Dr John Sullivan Talent Management Thought Leadership
The shutdown has forced millions of well-trained and experienced employees to consider a new job. So why not target and then cherry-pick from among the most desirable ones? During this time period, many federal employees and contractors are thoroughly frustrated. To show you why you shouldn’t pass up this rare opportunity, the primary focus of this article is to list the many benefits a company can receive from government shutdown recruiting.
“Government Shutdown Recruiting” Has Many Benefits
From a strategic recruiting perspective, there are multiple benefits to actively recruiting during this federal shutdown. I have broken the list of these benefits into two sections. The first explains why these government employees are great candidates and exceptional hires. And the second section highlights why recruiting them will be relatively easy.
Section I – Reasons why this recruiting effort will produce top-performing new-hires
Today, when you target federal employees and contractors, you will be able to hire the most capable and best-performing employees for several reasons. They include:
- You’ll be able to cherry-pick from a flood of good candidates – because of the large number of qualified candidates in the applicant pool (compared to the number of relevant job openings). Corporations and businesses will literally be able to pick and choose from among the most desirable and the most qualified governmental candidates (improving your quality of hire).
- These already experienced and trained new-hires will get up to speed quickly – unlike new hires that have been unemployed for many months. Hiring managers will be pleased with the fact that most of these available government workers will be both experienced and fully trained. So they will be able to get up to speed rapidly at their new company.
- You will build your culture by adding loyal and purpose-driven employees – because these government employees have been loyal and mostly purpose-driven. In the past, most of them wouldn’t have seriously considered leaving the governmental sector. That means that if your organization is purpose-driven, these new hires will reinforce your current values by continuing to be extremely loyal and purpose-driven after they join your team.
- These new-hires will provide competitive intelligence and connections – if you specifically recruit employees from the primary agency that regulates your company. And/or from agencies with which you do a great deal of business. With each new hire, you will bring with them valuable knowledge about the agency, its workings, and its plans. And by hiring already well-connected government employees. You will also gain their already established network with the remaining federal employees at their former agency.
- This broad talent pool also includes many managers – because the government shutdown includes employees from all levels of an agency. This talent pool will include many managers and even some executives. They may now feel a need to leave because they fear that they might be labeled and sanctioned as part of the “deep state.”
- You will find an abundance of diverse candidates and veterans – because government agencies have been leaders in attracting and promoting a higher-than-average percentage of diverse professional and hourly employees. Utilizing this source will likely help your company meet its own diversity goals. This is because one quarter of government employees are veterans. Your chances of landing a vet will also improve.
Section II – Recruiting them will be relatively easy
The reasons why extensively recruiting government employees will be relatively easy include:
- You will face a low level of recruiting competition – for a variety of reasons, many corporations have historically been reluctant to develop a company-wide recruiting plan that specifically targets current government employees. With today’s tight recruiting budgets and reduced hiring levels, I have found that most corporations simply don’t have the necessary resources for planning and creating a new government shutdown recruiting effort. So if you act fast, you will beat out most other corporate recruiters. At the same time, it provides your organization with a competitive advantage in recruiting.
- Millions of federal workers are suddenly actively interested in a new job – many of the 2.9 million government employees and up to 9 million contract employees can now be counted as being concerned about their future job security. That deep concern may cause over a million federal employees to suddenly become active job seekers, meaning “they will find you” if you merely post an exciting job ad. The recently announced layoffs that will occur during the shutdown will cause thousands more to become active job seekers. That talent pool, along with the ever-increasing pool of normal unemployment available, makes this a huge recruiting opportunity that shouldn’t be missed.
- Attracting top candidates may only require offering stability, security, and respect – after suffering through DOGE and numerous additional presidential and congressional budget cuts. The primary interests of many government employees/contractors have narrowed. So that they are now focused on stability, job security, and finally being treated with respect. So if you can offer your recruiting targets those three things. You will be able to attract and land a large percentage of your governmental recruiting targets.
- Missing a paycheck will create a sense of urgency among your targets – because a significant percentage of federal employees won’t be receiving a paycheck this month (even if they are still actively working). Many will be struggling just to feed their families. With no end to their cash drought in sight, many who live paycheck to paycheck will be forced to immediately look for alternative jobs.
- They’re now looking, because their dream of making a substantial impact has faded – even if a purpose-driven federal employee gets to keep their job after the shutdown is over. The continuing budget cuts, coupled with the dramatic shifts in agency leadership, direction, policy, and priorities, will often mean that those employees who joined the government with a dream of having a substantial impact and making a difference will now consider a job search after they decide that these dreams are now unreachable over the next four years.
- Your recruiting targets will be easy to find and communicate with – because most federal employees are extremely well-connected when they are actively looking for a job. It will be easy for your recruiter to find and communicate with them over a variety of channels.
- Relocation won’t often be an issue – because government employees are widely dispersed. You will be able to find recruiting targets in every state and in most large localities. And that will minimize your need for expensive relocations.
Implementation Tips To Consider
For those considering implementing a complete government shutdown recruiting effort, here are a few critical implementation tips to consider.
- Make it a recurring recruiting process – every large organization should develop a standalone “government shutdown recruiting process.” That can be quickly activated right before the threat of the next government shutdown.
- Make your recruiting process data-driven – like all modern recruiting processes, this one must be data-driven to succeed. So it’s essential that you develop performance metrics to measure the performance of this recruiting process. Eventually, you must use these performance metrics to demonstrate to your executives that your recent government hires have outperformed the average hire in productivity, leadership, teamwork, and retention.
- Keep on recruiting after the shutdown ends – because the bad experience of this painfully long shutdown will linger in the minds of the remaining government employees for months. Expect the job search of many government employees to continue for months.
- Expect rusty interviewees – because many of your candidates will have been long-term government employees. Be prepared for the fact that many of them will appear rusty during their initial job interviews simply because they haven’t participated in an external job interview for so long.
- Consider offering a sign-on bonus – because many of your government recruiting targets will be living without a paycheck. Offering even a small sign-on bonus will dramatically improve your chances of receiving a quick positive decision from them.
Note: You can find many more tips on how to recruit government employees here.
Final Thoughts
From my perspective, as a recruiter, your primary obligation is to provide your teammates with the very best coworkers. To meet that goal, smart recruiting leaders need to see emerging opportunities when others don’t, then act quickly to create a competitive advantage in recruiting for their company.
Fortunately, the current government shutdown provides recruiting leaders with a unique strategic opportunity to proactively recruit from a recruiting pool that is not only of record size but also dominated by candidates with recent experience and updated training.
And right now, that candidate pool is also dominated by those who were forced to become highly motivated, suddenly to actively seek a better, more satisfying, more stable, and more secure job. Carpe diem!
Thank you for reading and sharing
Notes for the reader
This is the latest article from Dr. Sullivan, who was called “the Michael Jordan of Hiring” by Fast Company. You can subscribe to Dr. Sullivan’s weekly Talent Management articles here or by following him on LinkedIn.
