Grief is crippling recruiter crisis response to Covid-19

For many agencies, our response to COVID-19 is Ebne,

Ebne. Edward de Bono’s invented word, so desperately right for today. EXCELLENT, But Not Enough.

It’s understandable.

We are all in ‘strategic grief’. The phases of ‘commercial grief’ are almost identical to life loss grief:

Denial, Anger, Rationalising, Despair, Acceptance.

For most Recruitment Agency leaders, we’re still early in this process. We need to leap-frog to Acceptance. Acceptance that COVID-19 is going to impact your business much more violently than we think; acceptance that what you have done so far is simply not enough; acceptance that you need to lift your leadership game, now, to lead your business with decisiveness and pace.

Here are the eight key steps for you to at least consider accelerating immediately. This brilliant stuff came from the fertile brain of my brother Chris Savage who is magnificently supporting his industry, marketing and communications. We agreed to share material. So far I have used lots of his, and he has used none of mine. Seems fair after I have carried him in every other way for 58 years.

1. Clarity of Message

Your employees and colleagues will respond much better to decisive, brutally honest, direct messaging and leadership (delivered with some personality and charisma), than to messaging clouded in too much compassion, empathy, and half-truths.

That’s leadership. Saying it exactly the way it is, preparing all for what’s coming, taking care to provide some reassurance, but making sure everyone knows exactly what faces them.

I hear ‘we don’t want to demotivate the team’, a lot.

Be more direct. Tell them what the reality is. Be completely frank. Tell them what you think is likely to happen on revenues. Explain why and how we’re hunkering down. Commit if you are able to try to save jobs, yes. But be clear you can’t do this alone. It needs sacrifice for all. Be clear about how Government subsidies and support can help.

2. Communications with Clients.

Recruitment companies doing this well are ensuring that there is LOTS of communication happening between our teams and their day-to-day contacts. Problem is, we’re spending most of our time talking to operatives client-side who just do not know what their company response will be to COVID-19.

Are you talking to senior enough clients to get a real feel of the impacts on their business, and likely go-forward strategy? And thus a better feel on the likely impacts on your revenues? Many agencies are not. Get ‘senior’.

3. Chutzpah

Chutzpah means ‘extreme self-confidence or audacity’ (usually used approvingly).

In almost every agency, it’s clear that ‘energy’ is just not where it needs to be on key clients. There are bursts of energy, yes. It has to be consistent, every day, every week, for the duration.

We have to crank up the nimbleness, communication, ideation, problem-solving. Yes, many clients are distracted and confused, and approvals in most cases have slowed.

Nevertheless, we need to be the most energising people in their lives. We need to come with stories, ideas, options that give them hope, and something to talk about with their colleagues. Keep thinking ahead. Four weeks. Four months. Give them great thinking about their ‘fight back’ options and strategies. And the staff they need to execute them.

4. Culture

Most agencies feel they have got off to a great start on WFH. It’s been kind of exciting, and different. Here’s the reality: staff morale and productivity is about to fall off a cliff (it’s started already for some of you, right?). It’s going to be our biggest challenge.

Our teams are already deep in ‘on-line fatigue’. It’s exhausting. Here’s a frightening statistic from the ‘remote learning’ for school kids in the aspirational, ambitious Hong Kong education scene. After several weeks of on-line learning, ‘attendance’ is down to 30% in some cases. The Wuhan lock-down experience suggests most found Week Four unbearable.

Owners and leaders of recruitment agencies need to become ‘Chief Energy Officers.’ Get your leadership team together now and decide how you’ll be ‘dealers in hope and energy’, every day, for the duration.

5. Costs

This is simple. But very painful. If you have not gone far enough already (and that’s most agencies), then take action. Do not delay.

Either way, prepare for more bad news. It’s the first principle of crisis management. Prepare for your revenues to slide another 15%-20% in a week’s time, and for the next six months.

What is your plan to reduce costs, dramatically? How will you manage cash? Resist cutting costs in dribs and drabs. Take decisive action, within the law and leveraging all Government support possible to preserve jobs for the long haul. Protect jobs as passionately as possible. Share the impacts.

6. Collaboration.

Collaboration is key in a crisis if an industry will survive and thrive. Now is not the time to ‘big up’ any small success you have (or big ones for that matter). This is serious shit and we need to help our industry survive

Collaborate. Support each other. Share. Encourage. No negatives. Resist that smart-arse social comment. We don’t need it. Nor do you. Please.

7. Configure for the Future

There is a future. Now is the time, this weekend, to start nailing your strategy to prepare for the business bounce-back and be ready for the recovery. Some say it will be a V-shape recovery. Six months of pain followed by a ‘kaboom’ fast return to big spending, growth and hiring. Others feel the recovery pace will be very ‘mixed’ depending on the industry.  (That’s me)

Here’s the given. We need to plan for and leverage a ‘leap-frog’ of change in candidate behaviour, mainly through digital channels. That massive change will also occur in how our clients engage and use agencies. We’ve spent a lot of time for years talking about what ‘the agency of the future‘ looks like. That day has arrived. Take the lead.

So get big brains thinking about how our clients’ business model, channels, and customer engagement is going to change with this massive long-term change in behaviour.

What does that mean for the services they will need from us? Do we need to recalibrate capability?

I know we’ve all been busy. But when I ask agency leaders about how we need to configure for this massive change, and quickly, most have little to say.

8. ‘Chat’ (narrative)

As Prince Harry realised when he looked up ‘Meghan Markle’ on the internet before his first blind date with her: “I knew I’d have to have good chat.”

Agency leaders (and recruiters) must get some ‘good chat’ nailed and shared with your leadership and client-facing team.

A powerful narrative about how clients can respond to short-term challenges. And a clear, persuasive point-of-view about this ‘future that’s happening much faster.’ We need clear, smart ideas and thinking of what our clients are facing, and what they need to do. If we do this, the work for us will flow.

It’s up to us, the leadership of this industry, to be brave, bold, consider all ideas, be collaborative, and most of all, take action, now, in whatever our gut tells us to do. We can do this!

Please be clear. I edited this. I added a few sentences. I corrected his shoddy grammar. But this is all the work of Chris Savage, (my baby brother). Connect with him on LinkedIn. Subscribe to his blog

Access the library of my Crisis advice here  (Blogs, podcasts, webinars)

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