Why the value of recruiting isn't simply finding people. It's helping companies make better decisions about them.
I've spent more than 25 years in recruiting.
I've worked with startups, growth-stage companies, established businesses, founders, CEOs, and hiring managers across a wide range of industries.
And I've come to appreciate something that isn't always obvious to people outside the profession:
Recruiting is one of the few professions where you're held accountable for an outcome you cannot independently produce.
But here's the more interesting part.
Sometimes the best possible outcome of a recruiting process is deciding not to hire the candidate.
That may sound strange coming from someone whose business depends on helping companies hire people.
Let me explain.
Finding People Is Only the Beginning
Most people think recruiting begins with a job description and ends with a signed offer letter.
In between, they imagine a relatively straightforward process.
Find qualified candidates.
Interview them.
Present the best ones.
Make a hire.
Except that's not really what happens.
A good recruiter must first understand the business problem behind the opening.
Why does this position exist?
What does success look like?
What capabilities are essential?
What kind of leadership will work within this organization?
What risks does the company need to avoid?
And perhaps most importantly:
Does the hiring manager actually know what they need?
Sometimes the answer is yes.
Sometimes the answer becomes clearer only after meeting candidates.
And sometimes the hiring manager discovers that what looked good on paper isn't what the business actually needs.
That's not necessarily a failure of recruiting.
It's part of the discovery process.
The Resume Is Not the Person
I say this frequently:
Your resume should never require interpretation.
But even an exceptional resume can only tell part of someone's story.
It can document accomplishments.
Describe responsibilities.
Show career progression.
Demonstrate experience in a particular industry.
What it cannot reliably establish is how someone will think, lead, collaborate, or respond when confronted with a problem they've never encountered before.
Consider a hypothetical VP of Sales candidate.
The resume is impressive.
The industry experience aligns.
The candidate communicates well and has held positions with significant responsibility.
Then, during a deeper interview, the company presents a business challenge.
An underperforming sales territory.
The sales representative has a strong reputation, but the territory isn't producing the expected results.
What does the candidate do?
Does the candidate immediately conclude the salesperson is the problem?
Or does the candidate investigate territory design, customer concentration, competitive pressures, pricing, pipeline quality, management processes, and historical performance before assigning responsibility?
Does the candidate independently ask insightful questions?
Or does the interviewer have to repeatedly prompt them to dig deeper?
Those distinctions matter enormously.
They reveal something about how a person thinks, not merely what a person has done.
And sometimes that deeper evaluation exposes a gap that wasn't apparent during the initial screening.
That's not an argument against recruiting. It's an argument for better recruiting and better interviewing.
Sometimes the Process Works Precisely Because Someone Doesn't Get Hired
Imagine hiring that VP of Sales without exploring how they diagnose business problems.
The company commits to a significant salary.
Perhaps equity.
Potentially a relocation package.
Then comes onboarding, organizational disruption, and the inevitable learning curve.
Six months later, the company discovers that the executive is better at managing individual salespeople than diagnosing complex commercial problems.
Now the company faces the cost of replacing a senior leader.
And the opportunity cost of six months without effective leadership.
What would it have been worth to discover that potential mismatch before making the hire?
Quite a lot.
A thoughtful recruiting process should surface those risks.
That doesn't mean every rejected candidate is a bad candidate.
A person can be exceptionally talented and still be wrong for a particular organization, role, or stage of growth.
And interviews are imperfect. One exercise should be considered alongside a broader body of evidence, not treated as an infallible verdict.
But identifying a credible concern before making a consequential hiring decision is valuable.
Even when the search continues.
Recruiters Are Accountable. But For What?
This is where the conversation gets complicated.
Recruiters absolutely should be accountable.
For understanding the assignment.
For building an appropriate sourcing strategy.
For identifying and engaging prospective candidates.
For assessing qualifications, motivation, and fit.
For presenting credible candidates.
For communicating clearly.
For providing market intelligence.
For challenging unrealistic expectations.
And for continually improving their judgment.
If a candidate reaches a final interview and demonstrates a meaningful gap, I want to understand why.
Could I have asked a better question?
Could I have tested a capability more effectively?
Did I misunderstand the hiring manager's priorities?
Or did the interview simply reveal something that could only emerge in a deeper business discussion?
Those are legitimate questions.
And good recruiters should welcome them.
But there are also variables recruiters cannot control.
Candidates change their minds.
Hiring managers change priorities.
Compensation budgets shift.
Internal deadlines aren't always communicated.
Organizations make independent hiring decisions.
And sometimes everyone involved acts reasonably, yet the search doesn't produce a hire within the anticipated timeline.
Accountability for professional performance is not the same as control over every human decision.
The Hidden Complexity of Hiring
Recruiting involves two parties making significant decisions for different reasons.
Candidates are considering their careers, finances, families, aspirations, and professional identities.
Employers are considering productivity, culture, leadership, growth, financial risk, and organizational stability.
Those interests overlap.
But they are not identical.
A candidate might be technically qualified but unwilling to accept the compensation.
A company might love a candidate but have concerns about commute distance or long-term retention.
An executive might have the right industry experience but lack the leadership approach the organization needs.
None of those situations can be solved simply by generating more resumes.
They require judgment.
Communication.
Context.
And sometimes difficult conversations.
AI Will Change Recruiting. It Won't Eliminate Judgment.
I'm enthusiastic about technology that improves recruiting.
AI can accelerate sourcing.
Organize information.
Support research.
Improve outreach.
Help recruiters prepare more thoughtful interviews.
And reduce administrative work.
Those are meaningful improvements.
But AI cannot turn a resume into certainty.
It cannot guarantee that a candidate will accept an offer.
It cannot eliminate organizational politics.
And it cannot make two people interpret the same interview in exactly the same way.
Technology can help us identify and evaluate information.
Human judgment is still required to understand what that information means.
You cannot take humans out of a human process.
The Real Product Is Better Hiring Decisions
I don't believe recruiters should be measured solely by the number of resumes they submit.
Or the number of interviews they generate.
Or even the number of hires they produce, without considering the quality and durability of those hires.
Those metrics matter.
But they don't tell the whole story.
The real question is whether the recruiting process helped the organization make a better-informed decision.
Did we understand the role?
Did we identify credible people?
Did we expose potential risks?
Did we challenge assumptions?
Did we help the company avoid an expensive mistake?
Did we improve the likelihood that the person ultimately hired will succeed?
That's the value.
Recruiters find people for jobs. Great recruiters help companies understand which people should actually get those jobs.
And occasionally, that means recognizing that someone shouldn't.
Because the objective was never simply to fill a position.
It was to mitigate the risk of making the wrong hire.
That's why recruiting is hard.
Not because of the jobs.
Because of the humans.
Doug Burris | Founder & Principal, DBI2 Consulting
Helping startups and growth-stage companies make better hiring decisions.