By
Michelle Reese
Tribune
October 2, 2005
If you're looking for a job and sitting by the
phone waiting for a recruiter to call, you're probably going to
wait awhile. Recruiters exist in all types of industries. A Company
seeking the best candidates to fill a position will hire a recruiter
to do the legwork.
There are different types of recruiting firms:
temporary contract placement and executive placement. They are paid
one of three ways: for a quick assignment, contingent on finding
a candidate or retained to find a candidate, said Kathy Sweeney,
a certified professional resume writer and owner of East Valley-based
The Write Resume.
"Building relationships over time with recruiters
is the key to being successful with them. If the candidate is not
in constant contact with the recruiter - at least once a month -
then the recruiter will forget about him," she said. "In addition,
a job search candidate needs to understand that recruiters are hired
to look for candidates with specific qualifications."
Pamela Roe Ehlers, vice president of American
Career Executives, agrees.
"The recruiter is looking for the 100 percent
perfect fit, usually from a competitor company; even though you
as a professional or executive have excellent 'transferable skills'
don't expect the recruiter to try and sell the company on you. A
good rule of thumb is to rely on only 10 to 15 percent on recruiters,
about 4 percent on the Internet, and more than 70 percent on a strong
self-marketing plan based on networking to find the job you want."
Scott Carr is owner and president of Accounting
Choices LLC, and recruits for Valley companies seeking financial
and accounting professionals. Someone wanting his attention should
have a resume with job consistency, first and foremost, he said.
"If someone's got a nice career direction and
they've shown progress in responsibilities at their careers and
they have job stability, that's someone I can help," he said.
Carr said he finds potential employees in a
variety of ways: Those who answer advertisements, belong to associations
or are involved in the community.
Like Carr, John Spencer recruits for financial
and accounting employees through his Scottsdale firm, Fountainhead
Staffing. He agrees that a solid career path is a major factor in
helping a job candidate.
"We encourage candidates to sit down and work
with us to get a better understanding of where they've been, what
they've done and where their skills are. Then we try to put together
a three-to-five-year plan of where they want to be," Spencer said.
Spencer said he asks, "How would you define success?"
and "Complete this idea, 'I would consider myself successful in
five years if I was doing...'"
That information gives Spencer a better idea
of where the candidate will be a good fit.
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