Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Understanding the term Job stretch

Job stretch is a term describing an environment in which you show what you can do on a larger stage -- heftier operating budget, bigger challenges, and supervision of more employees. – Bill

While negotiating with candidates who are on a high-end, middle management or senior level position often what motivates them for a change might not necessarily be on the usual salary improvement or benefits alone but often it could be on what we call as job stretch. It does become very pertinent that a proper probing is undertaken to fully understand what drives and motivates a candidate. For many candidates who are content with their current earnings(it might surprises some, but there are many people out there who are not so money driven- I guess its all about putting priorities in place), most invariably what they look for is a career growth- which can translate to taking on more challenges, more work load, greater opportunity to be part of the decision making team, etc. For some they are far sighted enough to understand that with growth and successful delivery and meeting the employer’s expectation, one can definitely be in a better position to be awarded with future raises, promotions and even more growth. Such people are generally much focused and they know what they need to achieve and they are prepared to make the necessary sacrifices and meet their pre-determined set of goals.

In order for a recruiter to negotiate based on a Job stretch it is very crucial that the recruiter understands 2 things first, and understand them well. First, what does the job description say and have an in-depth understanding on the job profile. Second, understand the complete profile of the candidates – his achievements, aspirations, roles and responsibilities, etc. Next, look for gaps between what you can offer and what his expectations are vis-à-vis job stretch. Identifying these gaps is the key to successful closure.

Examples of job stretch:

  • For a computer programmer – taking up a new job where opportunities are expected to work on new technologies or skills.
  • For a recruiter – opportunities for taking on more number of accounts with more number of back-end support.

***Happy Hunting folks!*

1 comment:

piyusha said...

quite true.. this works well for senior Professionals & becomes important that a recruiter presents the complete package of compensation, job stretch and job growth.