The real keys to success...consistency & process

My experience is that most recruiters struggle with consistency. Unsure how many placements they’re going to make this month/quarter, always playing catch up and ‘sweating the pipeline’ to try and squeeze through the last deal to hit target.

Equally, the best recruiters I know don’t have that issue. They can - within reason - tell you what they’re going to bill next quarter, or the one after.

The difference isn’t just experience - you know the old gag about whether you have ten years experience or six months experience 20 times! 

Process, process, process

The difference is process. The best recruiters know what to do, in what sequence, at what tempo, to produce the results that they want. Can they be surprised and hit a dry spell because their market shifts? Sure. Can they suddenly hit a hot run and have to hang on like a mosquito hitting an artery? Definitely.

But when they hit a dry spell, they know how to rebuild their pipeline and turn the business back on - whether that means pivoting or just shifting their focus to a slightly different niche. And when they hit a hut run, they recognise it for what it is and keep doing the basics to make sure that their pipeline is topped up for when the artery dries up.

Having a clear, defined sales and delivery process makes the difference between living with feast and famine, or just living with degrees of feast! 

Feast & famine?

When you know precisely what to do, how often, and to whom to generate the candidates that you’ll market, or the Job Orders that you’ll use to bring in the best candidates, life becomes so much simpler and less stressful.

But most recruiters still run around reinventing the wheel all the time, because they are too busy to work out what works, and how to do it consistently.

The wheel is not the foundational invention of human history. That’s the axle. Without the axle, a wheel is just a round rock with a hole in it. With the axle it becomes, well, a wheel! 

Simplicity wins

In the same way, you don’t need totally new techniques for outreach to clients or candidates to be a massive seven-figure success. You don’t need that new CRM, email system or automation. Yes, it might help and I’m a total nerd so I love that sort of stuff. 

But I regularly used to bill seven figures a year with just index cards, and a free LinkedIn account. Yes, I’m that old - which means that seven figures really was big billings! 

Sexy CRM and automation?

Process is what matters, not systems.

If you add systems and automation to a crappy process that doesn’t work, you just have a highly efficient and automated failure. How many times have you seen that?

The right KPIs

It’s not that hard to build a robust and effective system. You just have to take a step back and ask yourself these two questions:

1. What do I HAVE to do in order to hit the number of placements I want? (Everything else is then optional or redundant)
2. What is the best sequence to do those things in?

And then you track the numbers and tweek things until you’ve optimised it. And then - and only then - you add systems and automation, so that you’re speeding up a process that you’ve proven to work.

If you want to explore this more, have a look at joining a 30-trial of The Influence Academy for JUST $1! You’ll find this whole process explored and explained in a lot of detail. CLICK HERE for your 30-Day Trial.