Job Search and Recruitment Trends: Why the STAR Method is Flawed and What We Can All Do Instead with Recruiter Sue Gygax

In this episode, I welcome LinkedIn's Top Voice and Recruiter, Sue Gygax, founder of Spectacle Talent Partners, specializing in talent acquisition and career solutions. This episode discusses the evolving trends in job search and recruitment and examines the limitations of current practices. We explore a range of topics, including:

• The inefficiencies in the recruitment process and actionable tips that candidates can use to stand out.
• Why both recruiters and candidates need to master storytelling
• The challenges posed by the rise of 30-minute and asynchronous interviews and how recruiters and candidates can better prepare 
• Why the STAR interviewing method is flawed
• A new and improved framework for hiring managers and candidates

Show Notes:
The Career Refresh Podcast: How to Prepare and Get Ready for the Job Interview

The Career Refresh Podcast:  Check out Susan’s Previous Appearance discussing What Recruiters Are Looking For in Today’s Marketplace HERE

Show Guest:
Susan Gygax, founder of Spectacle Talent Partners, specializes in talent acquisition and career solutions. With 28 years in recruitment and leadership, she helps mission-driven companies and corporate leaders navigate today's volatile job market, offering strategies for inclusive hiring and confident career moves. She's also been nominated for the LinkedIn Top Voice position. You can find her on LinkedIn and her Website.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:47

Hey, welcome back. I'm Jill Griffin, your host Today. Before we get into the topic, I want to talk about something I keep seeing on LinkedIn or people direct message me, or I've seen a lot of comments on Fishbowl, and it is about the cover letter. All right, friends, the cover letter is definitely being diminished. It's definitely being requested less. We're seeing it's only being requested about 40% of the time. But the cover letter, when it is requested, it's not a throwaway, it's not a phone, it in, it's not a hey, let me drop my resume into chat GPT and have it write a cover letter for me. No, we're not doing that right.

Speaker 1: 1:26

The cover letter in these cases is to make sure that we understand that human connection. It's about building the voice, making sure that you're showing your enthusiasm for the job, the mission, the company, the product, the service, whatever it is. That it really should reflect your personal connection to the organization or the job and why you believe that this is a great opportunity for you to be there and to bring your contributions, and that's what it's really about. It's not just to regurgitate everything that's on the resume. So I just want to put that out there, because when I see people say that they don't need to write cover letters and my work should stand for itself. I would say honey, you know what? Good for you. But for most of us that's actually not true. And it also shows if a company is requesting it. Are you paying attention to the details, are you listening to their requests or are you doing it your way? And sometimes doing it your way is the right path forward. Sometimes it's not, and if you're trying to get a job or you see an opportunity you want to go for, this is the time to do it, the way that they're asking you to do it, and to follow the request to submit that cover letter. You will be thankful in the end when you get that practice and it's going that extra step Again. If you're trying to get a job, why wouldn't you go that couple of extra step?

Speaker 1: 2:45

What I often find is it's that people don't know how to describe themselves, and that's fair. So that's where you want to spend some time working on that. That is a place where I think using ChatGPT or one of the generative AI services can help you if you put your resume in there and say, like, help me describe this person, but you have to put a human angle on it. You need to know your strengths, your skills, your values, your career narrative, and all of that is things that I myself help my clients with, but it's something that can all come through in your cover letter.

Speaker 1: 3:19

All right, let's get on to today's topic. We are going to discuss the latest trends in the job search marketplace and the recruitment marketplace, looking at it from both sides of the equation. We know the process is flawed. I think everybody's doing the best that they can, but we are here to share some tips that you can leverage that will help you succeed. And when I say we, I'm bringing back my friend, susan Gigax. She has been on the show before I will put that show episode in the show notes and she is the founder of Spectacle Talent Partners, specializing in talent acquisition and career solutions. She's got over 28 years experience doing recruitment and leadership, and she helps mission-driven companies and corporate leaders navigate today's volatile job market. She offers strategies for inclusive hiring and confident career moves, and she does this all within her organization. She's also been nominated for a LinkedIn top voice position, and that is awesome, and if you follow her on LinkedIn, you will see the value that she is creating every day. I'll also put her link to her LinkedIn profile in the show notes.

Speaker 1: 4:22

So today, susan shares her insights on what recruiters and hiring managers can do better and we discuss what candidates need to do in order to break through. We discuss why the STAR method is flawed and it's not really an inclusive hiring tactic and I know many people use this, but this is Sue's sharing a framework where she would like to see more recruiters and hiring managers use instead, because it is an inclusive hiring tactic. We also talk about the rise of the 30-minute interview We'll probably go deeper on that in a later episode and also the asynchronous interviews where you're either sent interview questions in advance or you may be asked to record a video all in advance, and these places are they're difficult to navigate if you're not ready and prepared, and if you're a longtime listener, you know that preparedness is the tactics and ready is the mindset. Sue also shares the biggest failure she sees among candidates, and that's definitely a place that you want to lean in and capture what she's saying. We talk about why you need to practice the two lenses for storytelling as a candidate both your technical capabilities and then when you're showcasing which is kind of like teaching to ensure that you are ready and prepared, and it's also about that practice. So, friends, grab that notes app, make some notes, take it down.

Speaker 1: 5:50

I also think the framework that she shares is really, really helpful for even how you're doing potentially QBRs or reporting back within your current organization, to really think through on your performance reviews and the ones that you're doing with your teammates, how to rethink the STAR method and having it be a different way of showcasing talent and success. And I want to hear from you on the socials. Hit me up, respond to any of the posts, email me at hello at jillgriffincoachingcom. And, friends, until next time, embrace possibility, get prepared and be kind. Welcome back, sue. Glad that you are here with us.

Speaker 2: 6:29

Hi, so great to be here. Thank you, jill, for having me Been looking forward to our conversation.

Speaker 1: 6:35

So, for everyone listening, sue posts regularly on LinkedIn and she posted LinkedIn recently that talked about how the STAR method, which is the situation, task, action and result which is commonly used in the interviewing process, is flawed Like there's some good things about it, but it does have some flaws. And I've been saying the same thing, but I sit at a different side of the table. Right. I'm the person who's prepping you for the interview. I'm the person who's helping you navigate your way through the complexities of the modern workplace. Sue is on the recruiter side, so I wanted to bring her on today to talk about not only you know a little bit of an update of what's going on in the recruiter marketplace and then get into what should companies and recruiters do differently? And then, as a candidate, what do we need to do differently in order to be heard and break through, to get?

Speaker 2: 7:29

noticed, so with that.

Speaker 1: 7:30

Sue, why don't you take us through just a high level sort of what's going on in the marketplace today around recruitment and hiring for our listeners, sure?

Speaker 2: 7:40

So thank you, and I'll start by saying I've been doing this since I used to put job ads in newspapers. That's how long I've been in the recruiting world, yeah. So when I talk about the things that I have seen the ways in which interviewing, recruiting the candidate process at small, medium and large companies I'm coming with these 28 years of experience leading large teams at multi-million, multi-billion dollar companies. We hired thousands of people every year and I did that for 11 years my last 11 years in corporate before starting my recruitment solutions firm. So when I talk about these things, I'm by no means am I trying to say it's all broken. We should just throw up our hands and walk away, though there's plenty that can be done. I am saying our market today, with the reshuffling of the workforce, with hybrid work, remote work now this some of the larger companies are pushing returns to the office.

Speaker 2: 8:46

When I talk with my HR friends, this is a big part of their discussion, trying to understand how to navigate that. Then you have the rise of online everything, including jobs, right, and so candidates apply to a job and they see thousands of people potentially have also applied to this same job. So when these layoffs were happening and this reshuffling of the workforce. There were also, alongside a lot of these technical layoffs which got the headlines, where hr and talent acquisition professionals were also laid off. So those that are working have more jobs, that they're working on legacy applicant tracking systems, which may or may not be helping them, and abbreviated timelines to get jobs filled, which has made interviews longer and shorter at the same time, meaning shorter interviews, usually at the front end, 30-minute interviews the rise of the 30-minute interview can be another conversation we have and longer because you have more people interviewing you.

Speaker 1: 9:51

It's everything by committee. There's a million, and what I'm seeing from my side to your point is that the FANG I call them the G Mafia the Alphabets, the Facebooks, the Googles, the Metas not Facebook, whatever All of those companies. They hired a lot but also laid off a lot. They got the tech headlines that made everyone go, oh my God, there's so many layoffs and there are. There are definitely layoffs. We're not saying there's not, but what we're also seeing is that the speed in which we were hiring in late 2020 and early 21, when the speed of the resignations were coming in so fast and we needed like butts in seats and we needed people to be doing the work is there was so much mishiring where the rigor couldn't be there or they chose not to have it there. So they hired quickly and fast, which also meant that there was a lot of mishires either not necessarily the right skills or not necessarily the right cultural add to the organization and they were doing an okay job. So it wasn't a performance issue. It was more of that. People people who were like solid managers stretched themselves into open director positions and they just weren't ready for it yet. So it wasn't again a performance per se. It was just like you need a couple more years before you're there. So what I saw is they just all got swept into the layoffs. They just just like you need a couple more years before you're there.

Speaker 1: 11:13

So what I saw is they just all got swept into the layoffs. They just were like, okay, we're going to lay these off. So now they're more cautious and they're like we're not going to fall into that again. We are going to make sure that we have 26 people interview for a 30 minute interview, which they're going to come 10 minutes late and leave 10 minutes early, but you know what You're up and perform. So the pressure on the recruiters is enormous and the pressure on the candidates is enormous. We're not going to fix all of that, but what I'd love to talk about knowing that that's the reality everyone is what are we, what are we seeing from the recruitment side that we need to have more of, from recruitments, hiring managers, hr and then we'll get into what we need candidates to be successful.

Speaker 2: 11:56

It all starts before a job is ever a job requisition is ever open. Recruiters need to be able to develop their internal influence to drive change, Because all of the talk about diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging all of these goals and strategies that companies have that HR people talk about, it starts with the recruiter and the recruiter's ability to have conversations and have hiring managers trust that they are able to assess a highly qualified candidate and what that looks like. So that's number one being able to leverage their influence with the decision makers so that when they have open positions and they're bringing a diverse candidate pool to the hiring manager, the hiring manager understands where there's opportunities to maybe adjust their lens, because many times they're unwilling to do that. Because I know my team Right, I'll know it when I see it. I don't need all of this other stuff, I just want X, Y and Z.

Speaker 1: 13:05

Don't bring me what I'm hearing you say there is that we need people who are on the recruitment side of that house to really work on their storytelling skills. At the same time, they need to understand the marketplace and the category that they're working in, and they also need to understand the company and the job description sort of the triangulation of the three of those. So when they have a mixture of knowing the marketplace and the job description and then practicing the storytelling and influence so that they can show the hiring manager that these are adjacent candidates, they have skills. They wouldn't necessarily be the ones that would rise to the top, but if we're talking about making sure that we're having a more inclusive workplace, then bringing in different voices, different ideas, different opinions, different backgrounds is what is going to make you not only more profitable but make your, your culture and your company stronger. That's what I hear you.

Speaker 2: 14:00

Yeah, I've always said recruiters sit at the intersection of the market, the people and the manager. Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 14:07

Yeah, okay. So we hear a lot of misinformation of people complaining about the ATSs. You and I have talked a lot that there are very progressive ATSs, but guess what, not every company has them. They may be working on legacy systems. So, even though you might be working with one that's using, you know, ai related software and tactics, you also may apply for another job, which again is on a more legacy system. And one of the things that I didn't know about that you told me about and this is horrifying to me is that a lot of the recruitment is being done where not only are you answering automated questions, so you're not even talking to a person. You might be recording a video and you're being assessed in the exact same time that you're giving your performance and you're answering the questions.

Speaker 1: 14:56

And I just want to go deeper on that. I had a situation this is actually for a coaching certification that I had a couple of years ago to keep up my CEUs, and in the moment of quote coaching, the person who I had to coach was the person who was going to grade me. So, right there, how can you be in the moment of coaching and also the person grading me? And what would happen is, throughout the coaching is, she would stop and start furiously typing and make comments and then I would be asking her the next question. She'd be like hold on, I can't answer yet. And I was like this is a shit show.

Speaker 1: 15:38

I will say I passed, but not before writing them a very direct letter about how, from an inclusion standpoint, from a disability standpoint, from an understanding about neurodivergence and understanding how different people like every time I'm asked to answer the question, you're going to take me out of it and then tell me to tap dance and then grade my tap dancing and then come back into it Like oh my God. So when you told me that, I was like holy moly. So tell us, give us a little more context around that and what you're also seeing there.

Speaker 2: 16:15

Well, there's different ways that this is showing up. So, with video interviewing, there are some video interviewing technologies that have implemented some AI to try and assess people based on the way in which they're answering their questions. For some of these behavioral skills, those types of things, there's also asynchronous interviewing, which is one of the ways companies have tried to push more people through the candidate pipeline more quickly by alleviating what would traditionally be an introductory phone call or a screening call, that type of thing. So it's showing up in different ways. It's very interesting. If you look online and read reports, you will see the entire some people who are all for it and they're telling you why it's fantastic. And some people who are against it, and they're telling you why it's fantastic, and some people who are against it and they're telling you why it's terrible.

Speaker 2: 17:15

Not unlike any other technology that we've seen that has influenced our daily lives not the least of which is our livelihoods is AI, and so it's a little unknown. There isn't enough data, in my opinion, to make a good assessment. What I can say is it's unnerving and a comfortable conversation is a productive conversation. So if what you are doing as a recruiter is making the person on the other side uncomfortable. It's a bad outcome, no matter what.

Speaker 1: 17:48

So really, really helpful, really. And also, I think, at the end of the day, I always believe the best in people and no one wants to make someone feel bad or like leave an interview really stressed out and scarred right in a way in which maybe you're not the right person for this role, but that doesn't mean that you need to leave the interview now all of a sudden having to go to therapy because of what happened during the interview. I think it's a really important point which gets us into, I know, one of your frameworks about being kind and we're going to talk about always being kind, yeah, but to summarize, we want to see recruiters really taking the time to understand that storytelling and creating that influence internally, in addition of knowing the job market, knowing the organization they're recruiting for and, obviously, knowing the job description that they're recruiting for and, as a candidate, coming back to the idea of having to get through the STAR method, which a lot of companies are using, this idea of tell me a story, tell it to me. Quick facts, data forward. You know what is the situation, what was the task, what was the action, what was the result? Boom next. Right, very, very fast and there's some benefits to that to get through information really quickly, but it has really emphasis on flaws, which is what you've been talking about.

Speaker 1: 19:18

There's an overemphasis on past behavior, right, and we know that our resumes are status reports of what we've done previously. They don't tell us unless we know how to write and tell the story. They don't tell us what we're doing in the future, they just tell us what we've done it. Also, it can give certain candidates a preparation advantage, right, because they can go star story, star story, star story. But there's also a potential for, like, really vague responses and not necessarily getting into the context and the nuances.

Speaker 1: 19:48

If you're an adjacent candidate or you're new to the area, it's really going to harm inexperienced candidates, and I don't mean inexperienced that you can't do the job, I mean inexperienced that maybe you worked in an organization that was primarily nonprofit and now you're going into the private sector and there's a different type of way that you need to tell your story. And again, I think, lastly, there's also an over-influence on individual performance. We need to know what you personally did. We're done all the days with the hall monitor where the boss is just sort of walking around making sure everyone's okay and doing what they need to do. We need to know what your specific role is.

Speaker 1: 20:28

However, most work is done in teams, so you need to be able to tell versus what you've done and also what the team did and how, as a team, you're able to work both as an independent contributor, even if you're leaving a team. So those are some of the things that I see. You know bias towards very structured thinkers. You know I think in frameworks, so it's an easier thing for me, but somebody else who doesn't think that way doesn't mean they're not an excellent candidate. So tell us more about what you're seeing in this area and then what you'd love to see changed.

Speaker 2: 21:03

So there is such a broad range of readiness before going into an interview. I have been interviewing. I've done literally thousands upon thousands of interviews in my career and I can tell you and I recall them, unfortunately the instances when candidates who were unprepared have become less qualified while they were talking to me in my mind, based on the way they answered the question oh, people hear that.

Speaker 1: 21:36

That's I mean, but that's the reality because there's and I'll drop it in the show rings I links. I have a podcast about being ready and prepared. Prepared again is knowing your story. Readiness is also preparing your mindset and your confidence and you need both to show up for an interview. But you're talking about the preparedness, like you have to have your story down and you have to practice it out loud Because it might feel all blah, blah blah when you start talking at it. Or it's like feels like you're hitting all the jargon words and everyone's like what did you just? I know you spoke English, but what did you actually just say?

Speaker 2: 22:14

And you don't know. I mean you could go on LinkedIn and to some extent get a sense of whether or not the listener whether it be a recruiter or hiring manager or some other person somewhere in the organization who has some type of decision making authority on this position Hence the 30 people in an interview process sometimes. So you don't know that necessarily going in. So you really want to make sure that you understand the best that you're able to where this person is coming from, which is why, in my particular framework, we look at it through two lenses whether or not it's a technical showcase of your capabilities and skills or a teaching opportunity.

Speaker 1: 22:57

Really good distinction. Do you suggest that candidates have a technical story and a teaching story if they're coming in at a more senior level?

Speaker 2: 23:07

Absolutely. It can be the same story, but you're just talking about it through a different lens. And that's where the practice comes in. Like you talked about, practice, practice, practice.

Speaker 2: 23:20

I tell people think more TEDx than one-on-one conversation. If you were giving a TEDx talk, you would practice, and an interview is a little more like that. It still feels a bit intimate, there still is engagement and all of those things. But you wouldn't walk up on stage and have a 15 minute talk and not have any clue what you were going to say and the pushback I get and what I hear from people. Well, it's my resume. I know. I know it. Well, when I go as a recruiter, I dig. So when I'm digging into your background and I'm seven years in and I'm asking you specific questions and I expect you to be able to answer them and you can't, there's a question mark in my mind. So the person who is prepared better moves forward faster and more more likely. Right, because you can influence. You can't determine the outcome, but your behavior, your preparedness, absolutely influences the outcome. So people actually have much more power than they give themselves credit for in those instances.

Speaker 1: 24:29

Yeah, I would totally. I would totally agree with that from what I've seen too. Okay, so take us through. I love your framework, so take us through your framework and maybe give us an example of the pieces of your flame framework along the way and how candidates you know anybody who's listening, whether you're high, I mean. I'm working with quite a few candidates who are um, or quite a few clients who are going for senior level roles within their current organization and they're super excited about it and you know they already know that there's 25 people who are rooting, you know or who are going for this one role that's been opened up because of you know, somebody else got promoted out.

Speaker 1: 25:11

This is important to. I always say always be ready. You may love your company and have no desire to leave. You may get laid off and suddenly you have to go find something, or you may be deciding it's time to move on and look for new opportunities Any of those things. You have to always have your resume ready and you have to always have your stories ready.

Speaker 2: 25:31

Yeah, yeah. Another one I'm hearing recently, especially from women leaders, is they accepted a job and they have a regret, but instead of having job offer regret and staying they're leaving. And so women, who are very capable, conscientious leaders, get into an organization and realize it's not what they thought it was going to be right. They're walking away in the first 90 days and then they're you know, they're just, it's not aligned with their values.

Speaker 1: 26:05

Yeah, um yeah, and that's new and again, that that you know, the fact that you can do that does require a certain amount of privilege that you're able to do that. Not everyone can do that, of course, but that is absolutely a step change that people are going into a job and saying this just isn't right. You know, maybe they didn't ask certain questions on the actual interview process, maybe things didn't come up. You know, as a dear friend of my friend, a dear friend of mine, always says is don't eat the meal twice if you hate it, like we don't need to relitigate if, if you took the job and it's not for you and you're moving on, yes, reflect on the points and the pieces that you've learned and then stop eating the meal, move on and go to the next go to the next thing.

Speaker 2: 26:53

Yeah, yeah, it is scary that you know a lot of these women that I'm talking about. It's not like they have another job lined up, they just refuse. I get that. They refuse to, yeah, take some of the hits to their values and their personal wellness in a way that's that they maybe would have considered in the past. Right, so? So the framework, so okay. So so Jill talked about the star framework. Right, it's been around since the 1970s, created by DDI, back then when the the emphasis was on your technical capabilities.

Speaker 2: 27:28

Now, don't get me wrong, I love data. I data is the backbone of your story. If you can't tell me in a tangible way what outcome you achieved, there's a question mark in my mind. We got a problem, right, we've got a problem, but in today's remote, hybrid, highly diverse interviewer and also much more understanding of why people fail early in their in a new role in, say, within the probationary period, how many times hr people let go of somebody who was just hired, who didn't get through that probationary period? Um, or the fact that people are just no longer okay with not seeing you as an actual person, right, right, we want to see people as actual people, not just here, is my robotic answer, my formulating response that I've practiced over and over again and I could tell it a hundred times. That's, that's not enough today, because we want to enjoy the people that we're working with, we want to be able to feel like we would be comfortable engaging with them, coming to them with a problem and or having them be the problem solver. So in all of those ways, star no longer is enough to be able to do that.

Speaker 2: 28:45

So the framework where I, when I work with folks, it's it's called STACK and it's an acronym Right, so each one S is the situational context. So what that means is not just giving me the whole giant big picture. Give me very specifically the problem that you were solving and infuse in that the observable behaviors that were negative, the negative impact it was having on the team's productivity, on the culture, on the capabilities to meet the objectives, whatever that was. And then the next letter T in STAT is either your technical showcase or your teaching opportunity, which we talked a little bit about already, talked a little bit about already. The applicable action is the A and there's a lowercase either, because with that action I want, I, I encourage people to infuse their humanity into that.

Speaker 2: 29:44

So so much. Like you know, I've read recently don't bleed on LinkedIn right, being personal, being human on LinkedIn is great. Bleeding all over anybody is not great, but you want to infuse your emotional intelligence, your emotional understanding of their behaviors and what, hopefully that negative from the situation. You were able to have a positive impact on their state of well-being, the culture impact, the team's capability to work together effectively, which then led to better numbers, better outcomes, whatever that was Then. Finally, probably two of the places where I see vast majority of people fail is concise explanation for RC and always be kind for RK is concise explanation for RC and always be kind for RK. When I listen to people explain their experiences and skill set, I know that they have the technical capabilities, but I also know they're going to be in front of a particular leader who is maybe a little more difficult.

Speaker 2: 30:52

I also know that maybe they're going to have to go in front of the board or other leadership committee meetings, and I am assessing their communication as much as I'm assessing their technical capabilities. So being concise and not diluting your strengths by over-communicating is another key skill.

Speaker 1: 31:10

So do you have an example of what that might look like or a story you've heard from a client and how it played out?

Speaker 2: 31:20

Well, I don't necessarily want to share anybody's story, but I will say that I think I'll share one of my own stories. How about that? Okay? So when I was head of talent acquisition for a multi-billion dollar organization I was I had a new leader. Virtually every year I was there and so with that came new priorities and shifts and changes. I very much was in the position to be a part of a lot of changes, which was amazing. I also led a team of over 25 recruiters.

Speaker 2: 31:57

In one particular meeting with other talent management professionals, one of the leaders talked about something she was doing that involved recruiting around culture, a culture change Totally in her warehouse. Except I heard the recruiting word and I started to pay attention in the meeting and I felt very left out. I felt very much what did you just say? What are you going to do and how do you know about that? So, taking charge of my own emotions, I didn't say anything.

Speaker 2: 32:27

But I went to her and I had a conversation to ask her what she was doing and her response was oh, we just thought you were too busy. And once we had a clarifying conversation, talked through what the project was, I realized 90% of it was outside of where I needed to be involved. But there was 10% of that project that sat very comfortably in my work and my team's work, and so we worked together to be able to come up with a plan that was able to give her the opportunity to move the project forward much more quickly because she had access to me and for me to feel like I was doing what I needed to do to protect my team first of all, and also make sure that everybody was operating in a cohesive way. So it went from a very strenuous, awkward, angsty type conversation and project to this is great, we're working together and we had that speed to be able to move the project forward effectively.

Speaker 1: 33:30

I think that's a great, great example. Thank you, Sue. I just think having these conversations and helping people starting to think differently and thinking about we know that sometimes the marketplace can be hard and right now it is back to an employer's marketplace to really be ready and prepared and to think about things differently, both from the interview and the recruiter side and from the candidate, I think is really helpful for people just to pause and think things differently. I will put Shu's information in the show notes so you can follow her on LinkedIn. She puts a lot of great content out there. I'll also drop the links in the show notes for the couple of other podcasts and things we referenced in today's episode, and we thank you for listening.