Effective Recruitment Practices

GEZ
HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

SEARCH ASSOCIATES
www.searchassociates.com
ghayden@searchassociates.com

Effective Recruitment Practices for Search Candidates

Welcome, and Getting Started First, the Rules
I am very pleased you chose me as the Senior Associate who will act as your career advisor in your
search for a new international opportunity. I look forward to helping you. Our internal Search
protocol is that I will remain your Senior Associate for life.

Below, you will find quite comprehensive information about how to job-hunt most effectively.
Please do always contact me if there are questions that are not covered here.

I am your advisor, but cannot properly advise you unless I am completely in the picture regarding
your job applications. My advice is unbiased. I have your interests in mind when giving advice this
applies to whether you are applying to a vacancy sourced through Search Associates or through
some other medium. I therefore have the following rules, which I ask all my candidates please to
respect:

Always use the Search EMAIL SCHOOL function for any application you make to a Search
school, or copy me into your message if you use your own email programme. (Search system
emails contain a direct link from your message direct to your file and references a great
advantage). If this is not possible, simply email me briefly to let me know.
Always contact me before accepting a position if I do not know the school myself, I have a
colleague who does. We can help you make an informed decision.
Always remember that your word is your bond. Once you accept a contract, you must fulfill it.

Initial Applications
Less is more. Do not make the mistake that a fully loaded email with attachments is going to
impress, or reach a Head or other decision-maker. With todays level of email traffic, the more the
information contained in the body of an email, or attached to it, the less likely it is that the
information will be read.

Concision is clever. Be smart. Entice the Head to look at your Search file, which has all the
information needed for an initial decision on whether or not to follow-up. Recruiters can be inside
your Search file in one click. The place for your rsum is as an attachment in a reply to a Heads
expression of interest in you. Not in your initial application.

Confidentiality is everything. The confidential references on your file are very powerful. Why?
Because the writer knows you cannot read them, and is therefore likely to be frank about your
strengths, and about those areas in which there is room for professional growth. Testimonials, also
known as open references and also as just plain references, have less currency. They almost invariably
miss out or water down the parts referring to areas in which you can improve they are imbalanced.
Recruiting Heads realise such documents do not give them a rounded account of you. Have
confidence in your Search online confidential references, which paint a balanced picture of you.
Dont attach testimonials.
Dong Fang Tian Jun, Nanjing 210046, CHINA p. +862585322927 m. +8613905167114 f. +8625 8530702 1
Facebook: Search Associates - Gez Hayden
Search Associates London-January Job Fair
Search Associates -Johannesburg Job Fair.

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

SEARCH ASSOCIATES

Your Search File is Your Best Advertising. You will apply to schools for specific vacancies you have
identified as interesting, by email. If you email applications through the Search system, all Search
schools can access with one click your whole online file containing your job preferences, education,
career history, bio, photo, and very importantly, your confidential references.

Meet a need. NEVER apply to a school speculatively in case there is a vacancy. Heads have too many
emails already for real vacancies to allow them to give attention to applications for vacancies that do
not exist. Apply only for real vacancies posted definite and tentative.

Know your Future Employer, and Empathise. Inundated with emails, Heads are busy people and
they like the one-stop-shop that Search Associates provides. Do not overload Heads with
information in your initial email they may delete rather than read it. Instead, guide them concisely
towards your Search file.

Persist. Applying to schools is bruising, especially when you do not receive an acknowledgement or
reply. So do not take this personally. It is normal. Most schools reply only when they wish to follow
up. There is too much email traffic these days to allow any other stance. When you have applied for
one position, do not dwell on it. Put it in the drawer and move on to the next.

Email smart. Here is the matrix I recommend for initial email applications:

1. Before you start: EVERY email application should be individualised to the school you are
approaching. Identical rote applications are obvious to Heads, indicating as they do a
general rather than a particular interest, and are very rarely considered. PLEASE DO NOT
SEND SUCH APPLICATIONS they reflect poorly on Search, and on the individual applicant.
Also, they just dont work.
2. SUBJECT BAR state the actual job you are applying for, and your name, in the subject bar of
your email. EG Grade 3 PYP Teacher Candidate: Jane Bloggs. Do not repeat this in your
message.
3. Start the message by stating why you are a fit with the job and the school. Maximum 3
sentences.
4. In point 3, show you have researched the school and demonstrate with an example from your
career why you are a particular fit with one or more aspects of the school and its philosophy,
curriculum and staffing needs, etcetera. Why are you the special one for this special school?
5. In the next maximum two sentences, outline your qualification and experience as it pertains
to getting you the school and the job.
6. Say you are a Search candidate registered with the Gez Hayden Branch of Search, and your
full professional profile and confidential references are viewable online on the Search
database.
7. Say which fair(s) you will attend (if applicable), and your availability for Skype interview.
8. Always copy me in (not necessary if you use the Search mailing function, which copies to
me directly, but necessary if using your own email client).


SEARCH ASSOCIATES

SCHOOLS ROUTING YOU FROM YOUR SEARCH APPLICATION TO THEIR ONLINE
APPLICATION FORM
Schools these days are commonly asking applicants to complete an online application form. This is
so they can build a database of all applicants, including Search candidates. It is schools
technological response to the challenge of identifying applicants who are the best fit.

Since this is a relatively new phenomenon, the question of interface between the Search system and
individual schools systems is only beginning to be addressed. There is not yet a facility for
populating a schools own database directly from another one. Personally, I think that will be the next
breakthrough.

In the meantime, this reality requires you as a candidate to enter your data once more. That is an
unavoidable inconvenience. More worrying, though, is the possibility that your referees may be
bothered multiple times possibly each time you make an application. There is a risk of upsetting
your referees. Below is my advice on how to preempt that risk. Schools seem happy to work with the
following guidelines:

When you spot a vacancy on the Search website and are then directed to a school's own application
system, to prevent your referees from being pestered, there are two things you can do. Do both if
you can (to be doubly sure!) but do the second only if the first is not possible.

1. On a school-based online application, in the section on references, indicate your confidential
references are already available online through Search. (This is sometimes not permitted by the
school's system).
2. Once you have submitted your application through the school's system, write a short email to the
Head of School as follows:

Dear Ms. X,
My name is AAAAA BBBBB. Through your schools online application process, I have just submitted my
application for the position of YYYY, as advertised on your school's pages on the Search Associates
website, where my confidential references are available. Please would you or your HR department
confirm receipt of my application?
Yours sincerely, AAAAA BBBBB

Email this message to the school using the Search EMAIL SCHOOL system (I get an auto-copy) or if
you use your own email client, CC to me for my records. You should do this even if an auto-
responder sends a standard confirmation.



SEARCH ASSOCIATES

Your Search Online File

1. This online form is to impress a potential employer. Everything should be geared to that
purpose. Check your application is updated and checked regularly. This form is the
compilation of all the information you entered about yourself. Keep it tidy, as it is what
employers see. Do not leave stray question marks. Check spelling, punctuate formally, use
sentence case, and ensure it gives a professional account of you. You can update and amend
your application at any time.

2. Photo: Is it friendly, with a nice smile? Does your photo present you professionally enough to
be acceptable to a conservative recruiter? Does it show you have made an effort in choosing
it? This is a superficial prejudice, but nonetheless real. Do you really mean it when you say
you would not work for someone who judges people by their appearance? Photoshop out all
cups, saucers and other malapropos props.

3. How much notice to your employer it is usually sufficient to state the month of the school
year during which you have to tell your employer whether you are staying or leaving.

4. House sharing: very few people say yes to this, and I strongly advise against agreeing to it.

5. Positions You Seek: you can enter up to four positions prioritized (vertically) 1 to 4. For each of
these positions, you can indicate the level (Elementary, Middle or High School), and at each
level, a further prioritization Not desired, third priority, second priority, first priority. If you are
equally happy to teach at two levels, you can put equal first priority.

6. Keep options open. Lets say you indicate that you do not desire Middle School teaching.
However, you really mean you like High School teaching, but accept that to have a full
teaching load, you will possibly be required to teach some Grade 6-8 classes but great if you
do not have to. You should indicate within that subject line High School first priority, and
Middle School second or equal first priority. If you dont, an employer from a great school
could pass over your application, assuming you are not as flexible as he or she needs the
applicant to be.

7. Keep options open. Only leave unchecked those geographical regions where you are certain
you would not teach, even if the best school imaginable was located there, and made you an
outstanding offer. If you leave such a region unchecked, that best school imaginable will
ignore your application (actually, not even find you when they search the database), and
someone else will get that job which was meant for you!

8. School first, location second. Do you like the thought of spending 33% or more of your life in
a school which makes you thoroughly miserable, just because you like to look at the scenery
as you walk home, unhappy at work, hunched, and in the depths of depression? Dont
discount location, but dont let a desirable location override your good judgment.


SEARCH ASSOCIATES

9. Biographical Notes:
a) The term Biographical Notes leads many candidates to insert material only
marginally helpful in making a school interested in you. The whole purpose of
everything on your application form is to make a school interested in you. The focus is
professional rather than personal. The following are guiding questions to help you
compose your Biographical Notes. Dont exceed the 3500-character limit. Spell-check
your entry. See b) to k) below.

b) Do they paint a picture of you as a person Who are you? Where do you come from?
Where are you going? Are you balanced?

c) Do they show you to be a committed teacher or administrator, who likes children, and
lights up the classroom and/or school life for them?

d) Do they illuminate your interest in delivering the curriculum you teach, or hope to
teach?

e) Do they demonstrate a philosophical disposition towards the principles underlying
the curriculum you teach?

f) Do they fit with and support statements made elsewhere in your application?

g) Do they model your professional attention to prose composition, spelling accuracy,
and the ability to write effectively for a specific purpose?

h) Are they concise, simply expressed, and readable.

i) Do they market you as a future employee? Keep in mind the employer is mainly
interested in you as a professional contributor to the work of the school. He or she is
only peripherally interested in the personal advantages you would gain from being
where the school is located.

j) Have you sufficiently differentiated yourself as a professional, from a possible rival
with the same experience, aptitudes, education and subject interest?

k) Do they recount your ambitions to travel the world and to see exotic things and
places? If they do, delete them. Interest in travel is a given for international teachers.

10. Background Check Documents


SEARCH ASSOCIATES

Although optional, we strongly recommend you obtain background checks for all the countries you
have lived/worked in for a substantial time. If these are in a foreign language, have them translated
and notarized by a qualified entity, and upload the translation also. It is likely that this feature will
become compulsory in the future.

Researching Via the Search Database,

1. The Search database is a research tool. It should not be abused to scatter random
standardized job applications. Even the best mail-mergers cannot hide a standardized
application sent simultaneously to a range of schools. Heads expect that truly interested
candidates will have done their research, and that their applications will show that. Heads
expectations are high. Successful applicants act accordingly.

2. When you find a vacancy that interests you, then you should also find out as much as you can
about that school. Contacts are always helpful, as are school websites. I (and if I dont know
the school) my Search colleagues will know something of the school. Please always direct all
such queries through me, though.

3. I recommend you only apply to school from the Search website if you are SERIOUSLY
interested. You will need to clearly, concisely and persuasively describe that fit in your first
two sentences.

4. It is always better to use the Search email system, as the message you send contains a one-
click hot link to your file. Your own email client does not, of course. Do understand that most
schools these days have a policy of not necessarily replying to unsolicited enquiries. There are
just too many of them. Always include the Search mention indicated below.

5. When writing to a school, always mention that you are a Search Associates candidate,
registered with the Gez Hayden Branch of Search, and your full file and confidential
references are available on the Search Associates website. In this way the recruiter will be
doubly sure to know that he or she can quickly access all information about you.

6. If enquiring about possible or likely vacancies, it is also fine to ask when the status of the
vacancy is likely to be confirmed, so you watch the vacancy and pursue it more fully when it
becomes definite.

7. Be strategic in using the Search Database. In addition to the above

a) Spend a few moments to read through your own Search application. Write down your
defining questions what kind of job are you looking for? Are you flexible in that you
are open to different kinds of positions? Where should the next posting take you,
professionally speaking? Which locations are no-go for you? You have the beginnings
of your recruitment strategy. Go further.


SEARCH ASSOCIATES

b) Think before you act: find out about schools with suitable openings before contacting
them. Be professionally cautious, but not suspicious in your approaches to schools.

c) Use your research to identify possible openings. Do not write for further details unless
there is something very important that you are unable to find out from the Search
website, or the schools website. Heads do not have time to send further details. They
expect their candidates to be independent inquirers with developed research skills.

d) Keep your own records of the schools and vacancies that interest you.

e) Be rigorous in setting yourself reminders to check though the Search website on the
developing status of vacancies as they move through possible to definite, and to look
for more as they occur. This process should guide the timing of you contacting a
school directly.

f) Visit the Search website regularly, and follow up on any daily update vacancies which
may interest you.

g) Build a portfolio of intelligence on schools that interest you and have vacancies. You
should at least know the name of the Head, where the school is (!), which Search
recruitment fairs the school has applied to attend.

h) Prepare a rsum with photo, maximum 2 sides of A4 or Letter size paper, which you
can upload to your Search file.

i) I am here to advise you, but I cannot do the work of searching the database for you.
This is going to take time and effort on your part.

Interview Contexts

It is very rare that a candidate will obtain a position with a school without any form of interview
taking place. There are all sorts of contexts in which interviews can take place. I know of no-one who
thinks that any technology-assisted interview is better than an in-person interview However, with
travel costs, time limitations, and crucially, improving communications technology, patterns have
altered over recent years.

Job Fairs
1. Job fairs continue to play a major role in Search appointments, Each year, the number of job
fair placements made increases. The proportion of job fair placements to Skype
placements has approached an equal balance over the last decade, whereas previously the
overwhelming majority of appointments were through job fairs.



SEARCH ASSOCIATES

2. In countries where there are a lot of international schools, more schools are interviewing in-
country and are appointing earlier in the school year, for vacancies they know through
experience to be hard to fill early years practitioners for classes of 3-year-olds; technology
teachers with specialist advanced qualifications, for whom competition is fierce in any forum;
Chemistry; Physics. There are a finite number of such vacancies in any one year.

3. For the same reasons as in 2. above, a greater number of such unique appointments are being
made now through Skype interviews prior to fairs. The increase over the past is because in
the past, there were telephones, which were inferior. 50% of Search Associates Placements
take place through database contact and remote interview, and 50% through our job
fairs.

4. Job fairs are the most effective places for candidates and recruiters to conduct several
interviews in one short space of time. Interviewers can compare a lot of candidates.
Candidates can compare a lot of recruiters and schools. At a job fair, candidates and schools
get most choice.

5. All Search Fairs are selective, in that there is an attempt, inevitably approximate to a degree,
to match candidates to available vacancies. As vacancies are not always certain six months
before a fair, the selection process only starts 3 or four months beforehand. We attempt to
balance teachers against vacancies, so there is not a glut, say, of English teachers for one
vacancy. This is fair to teachers, and to recruiters (who might face a shortage). The later in
the school year the fair is, the greater the likelihood of candidates being accepted to
participate in it.

6. Job fairs try to hit a ratio of four candidates to one school, however big or small the fair is.
The chances of being appointed at a job fair vary from 40% to 60%, the latter being very
high. This applies to every Search Fair, whether or not it is early or late in the annual
sequence. Chances of a job, and choice of location at the later fair are as good as at an
earlier fair.

7. It is clearly wise to indicate an interest in more than one job fair. Please note that candidates
request an invitation to attend a job fair interest indicated on your Search application is
noted, but does not constitute a guarantee of an invitation.

8. It is clearly unwise to base your interest in attending a fair on invalid factors or perceptions,
such as: a venue being convenient to combine getting a new job and having a nice vacation; a
friend got a job there last year, so it must be good; I could go and visit a relative after the fair.
This is both your career and your life being changed. It is worth attaching the priority to that
consideration, and to invest in it. Please contact me for advice on the best match for you in
terms of recruitment fairs you might attend.



SEARCH ASSOCIATES

9. It is wise to make an objective choice on job fair attendance, based in your fit for the fair.
Different fairs have differing ideal candidate profiles, and you possibly need my advice on
your chances of success. Nevertheless valid criteria are - how appealing the schools are which
feature on the invited list; the inside knowledge of your Senior Associate, who will have some
knowledge of the (annually variable in some cases) style of candidate sought; your Senior
Associates appraisal of your chances of obtaining a position at the fair; the match of likely
geographical locations and your own interests in that regard.

10. Senior Associates are there to give unbiased advice to their candidates regarding recruitment
fair attendance. They do not lose materially or emotionally when their candidates attend
fairs organised by another Senior Associate. However, it is true that Senior Associates
generally prioritise their own candidates for the recruitment fairs they themselves organise.

Skype and Telephone Interviews
I can only conceive of two contexts where a telephone interview is likely: either a case of
technological breakdown, or the interviewer and/or the candidate do not know how to use Skype. I
shall not mention telephone interviews again. Skype interviews usually take place under the
circumstances described below.

1. As stated above, such an interview may lead to an appointment in the case of a unique fit.

2. Statistically more likely, the school does not intend to attend any further fairs and finds
Skype interviewing to be an acceptable alternative in the latter half of the school year.

3. Occasionally, where a school is making an attempt to cut costs or anticipates (as in the case
of unexpected projected enrolment expansion) increased costs beyond the original
recruitment budget, they will choose to go to a Skype interview.

4. Very commonly, unexpected vacancies occur, usually later in the school year (or even over
the summer vacation) and Heads just cannot spend time outside school, nor afford to fly a
field of several candidates in from different countries, to fill one or two positions.

5. Heads use Skype interviews to develop a shortlist of candidates, usually for a major position
in a school, with the aim of inviting a small number to interview at a job fair, or even at the
school for a personal interview.

6. Skype interviews are a perfectly legitimate and respectable way of having an interview and
getting a job. Always direct potential interviewers to your Search file, which, they can
simultaneously read on their laptop screen whilst talking to and looking at you on a second,
connected display. Failing that skill and know-how, they can print your application out!

Out-of-Fair Personal Interviews


SEARCH ASSOCIATES

1. These are very convenient if you are located near to the school. A good school will cover your
travel and subsistence expenses be sure to clarify this before traveling. It is not rude to do
so.

2. Earlier in the school year, these interviews are likely to be either unique fit situations, or part
of a sorting exercise (candidate is promising and worth a look, but the Head will not make up
his or her mind until interviewing others, elsewhere, including recruitment fairs, possibly).

3. If you are known to senior people in the school connections.

4. In the same way as for all other interviews, treat all such contacts as Search contacts. Direct
the potential employer early in the process to your Search file.

The Recruitment Musts

1. You must contact me for advice before accepting any offer from a school, just to be cautious.

2. You must keep calm and evaluate your opportunities objectively.

3. You must establish with any recruiter offering you a position a reasonable time for reflection
on the offer. You must not let yourself be pushed into a premature response.

4. You must be systematic and organised in your approach to keeping abreast of available
Search vacancies.

5. You must review your Search application and update it if it needs to be updated, within the
next seven days, in the light of what you have learned from this document.

6. You must not under-sell yourself, nor accept a position in a school you feel uncomfortable
with.

7. You must stick to your plan, and compromise objectively only on realistically established
standards.

8. You must never break a contractual agreement with a school.

Gez Hayden , Nanjing, August 13 2015.


Effective Recruitment Practices

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GEZ

HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

Effective Recruitment Practices for Search Candidates

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

GEZ HAYDEN, SENIOR ASSOCIATE

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