Articles From the Team
A recruiting story – client feedback
This is an anecdotal story from the world of recruitment. I wanted to write it all down before I forgot the incident, this way it will stand as a record of what occurred and an example of some of the best constructive feedback I have ever received from a BCL client….should anyone come to question that this ever happened later on!
The situation was thus; a client was using many recruiters to fill their vacancy and 1 lawyer had interviewed through BCL for the role. We got to a point in the process when only 2 lawyers remained in the battle, one from BCL and one from A.N.Other. These two lawyers were going to go head to head in front of the CFO, the crowd held their breath because of the tension, anticipation and all round excitement. Then I got a call saying this:
“Hi Mike, this is what I like about X” (name changed to preserve identity). “She is composed, efficient, pleasant to talk to and clearly technically competent”. All going well thinks I, I can almost feel the victory over A.N.Other. The ball gets played through to the striker. “She would be a very safe pair of hands in the role and has fantastic crossover in some key areas of work that we do”. The striker rounds the defender to go clear through. “None of what we talked about matters now”. The goalkeeper steps towards the incomer attacker. “The CFO doesn’t care about what I think, they are going to form their own opinions and they are not a lawyer”. The ball bobbles on an unseen divot of grass. “X is going to do miserably in front of the CFO because they don’t explain technical issues in an easy to understand manner”. The striker’s boot laces come undone. “There is hope though, if you can get across to her that she needs to really drill down into her examples, where did she add value, who did she work with, what precisely did she do in relation to the intended outcome then I think she can still win the role”. The goalkeeper’s boot laces come undone. “That is of course if it wasn’t for the other lawyer still in the process”. The striker gets a blade of grass in their eye. “The other lawyer is less experienced in key advisory areas but has the peripheral skills we are interested in, I`ve told them about X’s weakness and that they need to sharpen their technical understanding, I want you to pass to X that the other lawyer is less experienced in key advisory areas and if she explains her examples correctly she can do it. Let’s see which one performs best on the day, that way we`ll get the right person for the job”.
You can’t ask for fairer feedback than that, both lawyers were told the weaknesses of the other and the one who could show the mental agility to adapt would win the role. So who won? Nobody yet, the CFO interview hasn’t happened but you can guarantee it will be the company that wins in the long term!
For more information contact Mike Huggins at BCL Legal.