Grow in GAOFAN
It’s always raining these days. Through the rain curtain, I saw the light besides the words “GAOFAN Building” lit. Thinking the case that I looked around just before leaving the office, there are still keyboard sound accompanied by a short cough, which seemed somewhat abrupt at the time 8:30.
Thinking about it, it has been more than two months to join the big family of GAOFAN. I look around habitually every time I get off the work, I can see many buried heads and fast-typing fingers if it was early in time. If it was late, just like today, with hot tea on the hands and fast typing keyboards under their hands, colleagues scattered in every corner of the office in threes and twos. This is also my first impression of this place, quiet but weighty.
Face to point: JD is the source of all information.
Before I came to GAOFAN, I had no experience in human resources-related work. During the interview, I asked nervously “what kind of job a headhunter is”, and the supervisor replied to me with an official sentence: “a headhunter is to find a job for suitable candidates according to the needs of the company.” At that time, my interpretation of this sentence was very simple, and was basically “trying to interpret it with the aid of its surface meaning”, but I also needed to understand the flexibility.
During my first few days after entering the company, I set up accounts on various platforms and learned the method to accumulate points with the help of my supervisor and colleagues, and I spent the rest of my time working on manuals for new employees. The manual was detailed, which also made me realize that the job wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be. Originally, I thought JD was cumbersome and tedious, and needed just a glance at it. However, on the contrary, JD is the most information. Which conditions are requisite, which are flexible soft requirements, and which are regarded as the key points by the company are clearly reflected in JD.
Recognizing his, my headhunting career began with a serious study of JD. When encountering completely strange words, the easiest and fastest way for me, the stupid bird who is new to the workplace, is to make good use of the search engines. For example, originally I didn’t know anything about the industry. After reading a long introduction with dense black words on the white background hard for several times, I gradually understood the meaning of the so-called “mechanical automation”, which was the first project I ever worked on. The technical terms in the job description stumped me again. At this time, my colleagues reminded me that I could just show it to the candidate directly and let him make his own judgment. In such circumstance, I started my first contact with the candidate.
Take the initiative to ask for advice: what my colleagues who are also my teachers and friends taught me.
Since my childhood, there were always the word of “introversion and timidity” to describe me on the comments of the class teacher. In the first call, I really did not perform well. For this phone call, I copied a lot of answers to possible questions from the new manual, and listened to my colleagues’ calls for a long time in silence. I wrote down the key points about the company and the position on a piece of paper and simulated them many times in my mind before I was dared to call the candidate. However, I started off the wrong foot, I still remember how the other person said “send me an email” in a hurried tone that made me feel a little frustrated. Several calls ended in a similar ending. After hanging up the phone, I looked towards my colleagues for help. Facing my request, he asked: “ did the candidate disagree?” I shook my head. He said to me, “when you introduced it, it was too messy. There was no point.”
I bit the pen and said:” But I clearly wrote down so many points….”
He replied: “ it’s because of too many points. You were failed to arrange the order, and the emphasis was not prominent. It just looked messy. You should have to think, instead of saying what you think about.” I was opening the notebook to take notes, but he continued, “And you have to understand what the company is engaged in, and then convey it to your method in your own way. If just reading what you wrote, then what’s the different between your reading and the reading by the candidate? So they asked you to send them the JD, don’t you think so?”
This is very enlightening phrase to me that I still remember it two month later. And that was just the beginning of my colleagues’ guidance. In the month before I started my job, I spent a lot of time listening to how they communicated with candidates, how to deal with difficult questions from candidates, or how to bear around the bush for sensitive issues. Colleagues taught me everything about the experience in this aspect without reservation. They pointed out that indeed, the palest ink is better than the best memory, but we have to summarize it yourself after writing down the information. Sometimes they picked faults from my questions during the communication, and simulated the details of my communications with the candidates.
When I first entered the company, they knew that I needed to take a bus to the company every day, and they all proposed to send me to the bus station. On the road, when we talked about what I didn’t understand at work, I was also happy to answer questions. During the lunch time, they took me to the cafeteria at noon, and they didn’t hesitate to help me when I forgot to take cash, which made me feel extremely warm and stable.
Before I came to GAOFAN, I worked in a company in Shanghai for nearly a year. I still remembered that in that company, everyone talked through the computer although similar in the neat cubicle, and there were usually very poor face-to-face conversation. Everyone was acquiescing to such an indifferent normal, and the office was filled with the sound of typing on the keyboard, with few voices. During the long period of a year, I rarely felt the warmth where I felt in GAOFAN. Colleagues often get together to discuss the focus of the project, or share the latest information about the position obtained from the feedback of interviews on candidates with everyone for them to adjust thinking and direction.
It was with their help that I slowly went through the most difficult period of exploration, and started to make the first resume based on the information that I concluded through the communication with the candidate. I took another step in my headhunting career.
Emotional Management: Gentleness is also a Strength
On a Saturday half a month after joining the company, it was originally the interview day for my candidate who first entered the interview link. At 7:30 in the morning, I received a text message from the candidate with the short sentence “I’m sorry, I don’t want to the interview anyone”. It was a bolt from the blue that pulled me out of the state of half-awake condition. I was roused to sit up in the bed. It was the first time that I faced with this situation, and my brain was a mess. After thinking carefully, I called the candidate and asked him why he didn’t want to the interview. He told me that the company was too far away and was not large enough, and it did not meet his expectations.
I did not know what to say, and this was indeed the weakness of the company. I tried to explain to him that the company was a wholly Germany-funded subsidiary with a promising future. Originally, he claimed that he could overcome the problem on address. The candidate was impatiently after listening and asked: “so are you blaming me?” which made me speechless. I didn’t mean to emphasize this to him. But remembering that I had confirmed with him three times in the week before this interview and he agreed, but he changed his mind at the last minute, for a while, I adopted a tougher tone and said: “ I hope you can have some spirit of contract.” What replied to me was a busy signal.
My first candidate interview ended with the candidates’ voluntary abandonment. The company also expressed regret, and thought that he was suitable for that company. In later reflection, my biggest regret was that I failed to analyze the pros and cons from a professional point of view, but emphasized the contractual spirit with him, which was the bad consequence of my lack of professionalism and poor communication with people.
Later, at the morning meeting of the company on Monday, the huge conference hall was filled with advisers from various departments. There were rows of gifts in the corners of the stage. Those seniors who smiled or were calm as if they were used to it were always mentioned during the sharing of experience that “our headhunter is a service industry”, which destined us to take care of the feelings of clients and candidates, while my sharpness was highly undesirable. Something similar happened to me when I studied in the college and volunteered at the restaurant of the Youth Olympics Games. At that time, my supervisor taught me that “anyone who is in the service industry can’t have personal emotions”, to which I snorted. In several morning meetings, I slowly realized that this was my job and he was my candidate instead of an ordinary stranger. My emotional blame was very rude and didn’t make any good impact on things. I also failed to put myself in his position, and failed to achieve introspection and then correct errors in others. Such a perception made me bow my head in shame.
Afterwards, I edited a text message to apologize to the candidate who said that he would have went to the interview if I hadn’t take him seriously. It was also this conflict that made me realize that gentleness is a strength and taking a step back is also a wisdom. Not all fights must be carried out with suffocation, but the comfortable way can bring the desired results. Respecting for others can win respect. And this lesson is just the first lesson of communicating with people. I still need to learn a lot.
Introspection and self-examination: abandoning the student mentality is to really enter the workplace.
Regarding to the impression of the workplace, there are always someone who compares it to the “smoke-free war”, and everyone earn their own living relying on their own ability. For me, who has just been working for over a year, I have a little bit of insight into this. Although in such a warm family of GAOFAN, everyone is striving for their own performance. As I have learned how to create resumes, my problem became more obvious, that is, there were not enough resumes. The less quantity the resume, the less likely to be interviewed.
This was really agonizing me. To make up for the lack of quantity, I also spontaneously joined the rank of working overtime. It was also during the overtime period, I saw everyone’s hard-working posture after stripping out of the usual gentle appearance. Each sound of typing the keyboard was like bamboo shoots, vigorous and tense. And the overtime work that lasted for a week did not result in a huge leap in the quantity of my resumes, and I could barely guarantee that two resumes can be completed daily. After a few days of thinking, I found that in fact, working hours during the day is a good time to communicate about the resumes, and it was not wise to work overtime at night to make the resumes. In non-working time, the candidate also have their own personal affairs, which will reduce the efficiency in the communication about the resumes.
Therefore, I wrote “to make use of the daytime work rationally and efficiently” on the paper pressed under the keyboard. And now we often communicate about resumes more on WeChat, which actually greatly reduces the speed of resume communication, far slowly than a phone call. So I wrote myself a reminder – “use the phone instead of WeChat”.
This piece of paper gradually became my memo, and each piece was added when I encountered a corresponding problem to remind myself at any time that could not make the same mistake. In fact, colleagues will not correct my mistakes often, real growth requires self-discovery and correction by ourselves. A memo to warn yourself is indispensable.
Also in the process of seeking “quantity”, I found the importance of “quality”. In order to learn how to make a good resume, I checked the resumes made by many colleagues in the company system. Everyone has their own resume style, and I intercepted many people’s resume formats and text layout and combined them into the resume I made. In particular, a concise and focused recommendation reason specific to the company’s requirements can make the resume stand out. An excellent resume is easier to win the favor of HR, and then I also tasted the sweet brought by excellent resumes. Then I added a new reminder in the memo – “take the initiative to learn, instead of marching on the spot”.
However, the workplace is by no means a battleground of one person. It is a battleground for many. This requires more mature thinking in order to better integrate into it. I still remember that Party A’s company was dissatisfied because of the wrong information on the candidate’s resume. I stubbornly thought that this was my candidate’s mistake, not my problem. I did not introspect myself after an error but to blame others, which is also a performance of evading responsibility. Ah that time, the supervisor asked me: “wrong is simply doing wrong. Have you ever thought what your error can bring to the company?” His words were like a knock on my head, pulling me out of the naïve student mentality.
Yes, this is the difference between the workplace and school. When I left school, the Dean said at the graduation ceremony: “Workplace is not the last place to tolerate fault, the school is.” As what the supervisor blamed, it has the similar effect. The company cultivated us in the hope that we can create values for the company, not just learning. And it is very immature performance if facing the workplace with the mentality of students. I also wrote this sentence in my memo to remind me constantly Growing up has always been accompanied with a series of contradictions and struggles. There are confusion and enlightened awareness, as I have felt over the two months. From a beginner who has no knowledge of headhunting to now the practiced employee who are experienced in arranging the first and second round of interviews for candidates. During this period of time, my perception is not only on the work.
People often ask why I choose to be a headhunter. I didn’t have the ambition to do this at first, but GAOFAN gave me a chance to become a headhunter. However, if there is a job that allows me to have a group of colleagues who are also teachers and friend in the process of exploration, learn to better integrate into the society and workplace, understand the basic principles and skills to get along with people, and more importantly, makes me introspect myself, deal with many problems in a more gentle and mature way, overcome my own personality defects and achieve my own values, it will be both a good experience and a meaningful job. I think this is why everyone is willing to stay in GAOFAN.
This is another Friday. Every time I walked out of the building, I can still see a few electric bicycle parked in the dark of the garage. Everyone who stays a the office taking a phone and typing the keyboard must have a passion for the job, and a reason to fight for, and more importantly, a spirit of continuous hard work to achieve these. In the vast rain curtain, looking at the sparse stars and distant buildings with lights, there must be people waiting for them to go home in thousands of light.