Playbook, recruitment agency
The questions candidates will not ring a branch to ask
Somebody coming in to register is doing paperwork, not competing for a job, and hardly any of them know that. They arrive over dressed and anxious, or they do not arrive at all because they could not work out what they were walking into. None of it gets asked on the phone, because saying it out loud feels like an admission, which is exactly why a chat box picks it up.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for first visit questions holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- Registration is an administrative appointment that produces a record rather than a selection event, and saying that in the first sentence removes most of the fear attached to it.
- Many agencies run a short check or briefing at registration for the sector they staff, and a candidate who was not warned treats the whole hour as a test they might fail and could lose.
- The visit involves handing identity documents to a stranger in an office, which is a larger ask than it sounds, so what happens to those documents belongs in the answer before anybody asks.
- People registering for shift work often come in between jobs or on a day off with a child in tow, and whether that is workable is a question they will never put to a consultant.
How it arrives
- what should i wear to register
- is registration an interview
- how long will i be at the branch
- is there a test when i come in
- can i bring my son with me
- do you keep my passport or just copy it
What has to be indexed for this to work
| A registration page written as a sequence | Arriving, what happens first, how long each part takes, how it ends and what follows. Agencies hold every one of these facts somewhere and the order nowhere, and the order is the thing a nervous person needs. |
|---|---|
| Whether there is any check or briefing, and what it is for | Describe it plainly, including that it exists to place people rather than to filter them out. An unannounced assessment is the part of this appointment candidates resent most and talk about afterwards. |
| What happens to documents on the day | Whether originals are copied and handed straight back, where the copies go and how long they are kept. Somebody about to hand over a passport in a high street office wants this settled before they set off. |
| The practical detail nobody publishes | Dress, whether children are welcome, whether there is somewhere to wait, how long to allow. Cheap to write, and it is the difference between somebody turning up and somebody deciding to leave it for now. |
The reply
Registration is paperwork rather than an interview, so wear whatever you are comfortable in. Allow about an hour: forms, checking documents and a conversation about the work you are after, with a short briefing at the end for the sectors we cover [1]. Your original documents are copied and handed straight back to you on the day [2]. If you need to bring a child, or you can only make certain hours, say so and we will work around it. I cannot book the appointment from here, so leave me your name and an email and the branch will arrange a time.
It kills the interview assumption in the first six words, because that assumption is the whole message. The document sentence is unprompted, since handing over a passport is the part people quietly dread. And it raises the child and the hours itself, which is the constraint nobody types unprompted.
Where it stops
The trigger. The visitor asks to arrange a time, describes a constraint on when they can attend, or asks whether any part of the visit can be adjusted.
I cannot book you in or hold a slot for you. Leave me your name, an email and roughly when suits you, and the branch will be in touch to arrange it.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never say a candidate will be offered work once they have registered, because registration produces a record and nothing more than that.
- Never describe a check or briefing as something somebody can pass or fail, since that alone stops people attending.
- Never say documents can be photographed and sent in instead of being seen, because that is a compliance position and it is not the assistant's to take.
- Never promise the branch can accommodate a child, a particular hour or an adjustment without a person confirming it.
Questions
- These feel too trivial to publish. Are they?
- They are the reason people do not turn up. Somebody who cannot picture the hour they are committing to quietly plans their day around something else, and the branch writes it down as a no show and never learns why.
- Should it mention the assessment before somebody comes in?
- Yes, and say what it is for. The resentment is about the surprise rather than the task, and a candidate told in advance arrives expecting it instead of feeling ambushed halfway through the appointment.
- Can it tell somebody what work they will get after registering?
- No. It cannot see vacancies against a person, promise work or predict anything. It can describe what happens after registration in general terms, which is what the question is usually reaching for.
Keep reading
- Everything for a recruitment agencyTwo audiences on one website. Process, payroll and compliance questions are answerable, application outcomes never are.
- Handling first visit questions in generalWhat to wear, where to park, how long it takes, whether they can bring somebody. Cheap to answer and disproportionately valuable.
- A refund here is a clause, and usually not moneyRebate scales taper, a replacement usually comes first and conditions void both. What may be quoted when a hire leaves in week three.
- Two things called an appointment, one of them not yoursWalk in or by appointment, which branch, and why an interview is never the agency's to arrange. Booking answers without any diary.
- Application status questions, and the answer that is not a statusThe most asked question a consultancy gets and the one it cannot answer in a widget. What to say instead so the candidate stops chasing.
Try it on your own material
Upload a document or point it at your site, paste one line of HTML, then ask it something only your business could answer.