Monthly Archives: March 2010

when i called james with a great opprotunity, he told me that he knew the company and that he would never go to work for them…he knew the management and didn’t like them…didn’t like waht they sold and besides, he was under a non-compete…and they couldn’t afford him anyhow

the V.P. and hirng authority was a reasonable guy and my candidate’s reputation in that field was excellent even though his ego is gigantic…

the V.P. agreeed to talk to him on the phone…the company had just fired a disasterous employee so this replacement needed to be a sperfect as possible…

after two telephone interviews, the V.P. said that the next step was to come to corporate…but he warned james that he didn’t want him to go to corporate unless he was committed to “take the job”…well, james couldn’t committ to that…

so james took another job with a money guarantee that sounded too good to be true…they were going to guarantee him $250,000 to simply show up…

the V.P. was irritated but understood…meanwhile, i find him another great candidate…almost as good a james…in fact, he was a peer of james at one time…

steve goes thru the whole interview process with the V.P….gets the same instruction, “don’t come to corporate unless you are willing to do the job”…he agrees…goes to corproate..impresses the CEO and everyone else…gets the offer..

he turns the job down..$4500 in travel expenses…a committment to take the job if offered, and he turns it down…

the V.P. is furious…can’t blame him..

it has been three weeks since james had gracefully bowed out…out of some whim (..i.e. desperation) i called james… asking him how his new deal is going..

that day he laerned that his new company had just had their next round of funding postponed…that guarantee he got wouldn’t mean a darn thing if they didn’t get funding…and the woudn’t know for another month…

james was still reluctant to speak with the V.P. who he had turned down…but the very smart V.P. had just hired a V.P. of marketing that worked with james at one time…

the V.P. has his new hire call james…james gets excited… because his reference was excellent and his reputation was so good, he meets with the V.P. and accepts the job…

lesson: …it ain’t over till it’s over…some things are just meant to be

one of my candidates, walt, has had a really rough year…he was let go from his job six months ago…the same week that his wife of fifteen years asked for a divorce..the custody battle has been awful
he is a great guy, but his sales performance over the last three years has been dismal and he has changed jobs three times in three years…that hasn’t helped…
as a recruiter who has to present top performers to our clients…especially in this tough market, it was going ot be hard for me to get walt interviews..
walt, however, understood this…he followed just about every step in our on line program: www.thejobsearchsolution.com …
he would call from time to time and give me a report on how he was doing..
it has been a very long, diffcult road for him..but friday he called and said that he starts his new job tomorrow..
here is how he got it..
he volunteered…along with all of the other things i recommend in jss, last december, walt started volunteering at the local food bank…
he struck up an acquaintance with one of the other volunteers last january..
the other volunteer turned out to b a sales manager at one of the local companies…
he liked walt so much that when a sales job became available, he hired walt..
the company is totally different than walt has been in and the money isn’t as great to start with, but walt is soooo very greatful…

good job, walt!

p.s….walt told me that the one good thing that volunteering did was to get him to focus on others…he was pretty depressed about his own, personal situation…he even told me that in some of the interviews he got in the beginning of his search,  he expressed to the hiring authorities his disappointment about his poor performance on his recent jobs and his devastating divorce…and even the cutody battle….(..NOT GOOD to do)…the volunteering got him to focus on people that were less fortunate than he was…

he felt better and got a new job…

double way to go, walt!