Warts and all
Recruitment writing, part 2
If ye olde LinkedIn were around in the 17th century, it wouldn’t have been selfies that drove the algorithm.
Of course not, cameras hadn’t been invented then.
Instead, it would have been the form of portraiture that makes people taller, wealthier, younger and more attractive.
Not so for Oliver Cromwell. Virtue signalling was not something he valued, preferring the truth, unvarnished.
Thus, he verily didst say unto Peter Lely:
“I desire you would use all your skill to paint your picture truly like me, and not flatter me at all; but remark all these roughness, pimples, warts, and everything as you see me; otherwise I will never pay a farthing for it.”
I imagine if you look at all of the portraits of his peers, it would be his that most resembled the truth.
From this came one of my favourite expressions.
I show a warts and all picture of the vacancies, employers and candidates I represent.
Honesty is a good reason to do this, with a candour that can be disarming.
It’s also about good marketing.
Recruitment is unique in how employers, vacancies and candidates are all types of products, each of whom can change in nature.
To have a truly good outcome in recruitment, it’s not just a question of filling a vacancy but also finding the right person who can thrive in that role long enough to see a return.
Whether that return on investment is in terms of things done, goals reached, salary achieved, career developed, or something else. It’s an ROI for the candidate as much as the employer.
Having clarity on the unvarnished truth of capability, attitude, trajectory and add is the best way to find the right hire.
‘Warts and all’ isn’t just moral, it’s an effective way to recruit.
Here’s a shoe-horned analogy to show why.
If you’ve had the good fortune to find love, it may be because of all their qualities including their flaws, not despite them.
Okay, you probably have a form of personal development plan in there to upgrade your partner and be upgraded by them, but the nuts and bolts are pretty much fixed.
How about those aborted long-term relationships that fell apart because of a disagreement on babies, marriage or Brexit?
Might have been handy to find out before it got serious.
While perhaps you have a friend whose love-at-first-sight partner is highly irritating to you.
Horses for courses.
It’s funny how many parallels there are between dating and recruitment. Haven’t you noticed?
Assuming you aren’t a toxic or discriminatory employer, that what you propose is relevant, and that you don’t have confidential plans that can’t be divulged, showing the full truth of a vacancy does two things:
Gives honest insight into what you are like to work for, what the role entails and what a candidate should expect. The features.
Allows you to establish the genuine reasons your ideal candidates will want to romance you. The benefits.
This will attract more suitable candidates and dissuade less suitable candidates.
A bit like how Marmite owns its delightful grossness, and the experience of its consumers, to create a memorable brand.
For example, the ambiguous and organised chaos common to a growing SME won’t suit people who need structured workloads. Why wouldn’t you highlight that?
However, to show this insight, you need to have found that insight in the first place:
Establish and interpret context with meaning
Audit your job description, and other documentation, to ensure accuracy. You may recall my previous post on “True and Fair” which has a similar meaning to Warts and All. The difference is that true and fair relates to factual descriptions in documentation, whereas warts and all is about showing this with meaning in your marketing.
Correctly defining what good looks like in your ideal candidates.
This requires vulnerability and recognising you aren’t the perfect employer for everyone. If you have difficulty overcoming your blind spots, good recruiters can help.
Once you have these points nailed down, your ‘warts and all’ will be clear.
You won’t rely on bog standard bullet points that say nothing more than your job title might have said on its own.
After all, most people know what their own jobs entail, and your <job title>’s duties will come as little surprise on their own.
Alternatively, you can ignore your ‘warts and all’ and lead with generic wordage (innovative market leader / ninja rockstar) or bullshit (we’re a family / level up your career).
You can also choose to sweep them under the carpet and hope no one notices or complains.
The problem here is that inevitably they’ll come out in the wash, through unconscious statements that raise alarm, or worse still when someone leaves three months into their new job.
As a comparison, my typical advert gets around 40 applications with 30%+ being suitable enough to warrant a call. In a normal market, I hear other recruiters getting 100-400 applications with less than 5% suitability.
I’ve filled around half of my vacancies from advertising in the past couple of years, including those considered hard to fill, as part of a multichannel approach. The rest through other means.
For permanent management and leadership hires, my average retention is 4 years.
Warts and all is one good reason for this.
Get the ‘warts and all’ right and you’ll have cast iron features to underpin your product description.
From there you can show why it matters, which is what the next edition is about.
Thanks for reading.
Regards,
Greg
p.s. While you are here, if you like the idea of improving how you recruit, lack capacity or need better candidates, and are curious how I can help, these are my services:
- commercial, operational and technical leadership recruitment (available for no more than 3 vacancies)
- manage part or all of your recruitment on an individually designed basis for one client (no availability until June 15th at 11.30am)
- recruitment coaching and mentoring (no capacity until May)
- recruitment strategy setting
- outplacement support
Just hit reply to check if my approach is right for you.