First time recruiting - am I being too picky?

[Hackney]

I'm recruiting for an account manager, looking after some of the major UK retailers plus a few other relationships.
Job went live on The Grocer site yesterday and so far I've had a few CVs come in.

Each one has made no reference to the job in their email response. To me this is pretty basic stuff, and I'm inclined to turn these down out of hand, especially when the language in the email is poor.

I'm hoping that we receive about 100 cvs of which I'll get ten people in.
Personally I think I should reply to each of the others but I have my job to do and my time could be better spent elsewhere. Is it rude of me not to reply?

If I do reply should I advise people where they've gone wrong or give some tips?
As mentioned above a reference as to where your skills fit specifically with his job rather than just listing your skills is a key one for me.

But one guy has a cv which appears to end in 2013 after 9 months in a job.
I need that gap filled otherwise it's a glaring omission that puts me off.

Even if he's been travelling for 2.5 yrs at least tell me that right?

[PorkInsider]

If you try to reply to (what you're hoping will be) 90 unsuccessful applicants in the detail you're talking about, you may as well be in business coaching people on job searching.

If you really want to reply to them I would just go with a generic, "unfortunately you're application wasn't successful on this occasion, blah, blah..." approach.

If you get to the point of there being one or two whose applications weren't quite up to scratch, and you're feeling generous, then maybe tell them why you're not interviewing them. Personally I wouldn't though.

Save feedback for good ones you interview but who weren't successful as you found someone better. Letting them know what they lacked compared to the person you hire might well be good for them.

There are so many resources out there to help applicants nail their covering letter and CV that I don't think anyone who screws that bit up deserves much help.

Also you might well be seeing the 'scatter gun' application tactic in action here if you're getting interest from people who don't even mention you in their email. In my opinion hey don't deserve your time in responding.

Edited by PorkInsider on Friday 8th January 12:43

[TurricanII]

In my experience the perfect candidate who turns out to be a great hire for many years does not always customise their application/C.V.. Definitely do not dismiss out of hand without reading the C.V. based on lack of customisation of their email and C.V..

I suspect you will know from experience on the C.V. whether you want to interview someone.

I use a weighted ranking spreadsheet when hiring and I give a very small credit to applicants for addressing the job spec requirements in their application and a further small credit for customising their C.V. for the job. I give much more weight to interpersonal skills and the requirements of the job itself. At the end of the interviews the customising of the application email/C.V. might just give one applicant the edge.

[warp9]

We've changed our recruiting process significantly over the last year with great success. We used to recruit from competitors as we believed their experience would be beneficial. However most the staff problems we had were from these candidates. I've come to the conclusion that people look to move for a reason and many get good at standard interview situations, which doesn't mean they are going to be good at the job.

Now we look for personal motivations and attitudes rather than experience. There is a first phase telephone interview with competency based questions. Second stage face to face is more about attitude and desires.

Once they start there is a 3 month training program and ongoing support thereafter. It's been hard work setting all this up, but all the staff we have brought on this way are now more productive than many more established 'experienced' staff.

We run a call centre so this won't necessarily work for all, but I would advise you to be really clear about who and what you want, then stick to your guns in finding them. It's very easy to get dazzled at interview only to find 4 months later that they're not what you thought.

[MadDad]

You're overthinking this, if they are hard work before you employ them (in so much as you need to advise them how to apply for a job and write a CV) imagine what an overhead they will be if they become staff....

It's been a good 10 years since I recruited directly but there are two things I learned very quickly;

1; don't get emotionally attached/involved in the selection process - deal with the facts are they present themselves - you're recruiting for an account manager, they should be fluent, able to exploit an opportunity and express themselves clearly in a written dialog - if they cannot sell themselves how on earth will they perform when responding to a competitive tender?

2: don't enter into dialog at the filtering stage, if their CV and covering letter is a generic 'I've applied for every job on the internet' style letter (in so much as it's not been tailored for your role or has massive gaps in employment with no explanation) then send a standard 'thanks but no thanks' response. If they are genuine and really want the role you might get a 'why don't you want to speak to me' mail back, but £50 says you don't get a response.

Good luck, 3 years and 80 interviews you'll be a pro!!!
I used to use agencies and insisted that they met the candidates first, they would filter the wheat from the chaff and I would get presented with circa 10 CV's, of which I would interview 4 or 5 people and usually get 3 very strong candidates.

[AJS-]

Not necessary to reply to every unsuccessful applicant. Virtually no company does this. It is a nice touch and even a generic pasted reply of "Sorry your application was not successful" can be appreciated.

Regarding the covering letter, I would imagine as an Account Manager it's pretty important they get emails and stuff right with your clients, so that's not a wholly invalid reason to reject them. I am also a bit old fashioned like that, I think of paper CVs in an envelop, so having a covering letter just makes sense.

That said many people don't do this. Why don't you put a line in the advert specifying sending a CV with a covering letter? That way you can reject the ones without as they can't even follow basic instructions.

Gaps on CVs are an alarm bell. If the CV is brilliant in every other respect ask them about it.

Bonus tip - rather than going straight to interviews on the basis of a CV. Call the interesting ones for an informal discussion. 10 interviews is a lot for one position and will easily eat up 2 full days. If you have a 10-15 minute phone call with say 20 that look interesting you're broaening your pool out a bit while saving yourself a lot of time.

I think Turrican is also right that unless you're Ferrari or something, most applicants are firing off dozens of CVs and expecting a high degree of customisation at the CV stage. Go off their core skills and judge the research they have done at the interview stage.