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RANDY WILBURN, from page 3

DIGITAL RELATIONSHIP RECRUITING ...

and you will do whatever it takes to get in front of them. Most of the time, you look for an introduction to this potential client or try to figure out a way to position your firm so that they notice you through some marketing effort or via a mutual friend, colleague, or as- sociate. A lot of times, your next big project is actually disguised in a relationship that you already have or are attempting to develop. When it comes to recruiting talent for your firm, there is quite a bit that you can do to establish relationships with people that you might one day want to hire. I like to think of it as priming the pump. For those of you that have lived on a farm for any period of time, you know the effort that it takes to get nice cold well water to come to the surface. The first several pumps will yield little to any results, but then water will start to flow. Building relationships with intentionality works in much the same way. You have to get out there and meet and interact with as many people as you can. Some efforts will appear wasted at first, but the idea is to make a connection, learn about people, and try to establish a con- nection. The design industry offers plenty of opportunities for hiring managers to meet great candidates and create a dialogue with them. You have project meetings with many firms in attendance, business mixers, association gatherings, and the random bumping into someone that you know from another firm. These are all opportunities to establish rela- tionships. I look at every meeting or encounter as a chance to connect with someone new. Some relationships will take longer than others to develop, but, if you don’t make the ini- tial effort, the relationship will never happen. Here are four ways to build relationships and establish connections with people that you meet in the A/E industry. Find a common ground. When you are speaking to someone in the industry, find out what similar projects he/she is working on. It’s not that you have to share trade secrets, but in our industry, we usually have an idea of what’s going on. It’s always good to check someone’s tem- perature this way, and it opens up an opportunity for you to compare notes with someone that might have a different perspective on things. Discuss the future of the industry. Things are rapidly changing. I took a hiatus from the de- sign industry to do small-business consulting on my own, and when I got back, there were a lot of changes with the way firms operated, the technology used, and the way recruiting is done. Nothing stays the same, and I find it interesting to learn where people think the market is going in the next five to 10-plus years. This feedback can be insightful and offers a window into how someone thinks about their profession and the opportunities that exist within it. For instance, if you hear a lot of hemming and hawing about the market and people wishing things were like “the old days,” take note of that. When our team recruits a potential candidate and they have a lot of negative things to say about the industry and their job, we make note of that. When possible, the glass should be “half full”! Find out what they are working on that excites them. When talking with someone in the design industry, I enjoy finding out what they like and don’t like about their assignments and what’s been their biggest takeaway so far. Most of the time, people love talking about what they are doing. Every now and then someone might be working on something confidential and thus cannot elaborate, but most of the time this is not the case. Ask them about something other than work. I like to talk sports, pop culture, or other cur- rent events with a potential candidate to learn more about them and keep the conversation light. Talking about work all day can – and does – get boring. See if you can find some com- mon interests to discuss further. You might find out you both love car racing or fly fishing, or cycling, or the Pittsburgh Steelers. The only topics of discussion to leave off the table are poli- tics, race, religion, and Donald Trump (kidding!). Those are rabbit holes you don’t want to go down, and if you do, sometimes you never recover. Recruiting and establishing relationship involves a lot of hard work. If you work in a spe- cific area of the A/E industry and you run into the same people all the time, it is incum- bent on you to do what you can to establish a regular dialogue where possible. Like Jim Haggerty at ABC News, you never know where your next talent referral will come from. I’m always happy to answer questions about recruiting, retention, and relationship build- ing! Send me an email if you have anything I can offer insights on. RANDY WILBURN is Zweig Group’s director of executive search. Contact him at rwilburn@zweiggroup.com.

The Internet is the perfect medium for relationship recruiting. Its technology provides a mass one-to-one communications capability that enables you to reach out and touch hundreds of individuals with a message that is custom tailored to them. To be most effective, you should use the Internet to build relationships with three groups: Your employees. If your organization is like most, it includes an employee- referral program in its recruiting efforts. The Internet can help you to extend and enrich this program, expanding its contribution to candidate development. Use email to promote the referral program, announce awards, and thank participants. Candidates for your current openings. Use email to respond to every application you receive (including those from individuals not qualified for a current opening, as they might be a legitimate candidate for future vacancy, keep active candidates informed of their status, direct candidates to information on your website or to online articles in publications, and continue the selling process by sending them a candidate newsletter or other communication about the firm. Those who are not yet candidates. Use the Internet to expand your networking. Join and participate in virtual communities, offering your expertise as a resource for their members. Transform the employment area of your website into a a rich trove of job search and career management information that is open to and designed to serve everyone. Wherever possible, capture individual information so that you can continue to interact with visitors after they’ve left the site. Source: JobHuntersBible.com

THE ZWEIG LETTER NOVEMBER 9, 2015, ISSUE 1127

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