Are You a Passive Candidate? Discover What You Need to Know!
Passive job seekers are individuals currently employed and not actively searching for a new job. Yet, they may be open to a promising career opportunity if it comes their way.
To explain it more thoroughly, it means you’re not actively looking for the job, or you aren’t even thinking about working in another company, but your qualifications, expertise, experience, and skills are very attractive to some hiring managers or recruiters. So, naturally, they reach out to you in order to recruit you.
If you recognize yourself in these descriptions or are simply getting more interested in the topic, continue reading this post.
Benefits of Being a Passive Candidate
The Options Are Numerous
You're in a fortunate position.
The market is in demand for passive candidates, and that is your advantage. If you check the 2023 Manpower survey, you can see that 77% of employers around the world claim they faced an employee deficit. One approach to address this is for hiring managers to include passive candidates in their talent acquisition strategy. As a passive candidate, you can choose among many options, for example, you can find yourself a company with a company culture that fits your values and most importantly, you have time to explore various possibilities that are being offered to you, which means you might uncover an amazing chance you were completely unaware of.
No Pressure
Yes, you have the luxury of avoiding stress since you already have a job that grants you financial security. This means you're under no obligation to work in companies that might not be your cup of tea. You can say “no” without feeling anxious or uncomfortable, unlike active job seekers who sometimes find it difficult to decline what is offered to them.
Demand What You Want
Sit at the negotiating table!
You can ask for whatever you want, actually. The salary, position, working hours, remote or on-site work, or any other benefit that comes to your mind. Of course, that doesn’t include extravagant ideas like swimming in the pool filled with chocolate as a team-building activity. Or does it?
Joking aside, maybe you won't get what you're looking for, but it's easier to be honest and ask for what you need when you already know you're not financially threatened.
Professional Development
Even though you aren’t looking for a new job because you are satisfied with where you are now, tackling some unique challenges and delving into exploring your profession will definitely advance your own skills. It might also give you a fresh perspective and a clearer vision of where your career path might take you.
Strategies for Passive Candidates
If you are not looking for a new position but you love to keep your options open, here are some tips that might help you do so:
Keep Your Online Presence Fresh and Stylish
Social media is a modern tool to “be loud” and showcase your skills.
If you didn’t, update/create your business social networking platform profile - on Linkedin, for example. Update/add your resume, highlight your skills and accomplishments; don’t stay silent if you have any (new) certifications, share that info online! Also, recruiters will find you interesting if you list the projects you were actively involved in, or maybe launched on your own. Creativity always counts.
Network With New Contacts
New connections can always come in handy. Even if the offers that come to you aren't of interest to you, you never know where that “friendship” could take you. One contact can lead you to another, and that might open a completely different door for you, and bring you unexpected successes in your future career.
Stay On Top of Things
You should definitely consider staying updated about everything new regarding your career preferences because you never know when you might find info about some education, conferences, or events with speakers that hold lectures that might interest you. By keeping up to date with everything, you also contribute to your skills development and gain more knowledge, which consequently makes you more interesting to recruiters. And that can also get you new connections, as we already mentioned above - and that only adds to your advantage.
Be Open-Minded
When you do receive an offer, be flexible. Don't immediately dismiss it. Get informed, and pay close attention. While it's possible that nothing will come of it, it's also likely that you will learn something new, such as the prospect that your current employment position could be advanced, that you can have other perks, work for greater pay, and so on.
Conclude the Business, or Stay Open for More?
It's quite normal that people are looking for different working conditions and opportunities on their career paths during different stages of life. Even if you are satisfied with your position and the company you work for - you never know if there is a better fit.
With that in mind, the strategies we talked about will help you maximize your potential, but perhaps the most important piece of advice to remember is that you really have nothing to lose if you engage in the passive-job-search adventure.