My Job Search - Part 3 - The Companies

It has been nearly 2 years since my last full article. Life has been crazy both at work and in my personal life. My office continues to grow from strength to strength and we billed ￡60k over budget, in what was officially our first full year – highly satisfying. More importantly, my beautiful wife and I were blessed with the birth of our gorgeous baby girl Grace Helen who is now 6 months old and is the most placid baby I have ever known. Our other little bundle of joy, Alfie, will be turning 4 this year and provides us with entertainment daily. Life has taken me away from LinkedIn; however, I will make a conscious effort to spend some time on here again.

So, the much-anticipated third and final part of my mini-series is here, only 22 months late. Apologies. I would like to start by thanking everyone for the positive feedback, kind words and general appreciation my previous two posts received; I definitely have a lot to live up to with this one.

When I started writing these, I wanted them to be helpful to job seekers, recruiters and employers. So, for everyone who reads this final post in the "My Job Search" series, I hope you find it useful. Once again, my thoughts can sometimes split opinion, so please take all of this with an objective viewpoint and understand that at the time I had been made redundant, including broken promises from my previous employers, I had a young child and a mortgage, so I didn't always view subjects positively and I was extremely nervous that the next move had to be the right one.

When I was searching for a new role there were a lot of positive experiences; however, there were a few negatives too, and meeting the companies threw up the worst experiences of all. I have been for quite a few interviews throughout my working life, and working in the recruitment sector has helped me overcome feeling nervous during the process, enabling me to be confident and assertive when meeting potential employers. I am aware that not everyone is in the same boat and that interviews can be an extremely daunting process for many people. Therefore, I am still stunned by the methods of so many employers when interviewing prospective employees, although maybe they just have not been trained how to interview!? So remember it is much an interview for you to find out about them as it is for them to find out about you.

I, for the benefit of others, will not be naming the companies throughout this piece as I am sure they would not want to be associated with poor organisation, poor questioning and poor manners.  Let's start with poor manners and questioning rolled into one – the first interview had both of these in abundance. I personally like to arrive early for interviews and normally about ten minutes early; let's face it, first impressions count and you don't want to be late. So why do so many people like to keep interviewees waiting? Is it to make them nervous? Is it to build suspense and make the candidate sweat? Or are they just plain rude? I will pick this point up again; however, my first interview on this trail I was kept waiting in an office for 25 minutes past the start time. When they finally came into the room without an apology or explanation, I knew it wasn't going to be the company for me. The interviewer proceeded to tell me how "fantastic" her company is and without her it would be nothing, as she started it from scratch. "It is going to be the biggest recruitment agency not only in the UK but all of Europe within the next couple of years" – 2 years later and I am still waiting to read about them in The Recruiter. Now, I loved her enthusiasm and passion, but her company had been running for three months and had been making a huge loss every month (as many start-ups do). She also had a silent partner who funds the business and he even named it after one of his existing businesses (so much for it all being down to her). She wanted me to write a full detailed business plan for her and advise how I was going to make it a successful branch. Perhaps I’m being a bit presumptuous, but I honestly felt as though she was seriously struggling and needed some help reinvigorating her business. She barely asked me any questions and assumed a lot from my CV and LinkedIn page, so I am unsure how she decided that I was the right man to lead her company to the top of the recruitment mountain when she didn't even ask me about any financial figures from my previous companies. Business plans are standard practice in the interview stage when you are aiming for a certain role; however, it should not be the first thing that is asked of you before they even ask if you would like a drink. 

My second interview was an improvement and, had it not been for the Director changing his mind with regards to recruitment, I think it would have been even better. I met the interviewer offsite as there was a lot of change happening within the business and she did not want to unsettle her staff. We discussed the finer things in life – holidays, cars, trips to the theatre – and found that we had been to the same places and had similar interests. She was open about the state of the branch I would be managing and how the company was changing rapidly, things that were not appealing to me; however, with the support and help she promised I felt it could have been a good opportunity. We discussed the possibilities of expanding the branch and working together to build a network of branches, but there was a stumbling block. After nearly two hours of conversation about past work experiences we came to the topic of salary and package, and I was under the impression that the recruiter had informed the hiring manager of my expectations. Unfortunately, due to location and the circumstances in branch, we were slightly out of sync. I did receive an email from her stating that the interview went so well she wanted to offer me the job, have me start immediately and felt she could persuade her boss to meet my expectations. Her Director was not happy or as confident and demanded not an interview, but a "formal meeting" with me as I needed to prove to him that I was as good as she had said I was. I replied to the email in a courteous manner, advising I would be happy for a meeting; however, I was not prepared to travel for two hours without some guarantee in place that he would be happy to negotiate to my minimum requirements. I had not heard from them for nigh on six weeks when I received their email stating that they had met with others who were not quite to my standards and would now consider negotiating. I of course politely declined the meeting and provided some feedback to help them improve their recruiting process, for which I received a delightful "thank you" email from them.

Interview number three, seven and ten all had a similar outcome, this was because they were all with the same company. I met them three times and can safely say that they were one of my favourite companies before it all fell apart. This was something exciting, something new. This would take my career in a different path and would build my media skills immensely. After meeting the owner, who was welcoming, friendly and impressive with first impressions, this good will continued into the second stage interview before rapidly evaporating by the end of the third. The one main reason was poor organisation! He ferried potential colleagues in and out of the office to meet with me and provide him feedback, which was understandable and extremely pleasing to hear that they all thought I had a place in the company. He even advised me he was an avid Liverpool fan, things in my book could not have gone better. "Where's the contract, sign me up", I thought. At the end of the final interview he had a large brown envelope with the contract and offer letter outlining all the remuneration, holiday allowance and bonuses agreed previously, so at the point of handing this all over to me and into my excited and trembling hands he said, "I will post everything out to you." To say the least, and with about as much cliché as I can muster, I was confused.com. He had advised me at the end of my second interview that the final interview would be based on package and terms, not meeting people (some whom I had met previously) and more of a laid back general conversation, as in his terms I had "ticked all the right boxes". I received my offer letter in the post with exaggerated targets, a lower annual salary than the position was advertised for and fewer holidays!? I received a call from his "PA" who said she was excited about me joining the team, so she was deeply disheartened when I gracefully declined and advised the terms were less than my minimum requirements, despite reassurances that the final offer would be well in excess. To top this off, every 6 months I receive a message through LinkedIn from the chap who I was due to sit alongside and generate new business. He introduces himself to me and tells me how he could help elevate my career. He still has no idea that we had met twice before (obviously I am very forgettable); it's clear to see why they needed additional Business Developers.

The Best Connection left me waiting in reception too, but they advised me they were running late, they came and shook my hand, introduced themselves, offered me a hot drink and most importantly they made me feel welcome and like I wasn't wasting their time. In total, I spent more than 10 hours in the presence of the Manager, Senior Manager and Director over 3 separate interviews – each was genuine and asked me questions about me. My life experiences, work experiences, the margins I had generated, the branches I had grown, my successes, my failures, my personal goals, my personal achievements, and who I would have dinner with if I could invite 6 guests (Bill Shankly, my Grandad, Stephen Hawking, Muhammed Ali, Kenny Dalglish and Eric Clapton if you were interested); that final question I grant is random, but they took an interest in me and they didn't leave any stone unturned. We negotiated and came to a solution that worked for them and for me, they listened to what was important for me and I understood what their expectations were. Well, I must have listened because we can fast forward to present day and my branch is a big success. We are growing our client base month by month, our candidate base week by week and due to move into new premises shortly, which will increase my headcount.

It is not difficult to make someone feel welcome and present them with a challenging and exciting employment opportunity, but in my experiences 2 years ago it proved that some still get it completely wrong. If you are hiring someone, here are some helpful hints.

• DO NOT sell your company as the best thing since sliced bread when it is clear for everyone to see that it isn't – be honest
• DO NOT keep people waiting with no apology or reasoning – it's just rude
• DO NOT let a good thing go – a bird in the hand is worth two in bush
• DO NOT mess potential employees around and then expect them to join you – if you agree terms do not go back on your word

I had a total of 10 interviews with a 6 different companies and I was offered 5 of these positions in varying guises – the 6th didn't get to offer stage as they were too late. I learnt a lot about myself and, looking back, it was a great experience for me (even though at the time it was soul-destroying and frightening).

I started this process two years ago and have thoroughly enjoyed writing these articles, so I hope they have helped some people along the way.