Sense Recruiting Software’s Scott Hanna joins the 10-Minute Talent Show to discuss the importance of helping job seekers with their interviewing and onboarding. Scott has been in the recruiting and work culture space for more than a decade and talks about the various ways in which employers can retain talent — especially in a world where remote and hybrid working are becoming the standard.
What is Sense?
Sense is an automation and engagement platform for staffing and enterprise companies. We work with companies like Horizontal to communicate with candidates and improve employee and candidate engagement throughout the entire lifecycle. Whether it’s engaging with candidates in your database you haven’t talked to in 5 years who want to get back to work, to the warm and fuzzy stuff like making sure people know when their start date is, asking them for feedback after the first week, serving them after a month on their assignment, all the way through to the end of the assignment when we’re trying to redeploy them and bring them into a different kind of role out there as well. We have several different products that help with that, but essentially, we’re just trying to make candidates feel like they are being cared for and make the world a better place to work.
Why do you care about making work culture and the onboarding process better?
Whether applying directly to an employer or working through a staffing firm, the job search is a very daunting experience for any candidate. I’ve worked with good and bad recruiters. It’s important that you feel like you’re being paid attention to and being cared for throughout your entire tenure. For me, it’s always been important for companies to realize job seeker needs and that candidates feel engaged with the organization they’re working for.
What can employers do to retain good talent and employees?
Employees have a lot more power than they think they have. If you are a high-performing employee and you’re hitting your goals and progressing your career, you are a valuable asset to the company and have a lot of choices. In the professional world, employees are getting LinkedIn messages, emails and text messages from recruiters trying to pull them away for their current opportunity, and a lot of them will dangle a higher dollar amount in front of the employee. But that doesn’t make it the better choice. At the end of the day, you could get paid more, but are you treated worse? Are you not working for somebody you believe in? Are you selling a product that you don’t necessarily believe in? Those are all factors that can make it either more or less enticing for you to leave that job. Your current employer has a responsibility to keep you happy and to align your satisfaction with their company goals. If you have a highly engaged employee, they’re typically going to produce more, they’re going to refer their friends, they’re going to speak highly of the company and they’re going to stay longer. If you look at the cost of filling in a new employee, it’s much cheaper to retain an employee than it is to lose somebody and have to replace them. So that it’s a win-win for both sides!
What makes a good account manager, and what do you look for when you’re hiring onto your team?
What is powerful about a good account manager is that they have both the company they’re representing and the customer in mind. The idea is they must be empathetic to the needs of the client, but more than anything, they have to stand behind their business on the other end. So, the way that I typically approach that is just try being as real as possible. Don’t forget that you’re having a real conversation with a real person, and you need to understand what their needs are. If you’re trying to put a square peg in a round hole just to increase your commissions, you’re probably not going to do great. You have to care about your customers and what they want, but also be realistic. Be the one that says, “Hey, we’re not going to be able to do that. But we can do X, Y and Z. Is that important to you?” Don’t make false promises.
It almost it goes beyond just an account manager role. You know what’s good for the long term. There’s always these shiny objects, but we need to think about the best case scenario. When you have clients like Horizontal, who give you that real information and feedback, you know that they’re there for your best interests and want to help your current company grow. When there’s a really good synergy between the client and the account manager, that comes out to a win-win at the end of the day.
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