Self-Awareness and Recruitment Industry Success Five Practical Steps to Take Now

How self-aware do you believe you are?  Self-awareness is the starting place for much of your growth and improvement. When recruiting firm owners and leaders improve in this frequently overlooked trait, tangible improvements like better execution of recruitment strategy result. This leads to higher productivity and an increase in recruitment fees.

 If you answer yes to any of the following questions, self-awareness issues are likely involved.

• Do you get stuck in negative cycles that are extremely difficult to move past?
• Are you encountering obstacles that keep sidetracking your progress?
• Do you have important relationships that continue in the same repetitive conflict?

Developing this skill is like developing any other skill; it takes practice.  It can be done anywhere, at any time you choose.  Like other skills, the more you practice, the more it becomes a habit. Then the habit takes over to replace much of the effort.  Below are the five key elements to develop this critical trait:

1. Develop the practice of mindfulness. Mindfulness means being aware of what’s going on in your mind in the present moment. This is very challenging in the hectic, overwhelming world of recruiting. Many people find it helps to create a safe and quiet space to practice.  Like most people, I’ve discovered that if I don’t carve out a place and time to do this, it probably won’t happen. This can be done throughout the day and doesn’t require much time.  Even a few minutes helps.  Before I made this a habit, I found myself using the same excuses I heard from others:  “I don’t have time right now.”  “This just doesn’t work for me.”  “My mind just races, and I get antsy,” etc.  Sound familiar?

Mindfulness amounts to awareness of your thoughts and feelings without pushing them away or analyzing them.  Most people find that once this practice becomes a habit, they enjoy it and create the time to do it anywhere and anytime.  Especially when feeling stressed.

2. Quiet the mind and pay attention to whatever thoughts and feeling “flow in and out of your awareness.”  That’s it.   Focusing on your breathing is one easy way to start since it moves attention away from thinking and calms the natural tendency of the mind to move frantically.  Here’s a simple analogy:  When we look at an ocean, lake, or pond after a storm, the sediment is stirred up, and we can’t see what’s in the water.  After the sediment settles, we can see clearly.  A mind that’s filled with busy thoughts and emotions stirs up a lot of “sediment” that clouds our ability to “see” these thoughts and feelings.  When we quiet our minds, clarity can be restored.

3. Develop the ability to observe and accept whatever arises in your awareness. This is difficult because the ego naturally rushes in with inner voices of judgment.  Once these voices enter our awareness, our emotions are easily triggered, and it’s difficult to see and accept things as they are.  For example, I have critical thoughts of myself and others over “little things” even though I know I should just “let go and move on.”  Also, at times I want to “get back at others” for perceived acts of disrespect, even very small ones.  My ego wants to believe that I’ve “grown beyond this pettiness,”.  Despite much progress, I haven’t yet reached that level.

The key is to witness your thoughts, emotions, and actions without the ego taking over and creating stories (both positive and negative) about yourself and others.  This means looking AT your thoughts, feelings, and actions as being separate from who you are.  Otherwise, they appear to be who you are, which easily engages our judgments.  You know you’re on the right track when you accept negative thoughts and emotions with neither denial nor story-making about how you “should” think or feel.  Having thoughts and feelings we don’t want doesn’t make you good or bad, just human.

4. Learn to be open to the feedback of others and even ask for feedback. Let’s be real; I don’t like getting “negative feedback” from others.  How about you?  In truth, others can notice things about our behavior that we are blind to.  And we all have blind spots that can last a lifetime if we aren’t willing to listen openly to others and observe how they respond to us.  I’ve learned that the temporary sting of criticism is far less hurtful than continuously harming relationships.   The insights I’ve gained from this feedback have been priceless.  Reminding myself that these imperfections don’t make me bad, just human has also helped me allow this feedback without excessive defensiveness. When we make it safe for others to share their feedback, our awareness can soar!  View feedback as a gift and make the most of what you receive.

5. Create a process of reflection. There’s an axiom that it’s not experience that causes us to learn it's experience plus reflection that does.  This must be true since most of us have had the experience of continuing to do the same thing despite negative consequences.  I’ve done a lot of this in my life!  Reflection allows us to re-evaluate our thoughts, feelings, actions, and consequences.  This way, we can consider different options in the future.  Most people find it helpful to “externalize” their thoughts and feelings by writing or discussing them with people they trust.  When we externalize our thoughts and feelings, we can more easily “look AT them” as separate from who we are.  This provides a measure of clarity and objectivity that can make a key difference in what we learn.  Having a process of reflection at the end of each day and reviewing at the end of each week and month can be a powerful method to identify patterns and spark insights.

In summary, owners and leaders of staffing firms should consider the ongoing development of self-awareness to be a recruiting industry best practice to create a sustainably profitable firm with lower stress levels.  Since we’re all unique in terms of what specific practices will be most effective, I encourage everyone to experiment with different things regarding mindfulness, feedback and reflection.  Develop habits that work best for you.  You don’t need a large investment of time or trips to a mountaintop or monastery to develop in this area.  Even small, regular efforts can significantly impact every aspect of your life.