You have to kiss a lot of frogs

Don’t settle for anything less than a prince

A phrase that comes up again and again when I talk to recruitment leaders about finding the right clients is: 

You have to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince. 

What worries me is the number of recruiters who kiss a frog, realise it’s a frog, then forget about bagging a prince and settle for the frog.

I know we were all taught to get as many jobs on the board as possible, but when you end up with a long list of pond dwellers and zero royalty you’ve got to admit there’s a problem.

From a value perspective, this leads to three issues:

1. We think all our clients are a bit slimy

2. We value ourselves less for lowering our standards

3. When we eventually meet our Prince Charming we treat him like a toad

These are not insignificant problems. We don’t respect our clients, we don’t believe we’re worth our fees, and we miss opportunities to escape this downward spiral and charge what we deserve.

Clearly, changing your consultants’ lily pad dating habits can significantly change the performance of your business. Pride in the value of your services, higher fees, and more job control… and it all comes from the ability to identify the right clients to work with.

The good news is that there is something you can do today to begin tackling this problem. It won’t transform your business overnight, but you’ll be taking the first step to a better way of working.

So here’s your tip for today: once you realise you just kissed a frog, walk away.

As a recruitment leader, you should be encouraging this behaviour by explaining exactly what a frog looks like in your world, and which clients get to wear a crown.

You can build your consultants’ self-worth by celebrating when they turn down a second date with Kermit’s cousin. Reinforce the belief that one prince on the board is worth ten frogs in the bin.

If you want metaphorical dating advice on how to match your consultants with their Prince Charming, simply reply to this email and we’ll hop to it.

Jon

P.S. Don’t confuse frog-kissing advice with my second-favourite piece of amphibian recruitment wisdom: if you have to eat a frog, make it the first thing you do.

In other words, if you’ve got a difficult but important task ahead of you don’t spend your day worrying about it… just get on and do it.

I’d say clarifying your ideal client and focusing all your energy on winning the right business falls into that difficult-but-important category.

If you want metaphorical dating advice on how to match your consultants with their Prince Charming, simply reply to this email and we’ll hop to it.