I’m in the midst of several recruiting initiatives right now. While I won’t pretend I get thousands of resumes, if I do post a role, depending on the level, I could conceivably get hundreds.
Yes I screen them all. Yes I may take only 5-10 seconds on some. After all, some are not qualified in the least. Some I spend a little longer on and then put them in the ‘hold’ pile. Others I review in more depth and put in the ‘yes’ pile for interviews.
But I digress. What do I do with ALL OF THEM? I respond. Yes, you heard me. I respond. And I don’t have an automated response (although I suppose with technology I could). I don’t want to thank everyone for applying and say we’ll be in touch if we want to interview them.
I want to thank them for their submission and invite them in for an interview. Or thank them for their submission and let them know they are under review. Or thank them for their submission and schedule an interview (hooray!)
So what do I do? I send each and every one an e-mail. Yes, that’s right. Sometimes it’s from me directly. Sometimes I get my assistant to do it. Either way, it’s a personalized response so that the candidate knows his/her resume was received, reviewed and responded to.
Why do I do it? Because of responses like the one I got today:
Thank you for the response,
That alone sets you apart. Much appreciated and I hope your candidates work well for you.
Mike
You know what. If someone takes the time to read my posting, craft a cover letter, customize a resume and respond to it. He/she deserves a response back. There’s probably nothing worse than the sound of silence. You know that sound? It’s when you put your time and effort into applying to a role and hear nothing back in return.
Nice going Mike. I loved getting your response. I get a number of them from candidates surprised that someone took the time to respond. If you don’t have time to do that, it’s time you got into another line of work.
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