You Need to Give to Get

In the world of "give and take," do you take more than you give? When it comes to working with recruiters, many job seekers assume they can only receive help and not provide any. Additionally, many wrongfully assume that the relationship with the recruiter is short-lived-that it only lasts as long as the job opportunity the two are working on. As you'll read below, it pays for candidates to build a strong, long-term bond with a few recruiters.

I recently worked with a candidate who truly understands the importance of a long-term relationship with a recruiter. Bill Wachel was searching for an IT Director role in Dallas and I was able to set up an interview for him with one of my clients. Although a great candidate for the position, Bill did not get the job. Often this is the last interaction between a candidate and recruiter unless another opportunity arises. In Bill's case, he made an effort to send me a thank-you letter. Thank you letters to hiring managers are commonplace. A note to recruiters thanking them for their efforts is not. In this letter, Bill shared his appreciation for the help I provided him during the process, asked to be considered for future opportunities, and offered that I should "please contact him if he may ever be of potential help to me in any way."

The thank-you letter itself was very classy, but on top of that, he offered to help me in any way in the future. Recruiters live and die by the strength of their network. People like Bill can be a connection to candidates I may place all year long. Bill's offer to tap into his network to suggest candidates for other jobs I was trying to fill is highly appreciated. When it comes time for an IT Director to be placed at one of my clients, who do you think will come to mind first and foremost?

Candidates who take the time to provide help stand out in recruiters' memories. Many of you are just emailing recruiters your resume when they don't have a job that matches your credentials. The recruiters may put you in their database, but you may not stand out as an A-List Candidate. Think about how you can start the relationship by assisting each other instead. In the world of leveraging your network, you need to give help to get help.

Jeff Lipschultz is a founding partner of A-List Solutions, a premier recruiting firm in Dallas-Fort Worth. Jeff shares his views on employment trends and quirky observations of society at http://jefflipschultz.wordpress.com