The recent US election result proves to us that the world is a truly terrible place. However, given the 2024 most of us have had, we didn’t need an election to highlight this. I was speaking to a recruitment GM this week who felt that October was our lowest point, and it was upwards from here. Certainly, last month’s dire revenue in our sister business JOYN, and a strong(ish) start to November would support this view. However, I’ll argue that the lowest point of the year was Wednesday evening, just as Donald Trump got on stage and rambled his victory speech for 20 incoherent minutes. Regular readers of this blog will know that I break all the dinner party rules and frequently talk about politics AND religion. My rationale for this is that it’s my blog, I have to write it every Friday ad infinitum, and the reason that people make such poor decisions about politics and religion is that they are banned from healthy debate about politics and religion. Sadly, I cannot promise you a healthy debate today.
As you may have guessed, I am not a fan of Donald Trump. If I look at the groups who will be negatively impacted by his election…Palestinians, Ukrainians, women, immigrants, the LGBTQ+ community, poor people, rape victims, well….I kinda side with all of them. In fact, I’d find it very challenging to form a meaningful connection with anyone who would vote for a tiny-handed, trust-funded, failed-in-multiple-businesses sex pest. That’s him by the way, not me. And that’s the interesting thing about politics. It has always staggered me that the majority of people don’t think about the company they keep when at the ballot box. If you picture in your mind’s eye the most small-minded, racist, sexist, transphobic American you can imagine, who did they vote for? And yet, in the 72 million people who voted for Trump, there must have been plenty of intelligent, open-minded, educated, and inclusive people. Do they not feel embarrassed by the average number of teeth under those MAGA caps? Clearly not, and this is why we also have David Seymour.
If you want to see further examples of this, just look who joined Trump on stage, or lent him vocal support. Legendary sh*t-c*nt Elon Musk. Exploitative cock-fighter Dana White. And a man who’s face I’d love to stove-in more than most – Piers Morgan. Hell, we can add reptilian shape-shifter and pony tail fetishist John Key, and gold-digging nudist Paul Henry to the list. Two equally vile humans. And let’s look who we have on the other side; Barak Obama and The f*cking Boss Bruce Springsteen. Tell me, who are you wanting to share a nice pinot noir and couples massage with?
The company we choose to keep tells the world a lot about ourselves. And this extends to who we work with. Job seekers are rightly concerned with what the actual job is. They also understandably care about the pay. Location is a big deal, and in 2024 the ability to masturbate at home to Anne Robinson on a Wednesday afternoon also seems to have an appeal. When it comes to the team, many new starters only meet them on day one. Resignations have been made and contracts have been signed by this time. Sometimes, candidates “meet the team” as part of the interview process. Although a fine idea on paper, it is one fraught with challenges. Firstly, what with loose-lips, the candidate is essentially telling the world that they are interviewing. Secondly, it is not uncommon for a “team member”, bitter at not being considered for the role being hired, acts like an obnoxious prick to sabotage the process.
In the world of recruiting recruiters, we tread a fine balance. We want a quick process with as few stages as possible. We also want a good fit. We also don’t want to compromise the confidentiality of the process. However, one of the most important tasks to do for any recruiter joining a new firm is to do some very, very deliberate research on the calibre of their potential future colleagues. Of late, we’ve seen a few examples of deals not going our way. I wouldn’t consider myself a bad loser, but in each instance, we’ve felt that the candidate has made a mistake. “Of course you do Sean – you’re $14k down!!” I hear you say, but just hear me out. On each occasion, when I look at the calibre of Consultants at the “other” firm, they are not close to the standard of recruiters who work for the “declined” business. Use whatever metric you want, billings, tenure with one firm, quality of adverts written. On each occasion, a candidate has joined a business with less high-performing Consultants. And I believe this will be to their detriment in the long term. Lesser firms can however move faster. They have lower barriers to entry and therefore do less due diligence. And they will often pay more. Because…well…they have to. In nearly 20 years of recruiting however, I’ve never heard people complain that their colleagues were too good. No one ever complains about a high-performance culture. In fact, they typically become high-performers themselves. The same argument extends to ethics. You cannot live a happy life being the only ethical recruiter in your firm. If a boss hires a known dodgy operator or sex pest into their recruitment team, how can they expect quality people to join them? How can they expect quality people to stay? The company we keep is very important.
Anyway, I’m convinced things have got to get better soon. And if you’re a recruiter looking around the office and seeing Trump’s entourage, drop Claudia or me a note, and things can get better for you also.
Onwards and upwards.
^SW
