To Lie or not lie, that is the question?

Image: TfD

While I do not think this is the best approach in any circumstance, I believe we see more and more of people taking the “grey-area” road rather than being truly truthful in their interview process. This also goes for employers and their hiring reporesentatives.

It doesn’t matter if you are a fresh graduate, mid-level employee with a couples years experience trying to move up or a senior executive wanted to hit the C-level:

People lie in their interviews, no matter how big or small.

Companies lie in their interviews, no matter how big or small.

But don’t you think that the recruiting process, coupled with the current tight market and economic downturn just encourages people to use up their “white” lies even more?

What do you think. Ever catch a candidate | employer in a lie?

Working your way past the locked door, to the room of the interview

I am sure that many of us have had our share of interviews. Gone through the process of entering in data and resume information into a company applicant tracking system for a position. For those of us who may be a little more savvy, we may have built our relationships, made contact with our influential contacts, networked and sweet-talked our way into an interview.

Denied

Whichever way you chose to apply for a job, in the interview is where you feel you did your best. You were the perfect candidate for the position when you read the posting. It was love at first sight. You believed in your heart that you had a great rapport and even did the proper follow-up afterword. Warm and fuzzy feelings ensue - until….

You receive the letter, the email. The standard communication we all have seen when we didn’t get a role.

Dear Notgetin The Job,

Thank you for inquiring about the position of “INSERT TITLE” with the “INSERT COMPANY”, where every day we make a positive difference in the lives of our INSERT CLIENT OR GROUP HERE.

After reviewing a large number of applicants, we have decided to pursue other candidates for this role.  However, we appreciate and recognize the value of your experience.  Your information will be retained and considered for future career opportunities which match your background.

Thank you again for your interest and time for applying.

The ATS

For those of you lucky enough to never see a notification like this, consider yourself, exactly that, lucky. In fact I consider you some type of alien from another planet or someone who denies mail, has no email address or contact information.  Now-a-days email is the preferred communication channel for letters such as this. With the current economy, you are lucky if a company sends notification on any progress within the process of an interview.

Charlie Judy over at HRFishbowl.com had some good points from the SHRM 2010 Annual Conference (#SHRM10 ) in his interview with Gerry Crispin, Principal with CareerXroad.

I personally don’t think it is bad if you get one of these notes. If you have had only one interview then it is sufficient. However, if you have had two or three? If you have been in a room with multiple members of leadership and may have even been a finalist for a position… I do think a personal message from your internal recruiter, HR representative, and/or hiring manager is adequate, desired from the candidate and in good form for the company.

Now if you ended up bombing, insulting or destroying the end of your final interview process then you may not deserve it. Good luck getting anything.

What if your Candidate responded back to you in the same way?

How do you think an internal recruiter, HR representative, and/or hiring manager would react? Would you be offended, look at that candidate negatively. Utter the words “well how dare they!” and ban them from the process forever. Or would you chalk it up and say “that’s the market!”

Dear ImmaNot GonnaWorkForYou:

I wanted to take a moment to thank you for your time in my interview process. I appreciated your interest and your offer to work for XYZ. However, I have decided to pursue other companies that I feel are a better match for my specific job needs and requirements.
I wish you the best of luck in your sourcing, search and future endeavors. Please feel free to check back with me, as I may have interest with XYZ in the future .

Regards,
ImSoAwesome ImWorking ForTheOtherGuy

Think about it, candidates don’t like your response. So when you have the perfect person that you have been interviewing for a role, you make the offer and then they walk away with this response… how would you like it? I do understand we in HR don’t have time to respond to every candidate, but for the ones you have a full process with… don’t you think they deserve the time and closure?

So what are your thoughts? Is this off target? What would your reactions be? I would love to see you comment on it below!

Benjamin McCall on Twitter
http://ReThinkHR.org

When I hear the term Talent Management, I often hear it talked about in the context of recruiting and sourcing. Now I may be completely off, but to me, Talent Management is much more than just finding people for the role. It’s much more than finding the RIGHT people for a company to fill a job. Talent management is more than just recruiting. It is about how you interact, engage and build the people you have, to retain and develop them and even if they leave you, they will want to come back!

One definition I found was this: Talent Management is a holistic approach to optimizing human capital, which enables an organization to drive short- and long-term results by building culture, engagement, capability, and capacity through integrated talent acquisition, development, and deployment processes that are aligned to business goals.

Umm yeah… right. My eyes roll to the back of my head like when I was in my human psychology & anthropology classes’ freshman year.

There are many debates within the circles of HR on how you should Manage Talent. Here is what Talent Management is to me.

Talent Management = Sourcing: All you are doing is finding ways to differentiate you from the competition. Just like a candidate, you are defining and setting up how you will identify, search and contact talent. At the same time, maybe subconsciously you are projecting that beautiful and trendy word called a ‘brand’ that will attract the best, the brightest and help you somehow keep them! At the beginning of hiring, it is a sourcing strategy. You outline responsibilities; define the steps, & plans for contingencies. You also define what success looks like. Your methods become a toolkit that will set your approach and allow you to be flexible. However, this doesn’t mean you should just network or source to fill orders, meet deadlines or be “on to the next one.”

Talent Management = Talent Development: If you get the best and the brightest and ignore their need for development after they arrive, you lose the potential you once had. Talent development happens within performance management and consulting. It works when you help an individual identify and assess their needs in order for them to be prepared in performing their responsibilities to the company. By identifying where they are, where they need to be and the gaps that exist; you will keep them from or allow them to succeed. By identifying the appropriate tools and experiences for that individual, you better position the current talent to reach their full potential and contribute to the value and bottom line. This makes everyone’s job much easier ~ at least in theory.

Talent Management = Succession Planning: This simply means that an organization identifies key roles that need to be filled and the people that need to fill them when the time is right. It is preparing people and positions, getting them ready for a transition and change; not just with the possible change of a person in a position but also within the organization.

I talked to a colleague the other day and I think that there is a lack of this happening. In the current economy you would think that planning for possibility of replacement of key roles would be essential. That you would create opportunities for cross-training, identify people within the company that could fill the pipeline for unforeseen or potential. Yet with budgets dwindling and the focus being on surviving, many are forgetting that they may be surviving now, but when they get out of the trenches, will they thrive?

Talent Management = Saying what you mean, mean what you say: If you boast a great brand. Preach an awesome culture and praise what the organization will do for current and potential employees… and then don’t deliver… you not only hurt the company but also your own reputation. Now is a time where people want and appreciate honesty. Just as you are trying to make a well informed decision from the talent pool you have at your disposal, the candidates are also selecting you based on the promises you keep and the lies you tell.

Talent Management = Leadership: All of leadership, from the hiring manager and recruiter to the department head and CEO need to walk the walk, talk the talk and be ready to show that if need be, they will run with the heard to do the work that needs to be done to help make everyone be successful.

Above all Talent Management = People: In the end, it’s about people. I mean, you’re not managing androids, recruiting machines or training dogs. You are maximizing an individual’s potential to help you and the organization maximizes results! Don’t just be about the money they make for you. Don’t just hire them, forget them and then move On to the Next One…

Jay-Z Featuring Swizz Beatz - On to the next one (click for readers):

Disclaimer: This post was originally on the NAS Recruiting Talent Talk Blog in March of 2010 (without the images and narly video). NAS Recruitment Communications has created and evolved solutions to assist organizations with their recruiting, employment branding and on-boarding/retention efforts. They have not paid me nor nudged me in their direction to advertise them. Check them out.