IF SOMETHING HAS TO DIE YOUR VISION SUCKS

i don't know about the rest of you but i am sick to death(pun intended) of all the self appointed thought leaders, gurus and myopic purveyors of the visions of the future of recruiting being predicated on something being dead. The smell of decomp has hardly ever been part of my experience in this business.

Yes, things evolve and change. New things are added all the time but it's my take that if your vision of the future means that the recruiting agency business wil die, internal recruiters will die, job boards are dead, resumes are dead, interviews are dead and everything except what you came up with over a bottle of something or lunch with your idiot followers engaging in mental masturbation, you are too damn focused on things dying to make your philosophy work. Elvis may be dead and you don't feel so good yourself but trust me you can remodel a house without tearing out the foundation.

To wax sophmoric for a minute, let's take the wheel. It didn't die guru. Somebody took the first one made of stone with a few chucks out of it that made it a slow slog and rounded it a bit. Then somebody put wood on it, then somebody figured out if it had spokes instead a solid chunk of something it would be lighter, move faster, be easier to fix, then we put rubber on it and on and on. We don't have stone wheels anymore but the wheel didn't die, it evolved.

In the world of blogging all one has to do is flop something out there saying that what someone else does for a living, or how they do it, is dead or dying. Voila they get lots of comments from kookaid drinking followers and a contingent of pissed off people. It's my take that a real thought leader has enough vision and experience in an industry not to reinvent the wheel then declare everything but their latest brain fart as dead or dying.

in my opinion, after watching the so called "thought leaders" come and go for over three decades in this industry, real thought leaders don't call themselves one. Other people do. Real thought leaders don't have to declare everything dead or dying. They have the insight to take what is ,add what is happening and suggest what could happen if we added this process or changed what wasn't working. Thought leaders evolve along with their thoughts being something that give other people an idea of their own as to how to add something to their business or process.

I think the self proclaimed thought leaders can be identified by their self promotion and their wallowing around in glee ,describing anyone who agrees with them as being posessed with superior intellect and those who don't as naysayers, dinosaurs or slow thinkers at best. Here is a flash mob moment for you pal, some of us have survived , repeat survived and prospered in this industry for about three times longer than you have. So before you throw the baby out with the bathwater or think your latest idea came to you as a vision from God that will cause a plague to wipe out all that went before you. Take a look around ,recruiters have been evovling for decades before your brain fart and nobody died to make it happen.

My suggestion is that change happens, kids, industries, people grow up, evolve, add new things to get better and more productive. If your vision includes everything dying to make it happen it's not a vision ,it's destruction of common sense, learning and enhancing. Case in point, people found out about jobs in the mist of history by someone on a horse riding in and telling them that the rancher in the next county needed a cowbody. I think that might have been called networking or a personal referral. So dear thought leader if your brain fart gave you the idea that networking is the wave of the future and everything else is dead or dying ..you missed something in the last 100 years. The evolution of networking is pretty easy to follow.

What say you? Is the smell of decomp the only thing that stirs you to think?

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Brian K. Johnston on August 13, 2011 at 1:45am

Ding Ding Ding!

Note To Self: Whenever the overused term "Death Of Staffing Agencies" is used in the future... never reply... this is an old tactic to get attention.... :)

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Permalink Reply by Jay Liebowitz on August 14, 2011 at 10:51pm

Sandra

Thank you for such a witty and frank article on what I believe many people believe, but are not always honest enough to say. You have made my Monday reading your 'rant', made me laugh and also confirmed what I believe about these 'self proclaimed' thought leaders.

You are an insightful and very entertaining writer!

Your newest fan!

Jay

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Permalink Reply by Sandra McCartt on August 14, 2011 at 11:39pm

@Brian aw heck, I think we should just post a one liner that says, "it was colonel Mustard in the library with a candlestick who killed recruiters ,dumb ass, if you had ever played Clue, you could have saved all this bandwidth.

@jay, you are the kind of internal recruiter I like to work with. You have been in the management ranks so know what it takes to do the job. Welcome to RBC. I think you will find this site to be a free rolling bunch of working recruiters who try to help each other, share crazy stories, thoughts and ideas. Thank you for your nice comment. I see myself as the most ridiculous person I know but I am normally good for a laugh. I think most reasonable people can see these drooling fools for what they are but once in a while one of them gets so annoying that it feels good to just say, "gawd, yer fuloshit". If you say that fast they think it's a compliment.

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Permalink Reply by Jay Liebowitz on August 15, 2011 at 12:05am

Sandra

Well...you have a new BF in Melbourne and thank you for the nice compliments. Here's the biggest one I can give you. I have just attached the link to your article on my Linked-In profile. This may be the start of your new writing career!

Enjoy the week!

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Permalink Reply by Sandra McCartt on August 15, 2011 at 1:23am

Well jay, now you have really put the heat on me. I promise I will not have some sort of "vision 4.0". More like a guru chasing dog waiting in weeds..

New ideas always bear consideration. If they smack of doomsday instead of building and integrating then the doomsday prophet is best left on his box in the park with his fawning followers. The rest of us will go find a person who can do the job and put the thing together. It only happens with an apply button about as often as somebody wins the lottery.

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Permalink Reply by FREYJA P. on August 15, 2011 at 1:04pm

Sandra,
Thanks for the fiery comment and the chuckle it gave me. Whenever I read these kinds of "comments" from the "prophets" I shrug and think - in your world, buddy - guess you aren't working a desk. And sure, in thirty years, I've seen evolution in our business - it's changed but so has everything else in my world. Why should my business stay in a world from 30, 20 or even ten years ago?

So headhunting has evolved - so what? So has everyone actually working a desk - and guess what buddy? Change equals growth equals fun! And continued business....

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Permalink Reply by Sandra McCartt on August 15, 2011 at 1:59pm

Glad you got a chuckle. I can identify with that shrug. I had an assistant a few years ago who referred to those kind of pronouncements as, "Oh look, it's one of those, No shit, so what, who cares kind of speeches."

The folks who get excited about all the hype are normally the ones who have been in the industry 10 years or less.

I remember how smart i thought i was at about the ten year level, the truth was that i had just enough experience to think i were one and that i knew what it were all about. I found out in the next five years that at 8 to 10 years i knew just enough to be dangerous. If i had not gotten my ego in order and figured out that there was a new deal coming down the pike every time the sun came up i would have been roadkill like a lot of my peers of that decade. If we don't move forward we go backwards. There is no such thing as being hung in neutral unless we want to get run over but jumping out there like a bunch of kids on acid in bumper cars screaming that the sky is falling presupposes that all of our clients are as crazy as the gurus...and they aren't.

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Permalink Reply by FREYJA P. on August 15, 2011 at 2:09pm

I love nothing better than a "full rant" and yes, can trace pretty much the same thought process as you. As sure as can be, when ever we get complacent and think - well I'm the one, the scene shifts at what to us seems abruptly and we are left thinking like the "talking head" - but it's really only because we've put our outlook on hold while enjoying whatever success we've experienced.

So yes, agree, agree and agree again with you!

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Permalink Reply by Nate Fischer on August 15, 2011 at 3:30pm

Sandra,

How refreshing. I literally laughed out loud at your gusto. Not that my coworkers don't already see me as a little crazy to work with. This was great, and doing well in my own job, I, as well as you, know this job changes like the waves of the ocean. You can never do it the way you did it five years ago.

I will give you this much, generally you always see the people wanting to argue or pick a fight here, and I haven't seen that on this post yet, so kudos for calling it like it is with so much truth that you just can't stand up against it. ROCK ON!

Nate

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Permalink Reply by Sandra McCartt on August 15, 2011 at 4:34pm

Thanks Nate, i am more than a little crazy myself. Not sure if i got that way being a recruiter or being crazy made me a candidate for recruiting. I am rockin on baby, if anybody wants to pick a fight there aint' no glory in hittin an old woman. She might just pop your chops and then how silly would you look. There is comfort in being a crusty old recruiter. Glad you laughed out loud. The gurus always give me fodder for funnies.

"I am a thought leader". Yeah right and i am the virgin Mary with an ATP pilot rating, i just don't have the hours and a long white dress and babies bore me.

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Permalink Reply by Valentino Martinez on August 15, 2011 at 5:47pm

Sandra,

As always, it's a treat to hear the voice of reason (yours) vs. arrogance run amok supposedly from Mt. Olympus.

On the unmistakable Macartt humor--well, that always a welcome bonus (I'm still recovering from the cat herding visual).

Tino

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Permalink Reply by Sandra McCartt on August 15, 2011 at 6:16pm

@tino Isn't it amazing how reasonable we get after we have had our brains beaten out in this industry for 30 or 40 years. I love the MT. Olympus comment. It's my take that the arrogance of ignorance runs downhill like a sewer pipe that blew up. So much crap that all one can do is try and get out of the way.

I remember well the first guru that i ever encountered. The personnel group in Lubbock (about 100 miles S. of Amarillo) decided that they needed to bring one of the big butter and egg guys from Chicago in for a joint conference with Lubbock and Amarillo to tell us the "Wave of the Future and How to do it" in placing people.

At that point in time in the world of recruiting cira 1982 or thereabouts nobody had a computer. Most of the folks in Lubbock and Amarillo either worked in Ag placement or Oil and Gas. Offices were not that fancy (except mine cause i was all eat up with looking expensive and professional at that point). So thinking that in my infinite need to up the game, i needed to rub elbows with a Pro from Dover off i went to the joint conference. There we were in a large conference room in a hotel with everything dark but the stage. Boom out jumps a black guy with a yellow bow tie, a yellow and brown plaid sport coat and sort of tan pattent leather shoes. He runs around on the stage for about five rah, rah minutes singing something that i suppose was a motivational song. Then it gets quiet and he says, "I am going to tell you how to be a professional recruiter, make a ton of money and be the thought leader of the future in recruiting. YOU HAVE TO HAVE A HEADSET!!!

And that gentle readers, was it. The wave of the future was a HEADSET. It would put you on the cutting edge of recruiting, make you a pro and double your placements. At the lunch break i smiled and went shopping for the rest of the day. No, i didn't buy a headset. I hate those things. Never could hear on one if i tried it and they mess up my hair or knock off an ear ring. I was doomed to being old school. No headset, no leading thoughts. Drat. But i found a cool fur coat on sale at Dillards so it wasn't a wasted trip.

When i read some of this stuff that is being barfed on the bandwidth at this point by the "thought leaders". I am always tempted to ask, "DO YOU HAVE A HEADSET?" Cause without a headset honey you ain't shit!

Can't tell you how much several my clients enjoyed the cat herding vd. They are still laughing. You made me a heroine with that one. I was invited to a retirement dinner and introduced as "Our recruiter who located a candidate who turned us down because her husband was allergic to cats." More fun than i have had in years.