Building Trust: The importance of constructive feedback and how you can highlight your potential.

By: Sofia D. , Tech Recruiter & Team Leader.

We all know that feedback is one of the most controversial topics in recruitment. It's very common to speak to people who tell us they've never received feedback on a process, or even read about it in publications on LinkedIn.

But after all, why is feedback so important? ??

The psychology of feedback tells us that feedback is a social process associated with human interactions that has a major impact on motivation (when positive and constructive, feedback can reinforce desired behaviors, as well as improve someone’s performance), with an impact on the individual’s self-concept and self-esteem, being essential to growing.

As a recruiter in an outsourcing environment, my experience of feedback is also that it is essential to the building of a relationship of trust.

Feedback: frequently requested, not always as expected.

In this business, and particularly at META, it's not always easy to get the feedback that candidates expect, as we rely on feedback from the projects they are being considered for.

Particularly in the very early stages of the process, the feedback can be less in-depth, with the reasons for disqualifying candidates being given as an option to other candidates, without going into why the person is not being considered in the process.

Ideally, we would always be able to point out areas for improvement, but this tends to happen in more advanced processes. Another ungrateful point for me as a recruiter is the lack of feedback from the candidate's project that has been sent for analysis.

Although we can ask candidates for a little more time for the process and insist on a response from the project, the time may come to give a final feedback in which we close the process for the sake of managing expectations.

It's worth noting that we are also fortunate to work with partners who are very concerned about this issue and who are as detailed as possible about the reasons why candidates are not progressing in the process, allowing us to give constructive feedback. And this is one of the most important parts of our role: working every day to gather as much feedback as possible so that we can pass it on to candidates.

Whatever feedback we have to give, it is always given to the candidate with the knowledge that the doors are open for future contact should other suitable opportunities arise.

“Feedback is an important factor in building a trusting relationship.” ??

The truth is that, in my experience as a recruiter, while there were processes that worked the first time, there were others that took a second or third try. And this was only possible because of the good relationship and communication that was maintained between both parties and, most importantly, the development of the candidates themselves during the process.

When it comes to the interview, candidates often ask for feedback on how it went and what they would like to see improved in terms of language, CV and languages spoken, among other things.

Many of the processes that worked the second or third time around were because the candidates were able to take the feedback they were given and reinvent themselves. I'm equally pleased when they come up to me and tell me that they've been able to take on challenges outside of META through their channels!

“Throughout my experience as a recruiter, giving feedback has been one of the main focuses of my work.” ??

Throughout my experience as a recruiter, giving feedback has been one of the main focuses of my work. And anyone who thinks it's just about the processes is wrong! ????

From reviewing CVs and helping to highlight candidates' skills, to encouraging candidates to improve their English by committing to scheduling new interviews after a period of time so that we can try a project again at that time, to preparing for interviews, I have done a little bit of everything to help candidates with constructive feedback so that they can highlight their potential.

And this is not something exclusively to me.

“META is made up of professionals who want to do things differently and who genuinely care about candidates and providing the best recruitment experience possible.” ??

I believe in the value of what we have built as a team, and this is evident in the feedback we receive from candidates (for example, on online platforms such as Teamlyzer and Glassdoor), which fills our hearts and motivates us to do more and better. ??