Keeping Your Eye on the Future as You Hire NOW

Let’s say your medical device sales department is among the many departments in thousands of companies that have been touched by the Great Resignation (or another wave of it this month):?one of your best sales reps has left you for another position.

Do you move immediately into scramble mode, rushing to source experienced sales pros so that you can replace your departing colleague as quickly as possible?

Hold on. Take a breath, or three or 15 and remember that you are not just hiring for now, you are hiring for the future, as well.

Rushing to hire often means a bad hire result

We have all experienced it: we need someone to fill an empty position NOW, so we call HR, our favorite niche sales recruiter or...whatever it is we do when we panic. And we hit the “recruit” button and then slam the “hire” button when someone who looks/feels “good enough” to us comes along.

And perhaps the person turns out to be a poor fit. (Many rushed hires become so.)

Or they don’t, and all is well for a while …. until another sales pro leaves you suddenly.

And you repeat the process all over again.

What would happen if you took your time and pursued candidates for opportunities now...and later?

Magic, that’s what!

By looking ahead and keeping a pipeline of candidates for the future (and, in this market, that future time could come much more quickly than you imagine) means you will not only hire someone great for your current opening, but you will also have built a network of great talent you can tap into quickly once you have another opening.

Here how to build that talent pipeline:

• Ask your current sales reps if any of their professional colleagues at other companies might be a good fit in the future and reach out to these folks.
• As you notify current job candidates that you chose someone else for the open position, let them know (if applicable) that they’d still make a great candidate and that you’ll be staying in touch.
• Reach out to people you know in your pipeline to see if they know potentially great candidates and contact them.
• Look on LinkedIn and other recruiting sites for attractive candidates and reach out to them.
• If you don’t already have their email address, ask if they would give it to you.
• Send all these individuals links to your company’s blog posts, case studies, white papers, etc. regularly over time.
• Reach out every now and again “just to touch base” and ask how things are going for them.

In other words, stay in contact continuously in the future and you will reap the rewards soon enough when you are able to hire a sales professional you already know rather well.

Have you ever done this type of candidate pipeline building before? If so, what were your results?

#hiring #recruiting #medicaldevicesales