He made $150k by changing the KPI

This is a story about innovation.

It’s also about leadership, measurement and fresh KPI thinking.

And it’s about making money.

I learned the lesson in a Board Meeting with my client Donald Stout, MD of Now Careers in Sydney. (Now Careers has several offices in the UK and 2 in Australia)

Donald and his management team recognised they had plenty of demand, but were struggling with supply. In other words they had clients keen to hire, job-orders open – but a shortage of quality talent.

So, instead of running more Ads on job boards, and scouring the already pillaged database for hours on end, and moaning about talent shortages, they decided to try something new.

And this is the beauty of internal disruption. Innovation doesn’t have to be earth-shattering. It can be incremental. Little things done differently.

So the message went out. Cut back on the client BD work a little. Let’s run fewer Ads.

What we are going to do is a 6-week targeted, measured, candidate generation campaign.

So each recruiter (there are about 12 in the business locally) was targeted with identifying, approaching, engaging with, and ultimately ‘recruiting’ a set number of new, highly-placeable candidates.

Yes it was a sourcing, referral generating, and headhunting blitz!

KPIs were set, and team goals agreed. Numbers were put up on whiteboards and a quick refresher coaching session run. In-demand skills were agreed, and a few quirky, fun incentives announced.

Strategies to find the best hidden talent were shared. LinkedIn of course, but other ideas such as asking for referrals, as well.

And this is how it played out;

In six weeks the Now Careers consultants secured 52 brand new, quality and qualified, talent. Candidates who had been ‘sourced and seduced’ and had agreed to be represented by Now Careers.

Then a new goal was set to represent these new candidates to a range of clients and potential clients before year-end.

The first goal? Client/Candidate interviews (CCIs)

The second goal? Offers and placements.

What are the results to date I hear you cry!

In December Now Careers generated $78,750 in permanent placements directly from those sourced candidates.

In January, the revenue number (confirmed and ‘strongly pending’) is $74,000

                                                         Hatching plans in the Ideas Room with Donald Stout

This is revenue otherwise not forthcoming. This has been created. This has been proactively generated.

Because of a change in activity focus.

So the exciting lesson for all of us is this. Great, placeable candidates, who WILL move are out there, but not applying for jobs.

If we secure a candidate via a direct approach, that candidate is almost certainly only working through us, incrementally increasing our chances of placing them.

Recently, one of my most read ever blogs was about a dinosaur manager who forced consultants to hit meaningless and ineffective KPIs

But here we have a fresh approach.

Sure, nothing earth-shatteringly new. It’s been done before. But for this business it was a shake up. A new spin. A shot in the arm for year-end weary recruiters, who were freshly enthused. A re-calibrated focus on what was needed, and what was likely to work.

And it did work.

Tired old candidate tactics like job boards must be supplemented with more proactive recruitment approaches.

‘Old dogs’ can learn new trick. Many of the recruiters in this team would not have proactively approached a candidate at this time of the year, prior to this campaign.

The keys were;

• Focus on what is needed, not what we always do. Be brave.
• Harness team enthusiasm by making it fun and as a group.
• Set a clear goal in a set time frame.
• Measure individual and team success against that goal.
• Celebrate wins and work on shortfall.
• Move fast to apply the spoils of our efforts (i.e. the new candidates)

Effective Recruitment leadership is often just a fresh twist. A little burst of creativity. Clarity about priorities. An ability to re-focus on what matters.

And it can make a massive difference. In fun… and money.

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Photo by Jimi Filipovski on Unsplash