Halloween Edition - Ghosting and Ghoulish Behaviour

So this is the first edition of a long overdue newsletter that I have been deliberating over for at least 6 months. I have finally decided to bite the bullet and write something, so be kind! That's me by the way, at the bottom of the pile on. Well, I say that it's me, but it's actually my alter ego, Horsey.

I'm James Brown and I have been working in construction and engineering recruitment for around 16 years and have had my business ATS Recruitment Limited for 12 years now. Initially setting up with my good friend and now ex-business partner Sean McGhee way back in 2012. Apparently Sean had the heads up on a worldwide pandemic and got out in February 2020, but that's another story for another day...

My wife Leanne Brown and I have three kids. Jacob (12) is our eldest and for 7 years was an only child. Jacob is a very talented, loving and caring young man who is into gaming in a big way. He is also autistic and has ADHD which sometimes brings its challenges but his infectious energy and personality means that there's never a dull moment with him around.

Mila (4) is our beautiful princess. She is 95% princess and 5% diva. She knows how to throw a strop but is also extremely loving and caring like Jacob and is just about the sweetest person I have ever met. She started big school this September and is doing really well.

Stanley (3) is our in house Wile E Coyote! He's the youngest of course and is always demonstrating that just because he's the smallest, it doesn't mean that his opinions shouldn't be heard! He has a wicked sense of humour and although I know he loves me really, he is very much a Mummy's boy. Stanley gave us a real shock on Monday evening, when we heard a huge thud at the bottom of the stairs as the kids were coming up for bed. This was momentarily followed by a scream and a Acme style cartoon bump protruding from his forehead. With Mum understandably freaking out, we quickly arranged for my sister to come and look after Jacob and Mila whilst we whisked Stanley to A&E with me holding ice on his head in the back of the car whilst Leanne drove her Nissan Leaf along the country roads like it was a Subaru rally car! Thankfully, after checking Stanley thoroughly, the senior nurse said that even though it looked really bad, everything was OK and of course Stan was full of beans by the time he got to the hospital.

Halloween is, without doubt, right up there with Christmas these days in our house. It's weird how it's gone from not really being much of a thing when I was a lad (showing my age) to becoming something that the kids talk about all year round, wanting to decorate the house on 1st October. It's a Simon Cowell 'no from me' on that by the way! Anyway, it got me wondering if the Halloween effect has infiltrated our recruitment business this month. As an agency, we predominantly work on permanent, contingency recruitment. Before I get a raft of comments telling me how I need to switch to retained and only work exclusively on senior appointments, grow a thriving contract business, we are trying to evolve the business whilst also continuing to keep staff in jobs, pay the bills, loan commitments, HMRC etc...

Anyway, we came into October hoping and expecting that the month would be our biggest sales month of the year by some distance. We hoped to continue the momentum into November to set us up nicely for December, which is always a tricky month in our sector. The day before the month even started, the ghoulish behaviour began! It seems that one candidate who we had 'placed' and was due to start on Monday 30th September, didn't show up on day one. I guess he got a bit excited on the Sunday evening and tucked into Celebrations his Mum had bought for the trick or treaters too soon. He did turn in on Tuesday 1st October claiming he thought that was his start date with it being 1st of the month despite him talking with his Line Manager the Friday beforehand and ending the conversation with "see you on Monday"! The company kindly gave him the benefit of the doubt by lo and behold, he was back into the candy the following Sunday and joined the Monday Club again on 7th October. See ya later pal and for us, see ya later invoice.

Fast forward a couple of days and despite this early setback, we're still confident of having a good month. Wednesday afternoon and my colleague Hayley Sharp gets a call back from a candidate, who in true Halloween spirit had been ghosting her for a week or so now. Hayley had secured the candidate a few interviews in late August/early September and got him a really good offer that was swiftly accepted. ID back, references taken, signed contract, get him on the sales spreadsheet. Decent fee with a good client, 1 month notice period, no worries. To her credit, Hayley is amazing at her job and goes above and beyond to check in with the candidates leading up to their start. The Spidey Senses start tingling when somebody who has been a great communicator stops taking calls and replying to texts and emails. Anyway, after a ghosting performance Casper would have been proud of, he eventually calls Hayley back to indifferently tell her he's changed his mind, has been offered a role for more money and is taking that. In some ways, you can't really blame the guy for taking a higher paid role and doing what is best for himself and his family. For us, it was gutting as it was a big fee that has just dropped off. We also have to explain to the client that the candidate has changed his mind and that we're sorry they've booked hotels, paid for inductions, training, laptops etc and he hasn't let us know until 5 days before he's due to start. However you try and polish this turd, it's not going to reflect well on us, the recruitment agency who can't keep control of its candidates... Clearly, they don't directly blame us, but I'm guessing that there is an element of frustration pointed towards us or perhaps I'm overthinking things?

So, the best month of the year has now turned into a distinctly average month and all of a sudden, all the positivity you had turned to worry and anxiety about if more bad things happen. The wind has been taken from your sails. You try not to take it home but sometimes it's hard not to. I've gotten a lot better at this over the years I think. Get back to the house and I soon have to switch from being a recruitment business owner to being Horsey or Daddy Robot but it's bloody annoying at times on this recruitment rollercoaster. I realise that by even writing this I am opening myself up to recruiters who are 'smashing it' telling me that I'm doing everything wrong. As mentioned above, we are trying to evolve the business and make positive changes to our business model and way of working but it's still as frustrating as hell when things like this happens on the contingency recruitment model. Ultimately, we are selling a service but we're also selling people. Unlike a product, a person has the ability to change their mind, to get cold feet, to lie, to be persuaded by outside influences, to get sick and of course for their grannies to die or car to break down on the day of an interview...

It's all part of the business, I guess. It's just a difficult business at times, despite what some people think. Just feel lucky that after a shitter of a day I have Leanne and the kids to come back to. Happy Halloween everyone, until next time...