The air has been thick
on ERE and all over the recruiting space; thick with the din of
ethics, legalese, and honesty and integrity discussions. What should
you say to get around the gatekeeper without being deceitful? How
much information should you reveal to the gatekeeper? How should you
introduce yourself to the passive candidate when you call? What is
ethical in sourcing and what isn't?
I am going to avoid all
that and focus on two very important aspects of great recruiting:
how to get around a gatekeeper without rusing (today's article) and,
once you get to the prospect or candidate, how you define the
purpose of your call and then execute the art of recruiting (an
article to come).
This will be about
tactics; a practical teaching session that any recruiter can execute
immediately. During my 12 or so years of recruiting and recruiting
leadership I have learned a variety of tactics from some of the
best-known names in the recruiting industry. Names like Sullivan,
Radin, Leffkowitz, Adler, etc., read like a who's who of recruiting
consultants and teachers who have shaped my execution, teaching, and
leading in the recruiting industry.
The tactics and techniques
I teach to my teams and that I will relay here come from my
experience with what gets results and what the aforementioned
recruiting industry thought leaders have taught me and many others.
This article won't discuss phone-call name generation or sourcing
techniques, but that will likely come in a later article. Much of
what I executed successfully as a recruiter, and now teach as a
leader, was learned from Peter Leffkowitz in my TPR days. Those of
you who have attended any of his seminars or training will recognize
much in this article.
A Hypothetical Situation
You are conducting a
search for a director of marketing or VP of marketing. If you're a
really great recruiter, you have competitive intelligence on a few
candidates who you know are high performers. One of those high
performers is a senior-level marketing professional at one of your
competitors named Barbara Smith. You are now ready to make the call.
Given the senior-level
scope of your search, there's a high degree of likelihood you'll
encounter your targeted prospects' executive secretary or
administrative support; the dreaded gatekeeper. Damn the man!
Want To Know How To Get Around a Gatekeeper? Hang Out
With One
The first thing you need
to do is get to know someone who has been a gatekeeper. Just about
every organization has at least one gatekeeper or someone working in
the company who did it in a prior life. Ask them how they did it.
Understand how they were trained and what scripts they use. Listen
to them apply their craft. Incidentally, hiring former gatekeepers
to be recruiters is a very sound recruiting strategy.
In order to get around the
gatekeeper, it is critical to know the script almost all gatekeepers
employ. Gatekeepers are taught to answer the phone in a very
specific way, and the script pattern they use is designed to get as
much information from the caller in order to make a decision about
who to let through and who to block. Great gatekeepers are trained
to block everyone unless they make a compelling argument for why
they should be let through or the person they support has
specifically indicated a caller should be let through.
Before we talk about how
to design the call and get by the gatekeeper, we need to look at a
typical recruiting call and the common script pattern a gatekeeper
will likely use during their interaction with you the recruiter. As
part of the call examination we need to look at how most recruiters,
especially those in the corporate recruiting world, script their end
of the call. Most TPRs are usually much better at this, though you
wouldn't know it by the voicemails and calls I have received from
some of them recently.
The background now set,
let's "listen in" on our hypothetical call:
Gatekeeper: Good morning; Barbara
Smith's office.
Recruiter: Good morning;
Barbara please.
Gatekeeper: May I tell her who
is calling?
Recruiter: Of course. This is
Michael Homula calling.
Gatekeeper: What
company are you with Mr. Homula?
Recruiter:
Quicken Loans.
Gatekeeper: And the nature of
your call?
Recruiter: Choke, gasp, uhhh,
mmmm, aaahhh...
Read that exchange three more
times. It is important to imprint this gatekeeper-recruiter
give-and-take into your brain. It's a dance, and you have to know
the movements of the dance in order to effectively dance with your
partner (the gatekeeper) and get around them.
The gatekeeper script
pattern outlined in this example is how the vast majority of them
are trained to execute their craft of blocking you. It's effective
and often works very well. In order to know how to execute this call
the right way, we have to first look at how it is done wrong. So,
don't read ahead. Stop right now and go back and read the exchange
three more times, paying careful attention to the word patterns, the
order and the rhythm of the call.
In the example above, our
recruiter (played by me) did a few things right but a lot wrong. One
thing the recruiter did do right was disarm the gatekeeper and build
rapport by using her first name. Assuming you could actually "hear"
this call, you would also know the recruiter mirrored their vocal
pattern after the gatekeepers. In this example, I sounded like I
belonged on the call. The call has to be delivered with confidence.
As the "intruder" in this situation, you have to sound like you
belong on the call. Too many recruiters feel some sort of guilt
about making this call and therefore they sound guilty in their tone
of voice.
Using the proper tone and
inflection, and using first names, sends a message to the
gatekeeper — you should know me and I should be connected to
Barbara. Some gatekeepers, especially in larger companies, may
assume you work for their company (that you are an internal
employee) or you are an approved vendor, and will pass you right
along. Just think about how many employees or vendors there can be
in some organizations. Executing this simple yet effective tactic
may get you everything you need.
Even though there were a
few good points during this call, there was still a lot wrong.
Namely, the gatekeeper got the recruiter off script and stuck them
with a tough question: "What is the nature of your call?" This is a
tough question for recruiters to answer and is often where the call
ends or goes sideways. Many recruiters immediately begin to lie or
employ some deceitful tactic to get put through. But that is not
necessary.
Try this exchange and
technique on for size:
Gatekeeper: Good morning; Barbara
Smith's office.
Recruiter: Good morning; who
am I speaking to?
Gatekeeper: This is
Jim.
Recruiter: Jim, good morning. This
is Michael Homula calling for Barbara.
Did you see that? Did you see what I just did? What I
did was employ a technique that Peter Leffkowitz calls pattern or
script interrupt.
Telling him my name before
he asked for it changes who is in control of the conversation. Most
gatekeepers have a script pattern they work from; there is a rhythm
and flow to it, just like a recruiter's script. Most of these script
patterns include a component of asking for the identity of the
caller, the company they represent, and the nature of the call.
These key questions happen early in the call "dance" and help the
gatekeeper to fulfill their purpose. That purpose is to gain control
of the conversation, determine the call's level of importance, how
valid the call is, gather information about the caller, and then
block the caller if they are undesirable.
By interrupting this
script pattern, the recruiter now owns the flow of the conversation;
the gatekeeper is pushed sideways and out of rhythm and becomes
distracted from his script and its subsequent purpose. The result is
that the recruiter improves the odds of getting through to the
prospect/candidate.
In other words, what I did
as a recruiter in this example is change the pattern of how my
information goes into the gatekeeper, which in turn knocks her off
of her routine or script pattern. I have changed the texture of the
call, as well as who controls it. In a very real sense, we have
humanized the call and humanized the gatekeeper. Instead of dealing
with Jim's script, I am now dealing with Jim the person. Now that I
have wrestled away control of how the information goes in and the
texture of the call, it is now just two people who see each other as
humans and not scripts. The playing field is now leveled.
About Those Tested, Experienced, and Grizzled Veterans of
Gatekeeping
Even if you use the script
interrupt technique outlined above, sometimes getting through can be
very difficult, especially when dealing with a great gatekeeper
(who, by the way, you should recruit).
The conversation with this
person often goes more like what follows, though please note that I
am using a number of interactions I have had over the years with
gatekeepers to create a general response here. Most keepers will use
nicer terminology than this, but the substance of the message is
legitimately the same.
Gatekeeper: Good morning; Barbara
Smith's office.
Recruiter: Good morning; who
am I speaking to?
Gatekeeper: This is
Jim.
Recruiter: Jim, good morning, this is
Michael Homula calling for
Barbara.
Gatekeeper: Mr. Homula, unless I know
the purpose of your call, I won't transfer you to Ms. Smith. Is
that clear?
Recruiter: Ugh, ummm, choke,
cough...
The key here is to not get
confrontational with this gatekeeper. Lying, rusing or deceit is not
really the best choice either, and can be illegal. This is what
works best, based on what I've have learned from years of experience
and training by the leaders mentioned above:
Recruiter: Jim, I appreciate why
you're asking that question. You see, my call involves a high
degree of sensitivity and confidentiality. I believe that needs to
start with Barbara. Once I speak with her, if she feels the
sensitive information I have can include you then all of us can be
involved in the communication. I just think we need to let her
make that decision. Until Barbara makes that decision, the
sensitive nature of my call means I should speak with her first.
The gatekeeper, knowing that
their director of marketing probably deals with a lot of sensitive
information, is likely going to transfer me to Barbara Smith or to
her voicemail. There isn't a gatekeeper in the world that wants be
responsible for a sensitive and confidential situation not getting
through. If Jim the gatekeeper puts me on hold to announce my call
to Barbara, he will inform her that the nature of the call is
sensitive and confidential, which will create a degree of wonder and
urgency for Barbara.
Recruiting Is Sensitive and
Confidential
The recruiting ethics
police out there may want to argue that by declaring my call to be
"sensitive" and "confidential" rather than revealing my identity as
a recruiter calling to offer Barbara a better opportunity is
scandalous, unethical, or even illegal. To that I query back in
advance, what can be more sensitive or confidential than a
recruiting call?
Barbara — someone I
know to be a high-performing director of marketing — is
entitled to learn about other opportunities that may be better than
her current situation. Barbara also has a right for any conversation
she has with me, or any other recruiter for that matter, to be
handled with a high degree of sensitivity and confidentiality. Once
I speak with Barbara, she can decide whether or not to continue
speaking with me.
Barbara is also the only
one who gets to decide if she would like to share the nature of our
conversations with anyone else, including her current employer. Her
company does not have the right to make that decision for her and
certainly neither does her gatekeeper. The days of indentured
servitude ended long ago in this country and only the talent I am
trying to reach gets to make decisions about their future.
Stay tuned for a future
article which deals specifically with the actual recruiting call.
Too many recruiters make the recruiting call ill prepared.
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