Hire-Sense: Never Fall in Love With a Resume

Hire-Sense: Never Fall in Love With a Resume

Journal entry: May 14, 2013

Subject: Never Fall in Love With a Resume

Just this week, I was talking to a young manager who was bold to say; “When I like the way a person looks on paper, I tend make up my mind about them before they ever walk into my office … Half the time I just see the interview as a mere formality!”

When I heard this I was initially taken aback.  Experience has shown that this is the kind of serious error that gets a manager’s nose bloody with his or her senior management team. I have seen many promotions lost because of a manager’s hiring mistakes. But then I remembered a mistake I made in my younger days.

I guess some things never change…

Early on in my career as an associate recruiter in a small midtown Manhattan recruiting firm, I found myself tackling my first middle management search assignment.

After completing an intense round of research in the library, (yes there was no internet or PC’s for that matter at the time), I began the process of placing hundreds of phone calls to potential candidates.  After about 2 weeks, I uncovered someone I really liked for the position and was excited to present the resume to my boss, who would then presumably present the candidate to the client.

Actually the resume couldn’t have been better.  The experience was perfect, the level was perfect, the salary expectations were in line, and the prospective candidate lived 40 minutes closer to our client’s offices than he did to his current job.

I was completely jazzed … It looked like I was going to make my first “placement”, not to mention earn the small bonus that was associated with “closing the deal”.

After reading the resume very carefully my boss looked over the reading glasses that were perched at the tip of his nose and asked me four questions:

• Is the person smart? And if so, why did I think so … specifically?
• Is his thinking innovative, are his ideas relevant to the stated goals of the position and the long range vision of the client?
• Does he have the skills to grow beyond the immediate position at hand?
• Does his professional style resonate with the management style of the client?

These were four tough questions and he knew that I didn’t have the answers. Due to my inexperience,   I had fallen in love with the resume and it clouded my judgment when it came to determining what was really important during the interview and candidate evaluation process.

Ultimately this person did not get presented to the client.  As my boss had suspected, he was the wrong person with the right resume.

I subsequently surfaced a candidate with less than an ideal background “on paper” but who had an amazing capacity to think conceptually, as well as an ability to bring a level of wisdom and innovation to the client.  She not only got presented to our client, but got the job!  Eventually, this gifted person became the COO of the company, which in the late 1980’s went public!  Over the years she gave me quite a few assignments and I was able to help grow her team.

Thanks to the litmus test that I had to satisfy for my boss, from that moment forward, I reminded myself never to fall in love with a resume.

Today, I spend a fair amount of time coaching managers who have problems getting past the resume.

Dennis Troyanos is the Founder of The Troyanos Group, Ltd. a retained executive search firm specializing in marketing, advertising and marketing services.  He can be reached at 914-479-1802 or dennis@troyanosgroup.com