Recruitment and Employer Brand

You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Who said that?

How you treat people during recruitment says a lot about your employer brand. Not only to your eventual employees, but also to all the people you interact with during recruitment.

Smart organisations use this opportunity to build a positive image of themselves in the minds of all the people they touch during recruiting new staff.
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact HR2B Executive Search in Vietnam

People Touched during Recruitment:

•

• Successful candidates
• All applicants
• Job ad readers
• Search consultants
• Families / Friends of the above
• Computer Social Network site users of the above

The way you treat job seekers is shared by their family and friends.

Bad news spreads faster than good news.

It is a fact that in recruitment we have to share more bad news than good news in total.

Learning how to treat candidates in a polite and professional way is an important skill in building your employer brand.

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What is 'employer brand'?

An employer brand is like a hair-style. All organisations have an employer brand weather they like it or not. Smart organisations take time to define a style for their brand which is easy to recognise and add value to their goals and objectives.

As with your company brand, your employer brand is made up of the many small things you do when interacting with your employees. Your brand is a promise. It gives people an expectation of how they will be treated.

Actions speak loader than words. Your brand is not defined by glossy brochures or a great video, but by the actions of your managers and staff.

Over the next few weeks we will take a closer look at the actions you can take to build your employer brand. We will use the ‘employee life cycle’ as a roadmap to the opportunities you have as a professional to add value to your company through employer branding.
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact HR2B Executive Search in Vietnam

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Importance of life planning in Career

If you don't know where you are going any road will take you there.

Your job search will be more effective and rewarding if you do a little life planning before rushing out and applying for jobs.

Recent science research has shown that in the absence of visible landmarks or cues from the sun, people who are lost can not walk in a straight line (Current Biology 2009). Dropped in the forest on a cloudy day, people will indeed walk in circles, and the same is true for people dropped in the Sahara desert during the day and at night. We are genetically programmed to wander around.

I have seen the same thing in people's careers. A 30 year old mid-career marketing professional I interviewed recently is an example. Without any clear focus this person wandered around from job to job in different industries and locations with out any clear direction of focus. Each time the person was seeking happiness and each time they ended up back where they started, unhappy and looking for change.

So if you want to walk the straight line to career success, don't count on luck or your own sense of direction, create a 'career compass' and set your direction. Of course it is true that the map is not the territory, so you will have to accept that sometimes you will be 'off-course', but overall knowing your direction will help you make smart career decsions when opportunities come along.

This post was inspired by this Scientific American 60 second science podcast.

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Know what to order from your Head hunter

In this second installment of a six part series, Tom Vovers explains a little about the different categories of search available and gives buyers some tips on how to choose the best type of executive search in Vietnam for their particular business circumstance.

"Often the best solution to a management problem is the right person” - Edwin Booz

Take out a pen and pencil and list down the ways you expect using a search firm will add value to your business. Like any professional service you will be paying a fee. Be clear about what you are buying.

Have you got your list? Ok, your check and see which of your items fall into these categories;

• Administration ease;
• Access to a professional mechanism for decision making;
• Access to labour market knowledge;

Choose a service from executive search firms or headhunters in Vietnam that fits these needs. Below are three types of service. Be clear about what you are buying from your Executive Search Firm.

Recruitment Process Outsourcing
With this service you are effectively buying administrative ease. Your service provider will carry out all the administrative steps necessary to fulfill your own recruitment process. Good companies will help you develop this process. For example, HR2B recently hired a sales team of over 10 people for an education company using this service. Our clients were charged a fee on the number of CVs process, the number of interview held, the number of offers made etc.

• Good for lower level daily hiring needs
• Good for project hiring
• Fee for service

Contingent Search
With this service you are buying the ability of "matching" between your opportunity and the candidates needs and desires. There is some administration and some market knowledge thrown in. It is called 'contingent' because if there is no match, then no fee is paid. In 2008 HR2B placed over 150 people using this service.

• Good for middle to upper level opportunities
• Hard to find skill sets
• Fee based on success
  

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact HR2B Executive Search in Vietnam

Retained Search
With this service you are buying market knowledge. Your service provider needs to understand completely the shape of your industry, the people involved and then use their skill of matching to suggest to you people who can deliver results for your company. At HR2B we will typically do this service for C"X"O searches (CEO, CFO, CIO, etc.)

• Good for higher level opportunities
• Requires a lot of research upfront
• Fee paid upfront and on success

Whatever service you choose it is important that you have a process to your hiring decisions. Our next article will deal with the standard search process. Happy headhunting,

Yours, Tom

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10 ways to Maximise your benefit from a headhunter

From a recent client survey we found that 60% of our customers had never used services of executive search in Vietnam before. For us it is important that our customers know how to use us and to understand about our business. In this first of a six part series, Tom Vovers shares with us 10 ways employers can maximise their benefit from an executive search relationship. What are your comments?


1) Be concise on needs
Be clear about what you want from a candidate. What will be their unique contribution to your company? Avoid ambiguity in our requirements. A good headhunter in Vietnam will help you do this.

2) Be decisive on candidates
Sort into Yes, No and maybe. Re-sort maybe into yes and no. Commit to moving a person on in the process or remove them from the process. Again, this is not time to be wishy washy.

3) Search is not sift
If you find a good person accept them. Don't wait for more candidates. You are searching for the right person, so compare against your ideal, not compare across candidates.

4) Team workUnderstand that your search is a team effort between the Headhunter, the line manager Decision Maker and your HR department. All 3 need to work smoothly together and ideally should have met at least once in the search.

5) Be clear on lines of responsibility
If it is everyone's responsibility then it is no-ones responsibility. Assign decision making authorities in advance of the search. Be clear with your headhunters in Vietnam what you expect.

6) Grant access to management team
Ideally the headhunter should be able to meet with everyone who will work with your candidate. This enables them to match on company culture and personal motivations as well as skills and experience.

7) Show interest in the search
If you are sent a confidential report, read it. Don't outsource responsibility for filling the role to your headhunter. It is a team effort and they will work with you in making the best possible placements.

8) Give prompt and complete feedback
Part of showing interest is to give prompt feedback. Good candidates have options. If you take time to give feedback the best candidates may have moved on to other companies. Be as precise in your feedback as possible. Simply saying "not suitable" leaves the headhunter and the candidate guessing. Use rejected candidates to be more precise about what you are looking for.

9) Use one firm per job
Avoid confusion in the market place and with your candidates. Having two firms searching for one role sends all the wrong messages to candidates and can lead to damaging your relationship with the headhunter.

10) Make job offers quickly and clearly and in writingUse your head hunter to come up with an offer that the candidate will accept. Make one clear offer and then put it in writing. Don't waste time over terms and conditions.
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact HR2B Executive Search in Vietnam

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5 mistakes Job seekers make

Some great advice from the USA that applies to Vietnam too.

From Heather Boerner, for Yahoo! HotJobs

Mistakes People make when they are laid off or retrenched:

1. Not recognizing their feelings. Losing a job is a major stresser. Aside from the obvious effects on your financial security, there are all those feelings of low self-esteem and despression to deal with. Don't ignore the feelings. Accept them and get on with the business of getting a new job.

2. Don't make your only goal just getting a job. Make smaller increments your goals. Boerner recommends:

* Instead of "I will get a job in X field this year," try "I will send out five resumes this week."
* Instead of "I will have three job interviews this month," try "I will call five people for informational interviews today."

3. Don't apply for every job you're remotely qualified for. That will only increase your chances of getting rejected and further erode your self-esteem.

4. Avoid negative people and experiences. If there is someone or something in your life that drains you emotionally, avoid it.

5. Don't put yourself in a "settling" state of mind. You didn't ask for it, but being laid off offers you an opportunity to figure out what you're really passionate about. Don't always go for the job you know you can do — go for the one you want to do.

see full article

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Falling at the HR Department Hurdle

Executive Search Service for professional level opportunities involves handling softer less tangible selection criteria than can be found on a person's or by conducting a general interview. Our clients are looking for people that will fit with their company culture. This is where HR2B and other reputable firms of Executive Search in Vietnam can really add value to your business.

We specialize in "getting under the skin" of our candidates, to know them, to understand their feelings and motivations and to help them decide what is best for them in their working life decisions. We verify our experienced perceptions by reference checking and fact checking.

We match this with our client's requirements. That is why it is vital for us to meet, discuss requirements and get feedback from the hiring decision maker. The hiring manager.
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact HR2B Executive Search in Vietnam

Human Resources departments play an important role in facilitating this relationship, and in providing us with the confidence that the manager we are talking to does in fact have the authority and permission to make a hire. Many HR departments try and stay in the middle of this relationship leading to slow process, unclear communications and a missed opportunity to make the best possible use of resources and talent.

Recently one of our fortune 500 customers changed their policy. We have been working with them for over 3 years providing a steady pipeline of talented people to their business in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

This client employed a new Vietnamese HR manager who interpreted a global policy as saying that line managers could not talk to executive search companies. He had this inserted in our scope of work. We tried to operate like this for 3 months and had many difficulties. We met with this client and explained the difficulties of slow process and inaccurate or incomplete feedback. Our old route of problem escalation via "Regional HR" had been downsized due to the recent economic crisis. Last week we had the line managers of this company contacting our consultants directly, and asking us to provide them with candidates for review before the "HR Department Hurdle".

Today I have ended the contract with this firm. The reason is that we have an obligation to our candidates to be their partner through their job role change process. The actions of this fortune 500 company prevented us from keeping our promise to our candidates.

The reaction of the Vietnamese HR management was to be 'administrators' of a global policy rather than trying to add value to their employer organisation and partnering with us in the difficult endevour of finding the right people for their business. They have made themselves into an obstacle rather than a resource. A wasted opportunity.

Hopefully soon this company will change and we will have the chance to partner with them again. In the meantime we can already see their employer brand becoming less shiny in the Vietnam market. This will surely be costly to that organisation, but more importantly it is bad for the good people who are working in there whose reputation will be dragged down along with their employer.

In this new connected world where LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites allow instant communications between people of all levels, it is quaint of HR departments to think they can stand between their managers and the outside world. Yes there has to be controls and monitoring, however modern organisations have to open themselves up to allow value adding activities to happen faster and easily.

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