Use these metrics to secure your next promotion

Why are we talking about headcount data?

If you are looking to get promoted into recruiting leadership, headcount data is the fastest path to promotion.

Better said, variance in the headcount plan tells a recruiting story that executives cannot ignore, leading to promotions.

In this segment of Recruiting Wisdom, we’ll talk about 3 types of variances to track, and why it’s important to do so.

But first, let’s talk about the executive mindset to help explain why this is so important.

The executive mindset?

Executives care about what was planned to happen vs what actually did happen. They have bosses too, they’re just shareholders or the board.

The details of recruiting performance (an individual recruiter’s production, or individual requisitions pipeline) is not their focus – it’s yours.

Your job is to give them the information they need to explain the outcome, and the solution to remedy it for their boss. This means talking “Macro-Recruiter-nomics”

Better said, this is the difference between weather and climate.

What headcount data is key?

There are 3 key variances to start tracking…

Variance 1: Recruiter Capacity vs Hiring Demand Actuals 

What the recruiting team said they were going to produce vs what they actually produced.

If recruiting produced less than what they thought they were going to produce, was it the recruiting funnel, individual recruiter performance, changes to the plan that disrupted recruiting, or hiring manager behaviour?

On the flip side, what did the business ask of the recruiting team, and was it possible in the first place?

The ability of a Recruiting Leader to objectively walk through capacity/demand is directly correlated to the value they add in an executive conversation.

Variance 2: Headcount Plan Variance 

How many roles were added, removed or changed during the current business cycle? How did these changes impact your ability to meet the recruiting demand?

Executives always think the plan they made at the beginning of the business cycle doesn’t change.

Your ability to track changes will help distribute accountability for missed recruiting production away from individual recruiter performance, making you a better people manager to your team.

Variance 3: Revenue Variance from Late/Early Hiring 

If a net new salesperson produces $365,000 of revenue per year, every day a recruiter doesn't produce that hire equates to $1,000 of missed revenue.

Knowing how late or early hiring impacts the targets help quantify the impact of recruiting. It will also justify agency spend.

You’ll probably need to sync with your finance team to understand revenue calculations - but fluency in the subject helps you rise to the executive occasion.

Once variance is captured, what’s next?

Once you understand your key variances, leverage an action plan to help bridge the gap between expectations and reality.

Interested in learning more?

🔥 Here is a free capacity-demand forecast template from Eric that you can download if you want to start tracking variance today.

✅ Eric built headcount365 to make variance tracking & reporting accessible to everyone. Connecting hiring managers to a single source of truth headcount plan that syncs with your ATS, HRIS, and Finance systems (book here if you’re interested in speaking to him directly).

🟣 If you’re ready to take your learning to the next level, we have a dedicated platform with training from 40+ talent leaders like Eric. Book a free tour with me here.