Our economy is thriving and new businesses are budding left and right. We all know, however, that not every business can or will come out on top. What differentiates businesses that sink from those that swim today? Their people! Those with the strongest, most diverse, and most resilient teams are those that reach the top and achieve success, and do so faster. They also stay there longer.
So what’re the secret weapons to secure a team that can take a company to the top of its industry’s ranks?
Recruiters and People Pros!
We know you know about us, at least a little bit. However, as recruiters reach the highest levels of demand they’ve ever been in, we want to fill you in on what our job really entails ー at least here at Clarity! While most recruiters will tell you they “fell into” the industry, we forecast more and more students will discover recruitment in their studies of business, and we forecast this career path will continue to grow. Sourcing strategies have become more sophisticated, and the required communication skills have heightened. Even the recent re-branding of many Human Resources functions is in indication of the new messages surrounding the field of talent acquisition. Senior heads of HR and Recruitment are now Chief People Officers and Heads of People. Some of these language shifts are emphasizing what makes HR and Recruiting-specific teams the culture drivers they should be ー the actual people in the roles.
The most effective and admirable Executives these People Teams support are those who care about finding the right additions to their company’s culture, and not just the right fits. We’re all humans at the end of the day, and it’s time a little humanity is injected into the key function of any company ー management of their greatest resource. Their people! Growth and profitability for top companies is a direct result of thoughtful recruitment and detailed strategies to attract the right people for a team. Helping provide this service for businesses to fuel their growth is what makes us tick, and we believe it’s a profession we can feel great about at the end of the day because we’re genuinely helping people grow their careers. As one of our own values here at Clarity, Humanity drives everything that we do. We care deeply about our people here on our own team as well as those we recruit and place with our clients. We also believe everyone deserves a fair chance to find their professional home and the tools to do soー whether short or long term.
So where do agency recruiters fit in?
We’re the actual secret sauce. You don’t always know we’re there, but behind most of your favorite companies, there’s a trusted agency partner handling sourcing across a wide array of diverse pipelines, screening, and navigating confidential conversations including salary negotiations with top candidates for any given open role at said company. One of the biggest challenges businesses face is sheer volume of applicants, and professional recruitment agencies are able to drill down on requirements for a job and source the best people for the it. On top of our highly-personalized candidate interactions, we’re conscientious account managers and strategists. We meet job seekers all day long and assess their capabilities. We then build shortlists for our clients to save them time and energy. Anyone who has run a candidate search in-house understands how time consuming it is, so our service saves internal hiring teams lots of time and energy. From admin support to marketing, legal and finance to tech, we recruit across all of these practice areas.
Let’s break down a day in the life:
Whether you’re a Recruiting Coordinator or a Senior Account Executive, one thing is for sure ー first thing in the morning is your time to fuel up! Then, get ready for a long day that goes by incredibly fast! So what does a day in the life of a recruiter at Clarity look like? Shifts vary, with some recruiters arriving as early as 7:30AM, and leaving around 4:30PM, others arrive at 9AM and leave around 6PM. But yes, we’re all on our phones making sure interviews go off without a hitch and feedback is fielded, even if we’re not sitting at our desks! We can’t give away all of our tricks, but here’s a sample day-in-the-life of a Clarity Account Executive…
7:00AM ー Get up, and get going! Commute into the office (or log on if you’re working remotely) and fuel yourself! Days can be packed with back to back calls and meetings with candidates and clients. Green juice, coffee, breakfast… whatever works best for you, just don’t run on empty.
8:00AM ー Emails and calendar management! While we try to ensure our calendar is set the day before, last minute adjustments always need to be made. Make sure everything is squared away and confirmed, and that candidates have all pertinent information for any interviews taking place on site at your clients’ offices.
9:00AM ー Match Meetings! We maintain a very collaborative environment here, and we’re a relatively small team. These meetings are an opportunity for individuals and teams to share their hottest jobs that their sourcing for in case there is any crossover, and candidate recommendations. Unlike other agencies, we’re incentivized to help eachother out here, and we all win at the end of the day by sharing our resources with each other. We also discuss job order calls we have scheduled for the day with new and existing clients, and share general status updates.
9:30AMー> Lunch ー Calls Call Calls! Interviews Interviews Interviews! Phone screens with candidates we’re sourcing come first, and after we have a great conversation, we bring them in so they can meet with their designated recruiter and other relevant team members in-person. We meet everyone face-to-face before we share details about specific roles, or share their resumes with our clients. Each Recruiter and Account Exec could be managing up to 20 job openings at any given moment, with new openings constantly flooding in, being re-prioritized and distributed to the right sourcing team throughout the day.
Lunch ー It’s lunchtime… already?! If you’re lucky, you might take yourself out for a walk through Bryant Park, or meet a client for lunch at a hot restaurant to catch up. Fortunately, our office is located among many great lunch options! Have a call that’s running late? Thankfully our office is stocked with snacks, Cold Brew + Kombucha on tap! We might even have a catered Lunch n Learn with a visiting speaker, or a Clarity U session to keep up on professional development.
1PM-4PM Afternoon can entail a variety of things ー we get to manage our own schedules barring emergencies + critical deadlines. Here are a few things we could be working on:
Catching up on Job Boards / Linkedin ー Reading in-mails, reviewing applications to our job postings, identifying who is a fit we’d like to schedule time with, and set up conversations and meetings.
Interview prep calls – When a candidate is invited in to interview with a client, we make sure they have all the pertinent information they need to succeed, including awareness of the companies location, arrival details, dress codes, who they’ll be meeting with and relevant history of the role and team. Recruiters get to become subject matter experts and learn about lots of super interesting companies and industriesー the more you know, the better relationships you can build with clients and candidates!
Client Check-insーAfter securing contracts with clients, we submit a carefully selected shortlist of interested candidates to our clients for review, we arrange time to field their feedback. This can happen over email, but when possible we like to hop on a call or meet up in-person to review their feedback. This informs the future of the search and whether we move into interview rounds or refine search criteria.
Take a Job Order Call ー Learn about a new position your client needs candidates for. And, note that they usually need them yesterday. Time to activate and calibrate the team with the specs! This can happen at any given moment ー so you always have to be ready to switch gears and think fast!
Sales Bootcamp ー We’re always prospecting and seeking new business opportunities, so we try to carve out time each day to make a few phone calls to new connections, or businesses we’d love to work with to introduce ourselves and our services to – and hopefully land a job to work on! Our CEO runs bootcamp sessions for sales people across levels to sharpen their skills and get real-time feedback.
Manager Check-ins ー Encounter a complex situation or need advice handling something new? Our leadership team is fully accessible to give advice, breakdown the best approach to proceed, and provide feedback. We’re all in it together, and know that experience is the best teacher.
Calls Calls Calls ー Interview Interviews Interviews! Self explanatory.
4PM ー Is it snack time? Maybe more Coffee? Green Tea? Kombucha from our office nitro tap? Our office favorite perhaps… Cookies from Culture Espresso? Or all of the above!
4:15PM until end of shiftー Securing in-person interviews and confirming client interviews for the next day and rest of the week. If we’re really lucky, we’ve just fielded positive feedback from our clients and our interviewees, which means we may be extending an offer today — the best part of the job! Then we spend the rest of the day lining everything up to start all over again tomorrow!
After Hoursー We may head out to a fun networking event, hit a gym class with a client or colleague, spend time with family, or take time to simple recharge! All while monitoring any after-hours emails, of course.
Interested in learning more about what it’s like to work at Clarity and the role recruiters play in building a business? Send an email to Colleen Robson [colleen@claritystaffing.com] our Head of People, along with your resume, and mention this post. A career at Clarity could be right for you if the above sounds like a schedule you’d be interested in tackling. If you enjoy meeting new people, are curious and a quick learner, a strong communicator and great listener, even better. We’re always interested in speaking with people that could add to our culture, so don’t hesitate to reach out!
