(written by Manager-Temporary Division, Jennifer DeLucia)

When I was 24 years old and not sure of what I wanted to do, I walked into John Leonard Employment Services and sat down with a Direct Hire Consultant.  “What do you want to do?” she asked.  I remember saying “what you do looks like fun,” and the rest was history.  She had me meet with our Outside Sales Rep and the Executive VP that same day, I took the Myers-Briggs test (do you want to build a bird house or paint it – I’m certain I indicated that painting a bird house would be much more fun) and low and behold, three hours later I was offered a job!  From that point on, I never looked back or questioned my career choice. 

I love being a recruiter!  Why?  Because it’s fun!!  I love people, I love to hear their stories and I love helping people find jobs—regardless of who you are and where you come from.  The owner of John Leonard, Linda Poldoian, for some reason took a special interest in me.  I always had a strong work ethic, but frankly, I was a bit wild in my youth.  Every day she followed up with me- what are you doing?  How can you do this better?  Why did this or that happen?  How could you have done things differently?  I’m not going to lie—in the first three months of my career at JL, I put in more effort than my whole four years at BC combined!  It was a lot of hard work and pressure for a “wild child,” but I asked myself, do I want a job or do I want a career?  Obviously, the latter won out….and I am thankful.

From those earlier days when I had my six-person SWAT team lined up ready to go in the morning at a moment’s notice to be dispatched to my clients who needed last minute emergency help to today, I have learned that there is a home for everybody, and my job is to find that home.   Sure, there have been some bumps in the road- like the time one of my SWAT members showed up with a hot pink tube top, back mini skirt, stiletto heels and fishnet stockings.  I had to coach her on proper business attire for my conservative Boston clientele.  Or the time that one of my temps showed up with a ski mask on to my client—who happened to be a bank, not to mention it was a 60 degree day.  You can guess how that turned out.

Just last week I sat down with the CIO at one of my client companies—he thanked me for jump starting his consulting career way back when.   I remember him being one my favorites. An Attorney with an Engineering Degree, he consistently demonstrated his ability to be flexible and open to whatever assignments I threw at him—a characteristic that has clearly gotten him to where he is today.  A few days ago, I received a call from a former temporary referring her son who recently graduated college.

Wow. Doesn’t time fly when you’re having fun??

Being in this business for this long, these are the stories that make recruiting truly rewarding to me.  Everyone has a story, and so because I am in the people business, I have lots of them to tell.