Morning routine - Work out, Breakfast, and office
3 Heroes - Mother Teresa, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington
Tea or coffee - Tea
A funny incident that she remembers - A fresher that Kathy spoke to wanted to start working as a manager in his first job.
Dogs or cats - Neither
Favorite movie - The Quiet Man
Favorite book - Eye of the needle
Kathy acts as a Senior Recruiter at NICE Actimize. She looks after North America's recruitment, compliance, performance management, and employee relations.
When you talk to Kathy for the first time, it can be slightly intimidating. The sternness on her face can feel just a little overwhelming in the beginning. But then as you talk to her and get to know her better, things change.
Beneath her stern looks, there is wisdom and compassion.
Kathy brings with her a decade of experience working in the HR field.
I learned so much from her.
When I asked her about the friction between the hiring managers and recruiters, Kathy bluntly said, “The recruiters need to be more accountable.”
When I requested her to elaborate, she told me that in the recruitment process, the recruiters are the experts; not the hiring managers, but the recruiters.
If recruiters are the experts, how can you expect the hiring managers to drive the process?
The recruiters can't be at the mercy of the hiring managers. They can’t simply follow instructions given by the account managers.
No… they need to lead the recruitment process. They need to take charge.
Kathy believes that too many recruiters take the requirement and immediately start hunting the candidate. This, she thinks, is a pretty amateurish way of approaching things.
Kathy then ran me through the exact process of assessment that she uses, a process that every accountable recruiter should use.
“Before you start hunting, sit with the hiring manager and jointly come up with a plan to hire.”
I totally resonated with this. In fact, most of iMocha clients that I have interacted with, suggest the same approach. The objective of this initial meeting is to get really deep into the requirements you expect the candidate to fulfill.
Kathy then went one step further and suggested a really specific tactic, which I believe is really valuable.
“In the initial meeting with the hiring manager, open your LinkedIn and fill in the exact requirements in the search option. Do this in front of the hiring manager. Often, you would realize that the requirement is flawed! For example, a LinkedIn search might show that there are only 1000 candidates in the whole of the USA who fit the requirement! It’s impossible for the recruiter to work with such a low number. But this step ensures that both the hiring manager and the recruiter get a dose of reality. The requirement can be then refined in order to be more realistic.”
While assessing candidates, there are a few red flags to be mindful of. If these flags are raised, the recruiter needs to be really, really careful about hiring that particular candidate. Here are the red flags:
Technology has made the world better, no doubt. But not always…
Kathy advises recruiters against over-indulgence in technology during the recruitment process. While technology and tools help recruiters with the effective filtering of resumes, they can’t always be dependent upon them. It’s not just the keywords that matter.
Only manual filtering of resumes could prevent the recruiters from seeing some really talented candidates who could be hired for other roles in the organization.
As a marketer, I so so resonate with this. Automation and technology do help the productivity of marketers, but a machine can’t replace a human (at least for the time being).
At the risk of sounding old-school, let me say this - In the era of constantly evolving technology, it is so crucial for professionals to be connected to their human side.
Thanks so much, Kathy, for all the lessons.
