after the most recent debacle I encountered with a candidate's "omission" on his application.  She was attending a SHRM conference last week and the speaker said that you only have one chance to keep an employer's trust.  Once you have lost it, seldom will you ever get it back.  So if you show during the most basic part of the interview process (completing an application) that you may be misleading or able to stretch the truth even a little, you will likely be capable of doing that once on the job.  

Lesson to be learned - ALWAYS complete an application with updated and correct information.  It never pays to omit information, even if it is unintentional.  It could cost you when it comes to offer stage.

Five reasons to use a recruiter

 

As you can imagine, we are asked all the time about the value we provide to the interview and employment process from candidates and clients alike.  I have been reminded on many levels in the past couple of weeks why we can play an integral role not only in the introduction phase and facilitation of interviews, but also ongoing success of our candidates and company partners.  Here are five simple reasons to consider.

1) Objectivity -- although many recruiters act as a hammer and the candidate is a nail, a good recruiter can really stand apart from the interview process to provide third party advice.  With nine years of experience in the business I have seen just about every kind of client and every kind of candidate.  I can draw upon those experiences to guide candidates and clients through the choppy waters of a conversation.  I'm not any smarter than either party, but I can point to experiences where others have made mistakes in the past.

2) Communication -- I can't tell you how many times we have had candidates tell us that we seem to really know our clients well.  This comes with time and really making effort to ask in-depth questions.  It can even be beneficial when a candidate doesn't end up going to work for the company.  We even tell candidates when a situation is NOT what they are looking for based upon their search criteria.  This makes for a much more efficient process as opposed to throwing wet noodles at the wall to see what sticks.

3) Transparency -- this goes hand in hand with the idea of objectivity I mentioned above.  This is critical especially when it comes to the offer stage.  If a candidate does not know everything they need to know to make a decision, they will likely hedge.  If a company has any hesitation about a candidate, they may not come out with a competitive offer.  Our job is to get all cards on the table in a fair and objective manner.  This sometimes leads to a handshake and walking away from a deal, but that is much better for everyone involved than making a bad hiring decision.

4) Counselor -- by getting to know our candidates well, we are uniquely positioned to listen to questions, concerns, issues, obstacles, etc.  No opportunity is ever guaranteed to be your last career move, but it is our job to ensure best effort is given while employed.  I have even counseled active candidates that are desperately seeking a new job to stay put for six months or more to wait for the market.  This can ultimately lead to a much better long term career decision and a happier employer down the road.  

5) Friend -- this is the simplest and most complex reason all wrapped up into one.  Who do you go to for advice on your most difficult life decisions?  Who do you ask out for lunch when you have a challenging work issue?  Who do you lean on when you're just flat out having a bad day?  We can play all of these roles and provide an outlet for candidates and clients alike.  But you won't reach out to me unless you trust me.  Once you can find that level of comfort, you are doing more than a job as a recruiter.

I almost made this into a top ten list and could certainly come up with a myriad of reasons why you should consider working with a recruiter in the future.  But I like the image of a "high five" as I want to portray a good experience as many people have had bad experiences with a recruiter.  Perhaps I should have titled this blog "Five reasons to use a GOOD recruiter"........

What have your experiences been with recruiters in the past?  I would love to hear your stories!

Depth chart -- what is your perpetuation plan?

Anyone who follows Iowa Hawkeye football knows the phrase "next man in" well, especially when it comes to our running game.  We were reminded of the importance of that phrase on Saturday afternoon when our first and second string tailbacks were both injured.  In came a non-scholarship player who appears to be more of a fullback than starting tailback.  More than 100 yards and three touchdowns later, the fans were all chanting "Weisman for Heisman!"

We all know that agencies and carriers alike love to hire college grads or life experience hires that they can train, mentor, guide, and build into legacy producers or salespeople.  The problem that follows is quite often total lack of ongoing support.  They say their philosophy is to hope they're "game ready" when they're faced with a tough situation, but they have not had the proper mentality in practice.

Okay, I might be stretching a bit here with football language, but bear with me for a second here.  I argue that Weisman had success on Saturday because he had repeatedly been told in camps and practices leading up to that game that he should be ready to play even if the chances were slim he would see the field.  Prior to Saturday's game he had touched the ball only a couple of times in an actual game.  But because his coaches had ingrained in his mind that he should be ready if called into action, he was able to perform at a high level when his number was called in the huddle.  He even went on to embrace the challenge and looked like he was having the time of his life.

Does your sales leadership remind new producers or salespeople of all of the fundamentals necessary to achieve success in real world situations or do they just throw them on the streets with a pat on the back and hope for success occasionally?  Do they know what the future will hold if they practice and play hard even when no one is looking?  How important are they compared to the million-dollar producer that gets all of the accolades at sales meetings and in the board meetings?

You can't have a highly successful sales team by accident.  You must preach on a daily and weekly basis the idea of what the near future goals should look like to eventually achieve long term success.  The daily grind may not be fun and could come with some pain.  You may see the tenured producers getting away with days off and the "easy life" with big paychecks and carrier reward trips.  But you never know when your number might be called and you could land a huge meeting with a valuable prospect.  Or meet with a broker that could lead into hitting your premium goal with a large association/program.  If you are not ready to be the "next man in", you could lose on the opportunity.  How do you want to be remembered?

All I want for Christmas.......

I know it is a little early to be talking about the holidays, but was reminded of this popular song yesterday afternoon when my son lost his two front teeth wrestling with his cousins.  He took a face plant on the floor and came up holding one tooth and the other was hanging by a thread.  In fairness to my nephews, both were already quite loose and my wife had promised to pull them by Wednesday of this week before school pictures.

Here is the question of the week -- as a prospective employer or active candidate, what are you hoping to get before Christmas?  With the fourth quarter nearly upon us, I am quickly finding out who is serious about making moves before the end of the year and who might just be fishing around in the market. 

Some of my clients are already making plans for fourth quarter hires and interviewing candidates as we speak.  I even have a few that have been actively interviewing for openings for the past 2-3 weeks and becoming quite anxious to fill the positions before October 1.  This strategy will give a new employee plenty of time to get acclimated before the year-end rush, along with getting them ahead of the curve for planning for 2013.  Although there is nothing inherently wrong with hiring someone in November or December, there is a lot of advantage to making a move now if you know it is going to happen in the fourth quarter at some point.

On the candidate side of the equation, I am beginning to see passive candidates turn active, active candidates put their foot on the gas pedal even more than previously, and in general more candidates simply wanting to know what options are available.  As a candidate you must always balance between making a move for the sake of making a move vs. really finding your next long term role.  But now is certainly a key time to at least begin discussions if making a job move is a goal by the end of the year.

Just as I am hoping that my son's teeth are filled in by Christmas, it is also my desire to help clients and candidates alike make their dreams come true before the end of the year.  The question is, are you going to take action and make something happen or wait until it is possibly too late? 

Milestones vs. change

Our new website is near completion and today we are all changing our profile pictures that were taken a few weeks ago.  The last time this happened was more than four years ago, and a lot has changed since then.  I was particularly reminded of this fact over the holiday weekend as September 2 was both my ninth anniversary of joining Capstone and my twelfth wedding anniversary.  Then September 3 was my twelfth anniversary of turning 25. 

I am incredibly grateful for what has comprised the last twelve years personally and professionally.  I have been blessed at home with a wife I couldn't live without, along with three precious children that are all growing up way too fast.  Add in an incredible employer that pushes me to be the best I can professionally and it seems like a blink of an eye when considering what the last decade-plus looks like.

At first I was proud of the milestones and I thoroughly enjoyed the trip down memory lane over the past several days.  Then I got to thinking about all of the change that has occurred during this timeframe and that is even more exciting the more I thought about it.  I don't think I would have had all of the accomplishments I have achieved without embracing the change that came along with the territory.  I have had to be a different husband with each new child we added to the Winterboer fold.  I have had to be a different father each time as well.  I have had new pressures on my time management with work in the midst of these changes, and that continues to change as my kids' schedules seem busier than mine most days.

Many more changes have occurred at Capstone over the past nine years.  I have been forced to embrace technology like never before, I have had to adapt to changing economic pressures, I have been forced to diversify how we deliver customized solutions to our clients, and I have had to interact differently with candidates during the past 3-4 years of increasing unemployment.

Here is the question I pose to you -- is aiming for long term milestones or being adaptable to constant change more important in order to be successful going into 2013 and beyond?

Do you have a "farm system"?

I know that football season is upon us and that is where my focus should be.  My son has his first flag football camp tomorrow morning at 7:45 am, as a matter of fact.  But several recent conversations with agency clients of mine have me thinking about the topic of a farm system.  For those of you that are not baseball fans, this is simply another term for the minor league franchises affiliated with the corresponding major league team.  We are fortunate here in Des Moines to have the Triple-A affiliate of the Cubs, hence the logo of the team on this week's blog.

Here is where we can all learn something.  All major league teams focus on blockbuster trades after the All-Star break to propel them to the playoffs and hopefully the World Series.  But unless you have the budget of the New York Yankees, you do not have an unlimited budget to make those moves.  So you have to focus on developing younger players and have them work their way up from Single A to Double A and Triple A.  You might have to throw a signing bonus or two at the best younger players, but for the most part they are playing for small weekly stipends to get them through each and every day.

There are several reasons why this is successful for the baseball profession and I believe they translate into the insurance industry.  The first reason is that the potential is there for every player to reach the big leagues and sign a multi-million dollar contract.  While in the minor leagues they focus on the details and even learn from some veterans that might be in town for a re-hab assignment.  The parallel here is to make certain your older, tenured, and successful producers are always spending time with the newer and younger producers.  Simply being around someone who has been successful at another level will rub off on you.

Secondly, players go into the minor leagues knowing that playing baseball is what they want to do.  They are not plumbers, carpenters or realtors that one day decided that playing baseball for a living would be fun.  So naturally you should align yourself with people that have an understanding of insurance, are committed for the long run, and maybe even have some outside influence of other industry professionals that have been successful and might be able to mentor them in the early years.

Third, and perhaps most important, is that the team does matter.  Although each player is grinding through each practice, game, road trip, and workout to achieve an individual goal, they all know they will go farther with the team's best interests in mind.  You must foster an open environment within an agency that promotes the idea of helping others.  When I was a young producer I had the opportunity to work with a few of the interns that were working with us in the summers.  As much as I had going on with my own production goals, I always thoroughly enjoyed bringing an intern with me on a sales call or renewal meeting to show them what I had learned at that point in my career.  It was usually invigorating for both parties and a great way to keep me on my toes as I had another pair of eyes watching and ears listening to my every move.

The last point I will make will also show where my big league loyalties lie, if it isn't already obvious.  The Cubs right now are sacrificing short term success for a bigger and better long term plan.  Sometimes you have to commit to the future by working hard on a plan in the present that may not be widely accepted.  You might have to make changes that the "veterans" won't like but that could improve profitability or productivity going into the next 2-3 years.  Instead of spending big money on a well-known producer with a large book, you decide to hire three or four younger producers with a lot of upside.  There is no one magic formula, but I sure believe that there is some great benefit to developing a well oiled machine called a farm system.

Taste of the good life

We are in the midst of the greatest phenomenon in Iowa outside of the annual corn and soybean reports that will come out in 6-8 weeks.  It is called the Iowa State Fair.  Over one million visitors stop by each year, easily making it the most attended event of the year for our great state.  You can get just about any food you can imagine on a stick.  Fried Twinkies are by far my son's favorite, and I tend to agree with him.

What I really like about the Fair is that you tend to stop and look around a bit instead of just trying to run from booth to booth.  This is a great reminder for candidates when they are seeking a new position or interviewing for a different role.  Far too often people tend to move quickly and not really view the process through an objective lens.  They are most interested in leaving what they view as a "bad" situation with their current employer, chasing more money even if the job isn't the best match, or even sometimes pushing toward offer stage just to feel wanted.  None of these are good options if you are looking to make a career move that will stick and be a long term solution.

Or just like at the Fair, there will be people that want to move faster than you are moving.  We still take a stroller for our two-year old and teenagers especially didn't like the pace we moved at while walking around the main concourse.  This is more of a danger for employers that have an immediate need that can't wait another day to be filled.  If you take the first candidate that comes in the door despite it not being a direct match, you will certainly pay for it shortly after the candidate commences employment.  It can also adversely affect a candidate's opinion of the company if they are not patient about scheduling interviews or waiting for response regarding references or other administrative details.

Most recruiters will tell you that time kills all deals and would actually love the process to move quickly every single time a candidate interviews with a client.  While there is certainly some truth to that, we are always more interested in finding a balance, taking the appropriate amount of time to fully vet a candidate, and even passing occasionally when timing simply doesn't work out.  It is a much better long term approach that will inevitably produce better results.  Just like the Fried Twinkie in the captioned photo, it is best sometimes to let your food digest before moving quickly to the next booth to eat a double bacon wrapped corn dog.......