Signs of coming Fall are around us. For me, that means sharp pencils and the start of the new school year. It also means looking forward to the first football game of the season. All of which combined with cooler days and colorful leaves make Fall my favorite season. After many years in the
search business, I’ve realized that the
hiring cycle has seasons as well.

Fall is the time of year when the eye is sharper on the year’s end-goal. Sales teams are getting clearer on their performance to meeting quota. Activity should be high to ensure that there’s a healthy pipeline to support coming in over goal at year’s end and have a strong start to the coming year. If your team’s projections aren’t where you think they should be, one of the problems could be that you don’t have the right sales reps on your team.

If hiring is in your future, think through how long this will take. Remember, the more narrowly you define your candidate profile, the more time and expertise it will take to access qualified candidates. The candidates the JESSI Search team reaches out to consistently report getting bombarded by calls from those looking to hire them. It takes expertise, skill and timing to be the one who gets a response.

Seasonality also affects how long it will take to gain a conversation with candidates. For instance, getting response from sales candidates can be very difficult in the months of June and December. These are months when they are especially focused on their quarterly goals and finishing the year strong.

If your hiring efforts aren’t getting you the results you would like, consider bringing in experts in talent acquisition. The JESSI Search team is recognized as specialists in acquiring top sales talent and other customer-facing positions, including executive-level roles.

Do you have a favorite season? What does it represent to you? Share your stories. We love hearing from you!

To grow your team, you will gain better results by clarifying the attributes of the candidates that are ideal for both the position and your company culture. Just as candidates are not all the same, neither are recruiting firms. Ease of working with a recruiting firm differs widely as does results.

On one end is the transactional firm where numbers are the game. This is measured by the number of resumes they can push in front of you. On the other end is a recruiting firm that takes a partnership approach. This type of firm will take the time to understand your business and culture and helps you to define the most important candidate attributes and competencies for each position.

Understanding these differences in approach and deciding which one best serves your purposes and time constraints is important. If you have the time to go through many resumes yourself, whether they’re a close fit to your exact needs or not, you can go with a recruiter who is sending a volume of resumes. If you’re ready to get the right person hired as quickly as possible, you’ll save time by partnering with a recruiter who takes the upfront time to get to know your business and truly understand the candidate profile that will serve you best and has the expertise to deliver on that!

Take the time to ensure you can get what you expect and need when choosing your approach and partner in the hiring process.

In a 1947 version of the comic book character, Superwoman, she experiences a spell compelling her to believe she has super powers.  What could you accomplish with the belief that you have super powers?

While walking through the Costco parking lot after battling my way through the aisles to cover my list, a lady bent down and picked something up. It was a LEGO® version of Superwoman and she handed it to me and said, “You look like a Superwoman.” I was so struck by her words, that I kept it and that small figure has stood on my desk for the past few months.

I believe our super powers come from our mindset and self-discipline. I look at her when I have an especially busy day with a lot to accomplish. She spurs me on when I need to pick up the phone and make a call or move outside of my comfort zone. I’m energized by the results I achieve after this little boost of inspiration. Shifting my mindset facilitates self-motivation and builds energy that results in small successes growing into bigger wins.

We are experts in finding, assessing and placing the best sales talent for our clients’ teams. We recognize and further assess for self-motivation and the discipline it takes to consistently follow through on the steps in one’s sales process – these are critical competencies for quota achievement and sales success.

What’s your super power? How do you practice that super power to motivate yourself and others? We always enjoy hearing your experiences!

We represent many companies’ value proposition to the talent market.  Accessing the best talent is often tough. Having a strong value proposition and experts who can position it to the right candidates certainly helps. One aspect I enjoy hearing about is the unique benefits employers provide to keep their team engaged and their employees healthy and happy.

Like so many others, we are growing our team and also want to attract the best talent. Early this year, I took pause to consider our policy on paid time off and I asked myself if we even need a vacation policy. We’re a team of achievers who enjoy our work and take serving our customers very seriously. I decided that the best policy for our team is unlimited vacation. In other words, we don’t track vacation days used. Thus far, my only concern is that without a specific number of days in front of them, my team will take less time for rest, relaxation and recharging!

Other unique ideas that our customers have shared include:

• Adding a day to employees’ PTO bank and designating it for a mental-health-break day.
• Reimbursing employees up to a set amount when they bring in receipts for time spent on family activities.
• Lunch and learns but the twist is that lunch is catered in by the company from a new restaurant each month and the learning is an off-work topic.
• Providing all employees with access to a paid health club membership.
• Giving employees the opportunity to earn a lower healthcare co-pay by participating in healthy activities and preventative checkups.
• Others bring it to work with onsite yoga, massages and access to healthy snacks in the breakroom.

Send us your favorite employee perks. We’d love to hear from you!

JESSI Search helps our customers source, hire and retain the best talent. If maintaining the best talent is key to your business success, let’s have a conversation soon.