Recruiters, make sure you know more than your colleagues

All too often a recruiter sits across from a candidate with exclusively the information already provided in the job profile.

This is a lost opportunity: candidates can read the job vacancy themselves! Read up beforehand and you’ll see that if you know even a little bit more than your fellow recruiters and sourcers, candidates will appreciate this immediately and they will automatically provide you with even more valuable information.

This means it’s important to extensively research the position for which you’re recruiting, even before you publish it. Look at what the customer wants, but also the line of business, specific (technical) areas and the background of the position.

"Candidates can read a job description themselves!"

Most vacancies consist of two specialisms / areas of expertise, such as ‘Chemistry Analyst ‘, ‘HR Secondment Manager’ and ‘Fiberglass Planner’. The vacancy for Fiberglass Planner for example consists of the specializations / fields “Planning” and “Fiberglass”. This means you will need to research both topics thoroughly.

Only checking Wikipedia won’t be sufficient for this kind of research. In order to really have added value in conversations with your candidates and your clients, you will need to base your knowledge on as many sources as possible. This includes customer-specific websites, manuals, job descriptions and even YouTube.

In short: Truly be the owner of your vacancy and you will see that you will finally really connect with your candidate.