accolo blog
Respectful recruiting (since 2003)
Friday, February 20, 2009 2:45 pm
posted by YoCC
The following post was written in response to “It’s Time for a Candidate’s Bill of Rights” by Kevin Wheeler. You can read it here.
The idea of regulating the recruiting industry to make people mind their manners seems a bit off. That being said, it’s not happening without any structure, so I guess there’s a case to be made for something stronger than blog posts. Before environmental regulation, dumping chemicals into rivers and poisoning your neighbors downstream was just common practice—now it’s abhorrent as well as illegal.
It’s Accolo’s view that candidates will vote with their feet—you treat them poorly, they won’t come back. You treat them with respect, they’ll come back and bring their friends. Unfortunately, the current employment market leads some recruiters to believe that respect isn’t required. I personally don’t think that a statement on the careers page that says, “Sorry, due to the volume of applicants, only those that are a fit will be dignified with a response,” is enough.
As an RPO, it’s part of our responsibility to our clients to protect their employment brand. Respect is obviously the right thing to do, but it’s also good business—every applicant is a potential investor, customer, partner, etc. We’ve generated over 25,000 referrals because we ensure that every candidate gets a response, even if it’s not the one they want. If “doing the right thing” isn’t enough, maybe tangible business results will be.
We’ve had a Candidate Bill of Rights since 2003.
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