Cheers for the i-Phone, Steve

None of you will have escaped the news of the passing of Apple’s co-founder Steve Jobs yesterday.  The internet is awash with condolences and tributes to this truly visionary person and the way he conjured dreams and desires into innovative products and tools that genuinely changed the way we live our lives.

As a recruiter, I just want to say “Cheers for the i-Phone, Steve”.

Hearing the news yesterday gave me a moment to reflect on how this product has changed my behaviour as a recruiter.  The role of a recruiter has always been about communicating, networking and sharing information.  Using organisation, influence, initiative, tenacity, determination and negotiating skills to bring people to opportunities and opportunities to people.

So of course, the i-Phone in it’s most basic (and probably most under-used!) form, as a telephone, is vital for any recruiter needing to communicate directly and effectively when not at their desk.  That’s old news.

But then I also use it as an alarm clock when I’m on early domestic flights or staying in a hotel.

I often check my e-mails before I’ve even risen for the day.  I post job adverts online without being at a computer.

My company’s entire recruitment database, whilst sitting in a cloud of Amazon’s making, can be swiftly accessed through an App on the i-Phone and work done on the move before even reaching the office.

My day is organised through the calendar.  I use it as a calculator when needed in client meetings or when demonstrating how commission plans work to candidates.

I use it to display the QR code that lets me board my domestic flights.  When in other cities it shows me where I am, and how to get to my next client visit.  I use it to quickly research the company I am about to visit, and visit Linked In on it to check out the background of the person I’m seeing.

On a recent trip to Australia I used it to type up the copy for our new company website whilst flying over the Tasman.  During the conference in Sydney I used it to send live tweets, building my social network and getting to meet those people in person.  It kept me in touch with my team back in Auckland.

On my not-frequent-enough lunch time visits to the gym to let off some steam it plugs into the exercise machines and I have my music library at my fingertips while working out.

I even received an employment agreement from a Wellington client, checked it over, and forwarded it on to a candidate who later accepted the job, all during the shortening rest periods when my wife was going into labour with our second child.  I hope this isn’t news to her!

Steve Jobs was a visionary who believed in doing things differently and in so doing altered the path we were all on.  There are many other tools similar to the i-Phone now, all of which do all of the above, but his was the original vision.  His innovation changed the way we communicate and how we consume and share information.

In so doing he revolutionised the way we recruit.  And that’s pretty cool.