You can’t control people, but you can control your service.

A non-stop week of filling temp roles has been humbling (but the market is moving – yay!) and has been a firm reminder of the above.

Back in the day, I used to be a high-volume, temp retail recruiter with the ‘duty phone’ glued to me 24/7 and I spent most weekends ‘on call’ walking up and down Oxford Street in London checking in on the 100s of temps we had out working in all the huge department stores.

I was basically moonlighting as a crisis manager – temps seemed to have several grandparents passing away and emergency trips to the vets for their hamsters every weekend (I’ve literally heard it all, and yes, they were just hungover…).

There were always shifts that needed re-filling, temps in the wrong uniform and clients to manage, but I built strong relationships and was always proud of how quickly I worked to turn things around.

This week hasn’t been AS nuts (but it certainly gave me a bit of PTSD from my early twenties), however, Naomi Marshall and I have certainly had our fair share of highs and lows.

I’ll be honest, we’ve had a temp let down a new client not once but TWICE, which we ‘sprinted’ to rectify at the speed of light (and we now have a very happy client who has since referred us to another client – more jobs wooo), to people accepting positions and then deciding to take something else (quality talent always has options – a post for next week!).

Anyway, this is just a reminder that shit will always hit the fan when you’re working in an industry where your product is something you can’t control.

At the end of the day, recruitment (and business in general) is about managing what you can control – control the controllables.

In my experience, clients are understanding when things go wrong as long as you demonstrate proactive problem solving.

So, when things go sideways (which they will), remember…

– Get on the front foot
– Put on your big girl/boy pants and communicate (even if that phone call makes you feel a bit ill)
– Solve the problem, don’t dwell on it

How you handle a problem is what people remember.

I’d love to know the wildest work crisis that you’ve had to deal with? Because let’s be real, we’ve all had a ‘hamster emergency’ moment before!

For example, Naomi Marshall once unknowingly placed triplets who were rotating through the temp job for the week…. Ask her about if you need a laugh.