How to Think Like Your Prospect?

As we consider the candidate mindset, we realize that they're busy achieving their success as a result a large number of candidates are just bored, tired or not interested in looking for “opportunities”. We need to recognize that candidates are chasing a career, not jobs.

When people write their profiles, bios, or resumes, they reflect their personality and skills as they represent their career goals creating an image. They are building a perception but that image is usually driven by their previous job search experiences. The truth is that a growing number of candidates are twice or three times bitten and oftentimes shy about placing any information on line. Add to this the upcoming privacy concerns brought about by identity theft and other such and it becomes apparent that finding candidates is about to get more difficult. Another factor that is affecting candidates keyword choice is their desire to not to be found by disingenuous recruiters, who will hound candidates for positions they are not a fit for.

Candidate’s mindset

To increase the success rate of our searches we need to stop focusing on the candidate's wrapping. You want to zero in on the candidate's mindset rather than what they've done in their lives. To improve the odds when searching for a candidate with a certain experience and knowledge, drive, or ambition, one who will be a slam dunk, you will want to invest some time looking for the keywords and concepts that bring out the values that he/she has helped develop. It isn’t as simple as highlight the words on the job description.

Outside the Box

Forgive the cliché, but the true essence of success for us today is “thinking out of the box”. If you want to find your perfect candidate you will need to be creative. If you are not the creative type there are think you can do to change that and even though learning to be creative is not easy for everyone it can be learned. One of the things you can do to stimulate your creativity, look for and join creative groups and befriend people that you consider creative.

Try to think of the way your candidate would explain his skills. Remember that an IT manager’s profile may have all the same keywords as a programmer or a tester or even an administrator’s profile. Instead of looking strictly for keywords that for terminology which would describe the language your candidate would if you’re looking for an Oracle programmer as opposed to an administrator or tester or even manager, your initial search string may look like [ resume oracle unix sql ] but to narrow to your programmer you may add a phrase like “wrote” OR “coded” or “programmed”. These terms will guide closer than the technical terms you may use. Try this search string instead [ resume wrote” OR “coded” or “programmed”) oracle unix sql ].

Do not focus on what keywords are on the job description but rather terms that your candidate may use. Make the technical terms secondary; remember keywords or terms that you select for your searches are more relevant to the results than the Boolean operators or field commands you use, even more relevant than the search engine you select.
Finding the right keywords is like finding the combination to a bank vault. You may tinker with a few terms but then; type in the right words or phrases, and bingo! You will get the perfect candidate. If your keywords are too general or too widely used, your chance of finding a good match to your needs diminishes considerably. If you don’t use good keywords, no matter how dedicated you may be, you will not be able to get the kind of results you wish for. So, before you invest a lot of time into learning advanced operators and commands your first step in plotting your Internet research strategy is to gather and evaluate keywords and phrases.

Moises Lopez
Sourcing Consulting/Trainer
The Sourcing Corner
Tel: (214) 377-8147
Email: mlopez@sourcingcorner.com
www.sourcingcorner.com

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