changing their job at the moment may actually be
those that you need,” says Daniel Mylnikov, head
of solutions delivery and talent acquisition, e Wave,
Sydney, Australia.
ON THE LOOKOUT
Communicating with people who aren’t looking
for a new position requires more finesse than
reaching out to someone who’s applied for a job
opening. Recruiting passive candidates often starts
with making a personal connection, says LaDonna
Tucker, director of talent acquisition and mobility
in North America, Schneider Electric, Carrollton,
Texas, USA.
“Every person has probably received cold emails
or LinkedIn messages that look like a form-letter
introduction. Those are what people respond less
to,” she says. “I’m encouraging my team to be
more creative, to think more like a salesperson or
marketer, trying to attract passive candidates to
our brand.”
To strike the right tone, Ms. Tucker recommends
gathering intelligence on potential candidates
before making contact. Scanning an individual’s
social media profiles can help a recruiter customize
his or her introduction and name-drop any shared
connections. These tactics make a response more
likely, Ms. Tucker says, and can open the door to a
conversation about the organization.
Just as a personalized message will yield more
ROI than cranking out form letters, having longer,
more meaningful conversations with a handful of
people at an industry event will do more to build
a lasting network than blanketing the room with
business cards.
“I think quality is far more important than
quantity,” says Elizabeth Harrin, director of the
project management consultancy Otobos Group,
London, England.
It can be helpful to scan speaker and attendee
lists to find high-potential prospects in advance
of a conference, and to prioritize events that focus
on the core competency in question. For example,
attending a select number of industry gatherings
focused on project management might yield more
exposure to worthwhile passive candidates than
filling the calendar with events only tangentially
related to the open project role.
After meeting a strong prospect, Ms. Harrin is
w
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