Episode 16
Peeling the Onion
Learn how to set yourself up for influence by scratching below the surface on matters like compensation, commute, and other potentially important employment factors, making the mute button your best friend, and learning from the Jedi Knights.
Transcript
Hi, and welcome to The Talent Trade . This is Stephanie Maas, partner with Thinking Ahead Executive Search.
Speaker:I specialize in commercial banking and commercial finance search and am your host today.
Speaker:I want to talk to you about the idea of peeling the onion.
Speaker:Now, if you've been in the search business for any length of time, when I say peeling the onion, Your first thought probably goes to crying without much explanation, and I appreciate that.
Speaker:However, that is not what I'm referring to today.
Speaker:Today we're going to talk about an aspect of elevating our recruiting game.
Speaker:By the way, this can 100 percent be applied to the marketing side of our business as well, but we're going to start on the slightly easier side and focus on recruiting.
Speaker:If you have known me for more than a minute or two in search and I've been to anything that I've ever done that talks about training, you hear me use a phrase all the time.
Speaker:The phrase is good recruiters are good listeners.
Speaker:Great recruiters are phenomenal listeners.
Speaker:So much of our job is super counterintuitive and you know you're doing a good job.
Speaker:If and when you spend.
Speaker:Way more time listening than you do talking.
Speaker:And that's what today's training is about is peeling the layers back of an onion to get to the core of an issue and how as recruiters we typically do that best is setting up an environment where our candidates, and if you're using it for marketing, our potential clients know, and understand that we are here to listen and understand and guide.
Speaker:Only when appropriate or asked.
Speaker:So this oftentimes comes down, especially when you're working with somebody new for the first time and they don't know you or your style.
Speaker:I will tell you, I have candidates and clients that I've worked with for years or known for years, and they know that when we get on a call together, it's their time to talk.
Speaker:And they just fall right in line.
Speaker:They just jump in and know right away what to do and start talking.
Speaker:But in a newer relationship, we have to set the stage for that.
Speaker:So here's a couple of ways we do this again.
Speaker:Keep in mind, good recruiters, good listeners, great recruiters, phenomenal listeners.
Speaker:A great way to set this up is to become a fan and a habitual user of your mute button.
Speaker:When we go into an active listening mode, oftentimes we're told that doing things like going and doing verbal cues that we are listening can be helpful.
Speaker:And they can, when you're a highly disciplined listener.
Speaker:For most of us that are newer in our listening skill set, a little less seasoned, we use it too often.
Speaker:And we use it to cut people off and they stopped talking shortly after we go.
Speaker:So a great way to start setting the stage is when you ask a question or you introduce an idea or you make a statement like, huh, tell me more about that.
Speaker:Hit the mute button.
Speaker:What this does is it brings awareness and intention to when it is our time to talk.
Speaker:Unfortunately, most of us recruiters are talkers by nature and look, that serves us well and Certain environments.
Speaker:So when it comes time to listen, we need to develop a discipline to, I used to say all the time, shut up and listen, but I feel like shut up is so harsh.
Speaker:I know that's crazy, but whatever.
Speaker:So I heard somebody last year say the phrase zip it and listen.
Speaker:And so that's what I'm gonna say going forward.
Speaker:Zip it and listen until you've learned to become a really seasoned, disciplined listener.
Speaker:That is our call to action here is you ask a good question, you hit mute and you zip it and listen.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:By the way, if someone goes, Hey, are you there?
Speaker:Are you listening?
Speaker:You take it off mute and you go, Hey, I hope you don't mind.
Speaker:I'm just taking a couple of notes.
Speaker:I want to make sure I understand what you're saying, or I want to make sure that I'm really getting a grasp on what you're saying, or I want to remember what you're saying.
Speaker:So if you don't mind, I'm just.
Speaker:Taking a couple notes.
Speaker:Hence the pauses.
Speaker:If you even get called out on it, most of the time you don't, but you can always say that if you do.
Speaker:Then the next key, when you become really disciplined at knowing when to talk and when not to, and using your mute button accordingly, then what we can do is we can ask questions that help guide the person we're talking to, to talk more.
Speaker:And the whole point is in being a better listener, we're trying to under.
Speaker:Stand, we're giving them a platform to share what's on their mind and get a better understanding for their situation.
Speaker:What's important to them.
Speaker:Again, this sets us up for an opportunity for influence when it makes sense and it allows us to keep their best interest in mind and in our hearts.
Speaker:So here's some ways that we do this.
Speaker:Questions are the key when you first start in this business.
Speaker:And I can remember doing this like it was yesterday, probably because even though I've been in it for a long time, I still do it like it was yesterday.
Speaker:But nonetheless, we ask surfacey questions and as a by product, we get surfacey answers.
Speaker:Surfacey questions typically have a yes or a no.
Speaker:Or a two to 10 word answer.
Speaker:Again, that's fine to start.
Speaker:These are what I call warmups.
Speaker:So this is like taking the skin off the onion.
Speaker:You're not crying yet.
Speaker:You're not getting into the heart of anything, but you are setting the stage that, Hey, we're going to start talking and I'm going to ask some questions.
Speaker:Then once you get past what I'll call level one questions, we start to get into some better questions.
Speaker:By the way, better questions are often.
Speaker:like, tell me more.
Speaker:That's interesting.
Speaker:How did you get to that?
Speaker:And again, sometimes they sound like questions, but they're really statements.
Speaker:And sometimes they're statements that really sound like questions.
Speaker:Then you can go even further.
Speaker:And when I've noticed the difference between successful, mediocre recruiters and successful phenomenal recruiters is when you get to that Third layer of questions.
Speaker:So for example, I was talking with a colleague the other day, fantastic recruiter does incredibly well.
Speaker:And we were talking about the quality of the questions and one of the questions that they were asking was, tell me about your search activity.
Speaker:What have you been doing on your own?
Speaker:Great surface level question.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:The candidate saying, Hey, they're currently employed, but they're thinking about making a move.
Speaker:Tell me, what have you done on your own?
Speaker:They said, Oh, you know, I've done this, I've done that.
Speaker:Surfacey questions, surface answer.
Speaker:Okay, well tell me more.
Speaker:When you say you've done this, you've done that.
Speaker:What exactly do you mean?
Speaker:Oh, you went on their website.
Speaker:Okay, great.
Speaker:One of their answers to the question, a potential candidate said, Hey, just want to let you know I have talked to another recruiter.
Speaker:The recruiter at our firm said, yeah, great, absolutely.
Speaker:If you're going to do a search, you need to be thorough.
Speaker:I have no problem with that.
Speaker:Here is the next level.
Speaker:The next level, tell me about those conversations where we've talked about a couple opportunities.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:What were those opportunities?
Speaker:And if you don't have great rapport, they may like, Hey, I'm not, you know, I'm not comfortable sharing those details.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:No problem.
Speaker:But just so you know, I, at some point I'm going to need to know, cause you don't want to do double work.
Speaker:It makes you look unorganized and quite frankly, it makes you look desperate.
Speaker:But if you're not comfortable sharing that information with me now.
Speaker:Perfectly fine.
Speaker:So in talking about those opportunities with this other recruiter, what was the extent of the conversation?
Speaker:Have you sent over a resume?
Speaker:Have they presented your background to a hiring manager?
Speaker:Did you give them permission?
Speaker:You need to know this information and you can easily explain to the candidate.
Speaker:Why you need the information.
Speaker:And it's very simple.
Speaker:We don't need to be doing dual work, make the candidate look sloppy and make the candidate look desperate.
Speaker:You don't know if that other recruiter, or maybe you do know that other recruiter might be a resume broker.
Speaker:By the way.
Speaker:If the candidate is comfortable with that, you should be too.
Speaker:It may limit the opportunities at which you can present them, but what's done is done.
Speaker:And again, we're focused on what's in the best interest for the candidate.
Speaker:So that is fine, but you need to know the answers.
Speaker:When I brought this up with the recruiter, his response, which was, it made me so proud.
Speaker:He goes, yeah, I asked all those questions and I was just like, yeah, anyway.
Speaker:Other types of questions.
Speaker:You may be talking about a commute situation.
Speaker:Hey, I work in DC market.
Speaker:Commute is critically important if folks have to go to the office.
Speaker:So tell me about your commute.
Speaker:Well, it's about 45 minutes.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Surface question.
Speaker:Surface answer.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Well, how does that impact your work life balance?
Speaker:I mean, generally speaking, it's fine.
Speaker:I mean, it's annoying and that's fine, but you know, whatever.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Well, tell me more about that.
Speaker:When you say it's generally fine, if you were going to make a move, how would an increase in commute time affect your work life balance?
Speaker:How would a decrease in commute time affect your work life balance?
Speaker:And then you listen and then, then suddenly they start talking about things like, well, Hey, I really don't mind the current commute because that's my downtime.
Speaker:I love listening to podcasts.
Speaker:I do this.
Speaker:I do that.
Speaker:Or, Hey, you may find out things like I take our kids to school three days a week.
Speaker:It's right on the way because of my commute.
Speaker:If it was longer, I wouldn't, I wouldn't be able to do that.
Speaker:I like that time with my kids or what you just find out all kinds of things that impact their decision making and why they make the decisions the way that they do.
Speaker:Same thing.
Speaker:One of my favorite ways to have this conversation is when we're talking about compensation.
Speaker:Now, sometimes it's due to laws and the states that we work, and sometimes I just find I get better answers.
Speaker:Instead of asking people what they currently make, I ask them about, Hey, what are your compensation expectations in this search?
Speaker:And again, it's a surface question.
Speaker:People typically give me a surface answer.
Speaker:They will say things like, well, I'm currently at this and I make a base of this and a bonus of this, but I'd like more or I want 10 percent more or whatever the case may be again, surface question, surface answer.
Speaker:So then I go down to the next level, peel back that onion.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Well, tell me from your perspective, I'd be curious when you think about an increase, what would that mean to you and your family or the idea of making an increase?
Speaker:Tell me where that comes from, why that would be important to you.
Speaker:And then you listen to their answers and then you ask more questions about their answers.
Speaker:Sometimes I hear things that are say, well, I mean, I've kind of always been taught that if you make a move, it should be for more money.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Well, yes, that's often very common, but I'd like to talk through that with you a little bit.
Speaker:If you're in an unhappy situation and I got you more money, but it was a better opportunity.
Speaker:Could those things offset or tell me how you'd feel about that or tell me what you think about that.
Speaker:Now we're going deeper.
Speaker:This is where we get meaningful conversation.
Speaker:By the way.
Speaker:Thinking ahead, we're a big proponent of using scripts.
Speaker:You should have a list of 10 to 15 questions that are your go to questions.
Speaker:When you get on the horn with a candidate, or if you're using it for marketing purposes with a potential hiring manager that you're not, you don't have to think about what you're going to ask next because the questions are right in front of you.
Speaker:Instead, you go into listening mode and you try to really hear what candidates say.
Speaker:When I say great recruiters are phenomenal listeners, I encourage you to go follow or shadow somebody that you think is a great recruiter.
Speaker:Oftentimes they have developed this innate ability to hear what people don't.
Speaker:And the way that you know that they're doing it is by listening to that third level question.
Speaker:When you listen to the follow up questions that they ask, you all of a sudden go, why in the world would they ask that?
Speaker:And then the candidate answers and it's a meaningful response and you're like, okay, that sounded like Jedi mind tricks.
Speaker:It's not.
Speaker:It is learning to listen in such a way that you can often hear what people aren't saying or you hear.
Speaker:Something that sets off your recruiter intuition that there's more to the story.
Speaker:And if we just peel it back a little bit, we get to the heart of the matter.
Speaker:Now, when I say all this, I have to give massive kudos to the first Jedi Knight that I, we call them Jedi Knights that I ever followed that I heard this.
Speaker:And it was someone that had been in the business for about 20 years longer than I had.
Speaker:And when I would shadow him, this is exactly what the shadow experience was like.
Speaker:I would listen to a 10 or 15 minute conversation and he would ask questions that I was like, why in the world would you ask that?
Speaker:Like where did that come from?
Speaker:And then I would listen to the candidate or the hiring manager's response.
Speaker:And it was like, that was the perfect question.
Speaker:to ask.
Speaker:Perfect.
Speaker:And so what I started realizing was that when you listen and really listen and listen to understand, you develop this recruiter intuition that when it's honed, you get to start asking questions that really get to the meat of an issue.
Speaker:And it is in that level of partnership with a candidate that ultimately allows you again, keep their best interest in mind and at heart, but it gives you opportunity for influence.
Speaker:When influence is necessary.
Speaker:So I hope this helps.
Speaker:If you need any help drafting questions, or if you feel like the majority of your questions are surfacy level one questions, I encourage you to go through them and try and find level two or level three, ask colleagues, ask other folks you respond.
Speaker:If you get stuck, please reach out to me.
Speaker:I am happy to suggest resources, training materials we've used in the past, or just one on one help to walk through anything that makes you a better question asker.
