How To Protect Your Position In TA & How To Bounce Back From Layoffs

It's a tough time in the world, and many recruiters are feeling the pinch. Unfortunately, when businesses have to tighten their belts, talent acquisition professionals are some of the first to be let go. On Episode 107 of the Talent & Growth - The Talent Acquisition Podcast Podcast, we spoke to Kristian Bright , the Recruitment Lead at Rooser and Co-Founder of DBR, about his experience being let go last year. He shared the mindset that got him through and how you can survive the tough times in recruitment.

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How can you future-proof your position as a recruiter?

It’s all about your mindset. Whatever happens is a learning experience, so try not to worry too much. Your mindset also needs to address how you approach challenging situations, and find the positives you can draw from it. A redundancy isn’t a failure or defeat, it’s just a change in circumstances.

The best way to future-proof your career is to build great relationships in the industry. Your relationship with your stakeholders is absolutely crucial, because they’re the ones who can actually help you when your company’s struggling. Keep them updated about what you’re doing and show up consistently. As a recruiter, you've kind of got to shed your ego and admit that you need them, and that you’re all in this together. It's in their interest to help you.

How can recruiters work towards becoming indispensable?

You need to understand how the business works and how it makes money. Get to know the business plan, what the objectives are and the perspectives of different teams within the company. Immerse yourself in all of it. From there, you can figure out where you can have an impact. You might not be an expert in this field anytime soon, but what do you need to know? How can you have a positive impact? What are the key hires? You need to know exactly where the gaps are, and how you can fill them.

 If you’ve had to move because of the recession, understanding how the company recruits will set you up for success. Figure out what's good about their process. What's been challenging? How have we found and hired people to date? Do a lot of the hires have come from a connection to somebody in the team? Spend time understanding where those connections came from. Find out what they look for in a candidate from a skill set and behavioural perspective. Spend a month learning and observing. Kick off those relationships with your hiring managers and keep bringing people together.

What advice would you give to somebody in TA who has been let go from their jobs in the last few months?

If you have a network, utilise it. Spend time building it in a meaningful way. Figure out how to utilise and leverage that network. You never know, one of those connections could find you a job. Can you build a bit of momentum behind your job search?

When you're job searching, set yourself small goals. Your objective is to get a new role, but set yourself some smaller goals as well. Can you get an intro call with somebody who's hiring? Can you get an interview? Are you going to reach out to like a certain number of people to start some conversations? Work towards each of those, and it’ll all fall into place.

It's about learning. Open up opportunities, network, reflect on what you want from each opportunity and play to your strengths. You have to stay true to your values and motivations. Just because you’re looking for work doesn’t mean you have to compromise your authenticity. If you’re not true to yourself, you could end up in this position again in the next six to twelve months’ time. You need to put yourself in a healthy environment where you can make good decisions and be effective in your role.

To hear more about how you can recession-proof your role as recruiter, listen to Episode 107 of the Talent & Growth Podcast here. 

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