In the current market, sometimes feedback can be overlooked. Lack of candidate feedback is detrimental to the entire recruitment process for all parties. See below a couple of reasons why feedback is so important for all parties involved in the process:
1) Candidate
When you provide detailed and informed feedback to a candidate, you help them learn what they are doing well, while also identifying areas in which they can improve. Honest, constructive, feedback gives solid advice on areas that candidates can work on. Therefore, improving their interview skills for next time. For the company, if they wish to hire the candidate in the future the candidate will be very keen to talk again if they received positive constructive feedback the first time around.
2) Employer
Giving feedback to a candidate is very constructive not only for a candidate to take away but also very important for the Employer Brand. Candidates who receive feedback are more likely to walk away with a positive reflection of the company even though they may not have been successful. Candidates communicate their experiences via word of mouth or via various social media platforms available and a negative view of a company can cause reputational damage in the Market. This can take a long time to repair!
Given how competitive the market is currently a brand reputation is something that a company cannot take for granted. In one sense by providing candidate feedback a client can turn a negative situation to a positive one.
3) Recruiter
Providing thorough, detailed candidate feedback as a hiring manager is critically important when working with a recruiter. Through candidate feedback, the Recruiter can understand where their candidate may have fallen short and work with the candidate to improve on certain areas whether it be through their interview technique or upskilling in certain areas.
Something that is often overlooked, is the recruiter getting feedback from the company on what it was that influenced them towards the successful candidate. It also goes without saying that the more the recruiter knows, the better their future candidates will be.
July 2019
William Clement Stone once said that “Sales are contingent upon the attitude of the salesman, not the attitude of the prospect.” – This can be true when we examine both the salesperson and the customer’s attitude. But, let’s focus on the salesperson, what are the sales skills needed to be a successful salesperson?
Sales skills can be divided into different areas: hard skills and soft skills. The first ones are the ones directly related to the job and can be developed and learned with training and practice. Under the hard skills, we can have for example the ability to find new opportunities, qualifying the leads, doing demonstrations and so on. Hard skills are for sure important but they are not enough for you to be as a successful salesperson if you don’t combine them with the soft skills.
Soft skills or People skills are the glue that holds things together, they are all about human interaction and they play a huge part when it comes to human-to-human communication.
So, what are the most 5 important soft skills included in a successful salesperson?
1. Communication
The ability to communicate is the base of every successful salesperson, it’s all about empathy, transparency, honesty and the ability to interact and engage over the phone, via email and most importantly, face-to-face.
2. People Management
This can seem easy but it’s not. Working in sales, every day you interact with different people from different backgrounds. The sales process involves different steps and different people. Managing people through this process is critical. It is important for you to have listening capabilities to value the teamwork and the collaboration.
3. Business Management
Understanding how to help business succeed is a must. A successful salesperson needs to have the ability to bring the most value to their prospects and customers.
4. Time Management
This is a must-have skill and understanding how to prioritize and manage your own time is essential to succeed.
5. Leadership
Leadership isn’t management. Leadership is a force which manages organisational procedures and coordinates the employees to achieve the company’s objectives and having effective leadership is necessary. A good leader has the ability to influence people towards the attainment of organisational goals.
Learning the techniques and strategies for being a successful salesperson is only half of the equation. You need soft skills and people skills to drive to success and these are skills that can’t be taught, but they can be developed.
To truly excel at sales, don’t forget about the soft skills. Develop them and they’ll turn you into a true asset to you and your company.
Would you like to discuss further on sales roles? Please feel free to reach out to me at federica.brungiu@e-frontiers.ie.
July 2019
Federica Brungiu
Besides being known as one of the major tech hubs in Europe, Ireland continues to be an attractive destination for many global financial institutions. The Banking and Finance recruitment market in Ireland has become increasingly active with an increased pipeline of International Banks and Asset managers continuing to look to Ireland as a preferred location.
We spent 5 minutes with Conor Byrne, Director of Banking and Finance Recruitment at e-Frontiers to understand the overall picture of this market.
The Recruitment market within Financial Services is extremely competitive in Ireland currently. What are the drivers?
We are seeing growing confidence in the Irish economy and many business transformation and relocation opportunities connected to Brexit. Given the huge growth in the fintech sector in recent times, this has presented more competition for top talent between Banks, Asset managers and the rising number of Management companies (ManCo’s) looking to establish here.
What Trends are you currently seeing across the market?
Continued demand for Risk, Compliance and regulatory professionals across all areas in the sector which has been mainly driven by central bank requirements for companies to have greater depth within their governance framework and an ever-changing regulatory landscape. We continue to see new entrants to the Irish Market with a strong pipeline in capital markets and asset management sectors.
High skilled banking and finance expatriates continue to return home as we are now seeing a greater variety of Front, Middle and back office roles in the Irish Market.
We are seeing a greater than ever focus on work-life balance for candidates when contemplating a move.
What steps are your clients taking to attract key candidates?
Clients are continually looking at ways to stand out through promoting good work-life balance, career progression opportunities and offering return to work programmes.
We also see Clients seeking to improve the candidate experience within the recruitment process. In the current market Speed is key – same number of steps with a shorter recruitment time.
What attracted you to e-Frontiers?
What differentiates e-Frontiers from other recruitment firms is that each division is led by someone with genuine domain experience in the areas they are recruiting for. Coming from the Industry side of things and having been a hiring manager, we are looking to add real value to both Clients and Candidates throughout the entire recruitment process. Thankfully in a short time, this has been well received by the recruitment market within Banking and Finance.
May 2019
