TCC to Partner with CS Recruiting

Written by Justin Sorto, TCC Education Committee Co-Chair

The Traffic Club of Chicago is partnering with CS Recruiting to drive more job postings to our website. Being headquartered in Chicago, a supply chain & logistics industry focused recruiting firm, and having a team of professionals who understand our industry, we felt that CS Recruiting could be an added benefit for our members and member companies. I had the opportunity to speak with Charlie Saffro, Executive Recruiter and Founder at CS Recruiting, and below is what I learned from our conversation.

Who is CS Recruiting?

For what types of roles do you recruit?

CS Recruiting focuses on finding talent within the Logistics, Transportation and Supply Chain industries. We work with roles of all levels and functions across North America.
Once we engage with a client, we are able to support their recruiting needs for almost any role that influences the supply chain. We work with roles that range from Dispatcher to Financial Analyst, Sales Leaders, C-Suite positions,
Operational Managers and everything in between. Many of our clients utilize our services exclusively for Executive Recruiting, and others take advantage of our full scope network and bring us in to recruit across all levels.

What types of clients do you represent?

3pls & 4pls: Traditional brokerage models and other non-asset transportation and supply chain services.
Asset providers: We represent a large group of clients in the Trucking/OTR space and also work with clients that own containers, railroads, steamships, airplanes and warehouses.
Shippers: Manufacturers and Distributors that have in-house supply chain needs.
Technology/Telematic Providers: Companies that sell a product or service into the industry to support logistics or supply chain functions.

What is CS Recruiting’s process?

Once we engage with a client, we set up a call assess their talent needs. We discuss the company history, culture, current search status, and focus in on the role they are looking to fill to ensure alignment. After we have clear direction, we assign the search internally to an Account Manager who oversees a team of Recruiters. These Recruiters are assigned to the search and dedicated to finding and evaluating talent specific to the role on which they are working.
It takes our team about two weeks to produce the first group of resumes, and during that time, we are conducting research to determine our strategy, finding and soliciting talent, and evaluating talent with in-depth screenings to qualify them for the role. Once we feel an individual is a potential fit, we share candidate profiles with our client for review.

How do you find talent?

Our database is our best resource as we’ve been building it with specialized industry talent for the past 10+ years.
We are constantly networking with professionals to learn about their backgrounds and understand their future career goals so we can reach out when we see a relevant fit. Additionally, we utilize most resume sites and we are extremely active on LinkedIn. We have a dual strategy that creates an inbound flow of resumes through job postings, yet the majority of our success is from our outbound sourcing where we “handpick” individuals specifically for the role.

Current Condition of Supply Chain and Logistics Recruiting

What certifications, training, education, and/or experience are you finding in high demand currently?

We generally see clients with specific education requirements for niche positions. These may include roles in Engineering or Technology, and clients often request specific educational areas of focus or degrees.
To be honest, we very rarely see clients that require a degree for Sales roles. Whether these are customer or carrier facing, enterprise or transactional, most sales individuals strengthen their skills through experience.
Almost all of our clients seek talent with some industry experience and value candidates who have exposure to any type of transportation or logistics service within their career.

Are there specific roles within the industry or types of companies that are hiring more than others?

For the past ten years, we’ve seen a high demand and lower supply of experienced Customer Sales Reps within the brokerage segment of the industry. In fact, most of our service provider clients are seeking Sales talent with a hunter mentality, and those candidates will generally have several options for where they want to take their careers.
Over the past few years, we have continued to see Asset providers and Shippers develop a non-asset transportation/distribution service as part of their offering, and they typically look for talent that has worked within a 3PL and understands the opportunity to leverage the stability and buying power of the parent company.
In addition to these brokerage roles, we consistently see a need for experienced Supply Chain Managers for Shippers, Fleet/Terminal Management talent for Asset Providers, and operational talent across all segments to keep the trucks moving and the warehouses functioning at their highest efficiency.

What is the future of hiring trends in the industry?

There is a big focus on recruiting Millennials as they make up over 50% of today’s workforce. The Millennial generation comes with different expectations and career goals, and companies must adjust to this cultural shift to secure talent. As technology continues to become more prominent, we are seeing the need for Integration/Implementation talent.

Are you seeing changes to hiring trends based on new technology/automation?

There is a lot of talk about robots “taking over,” but people generally don’t realize that there will always be a need for humans, even if their role is to manage and control the robot. As the tech play continues to grow in the brokerage space, we continue to see roles that are heavily focused on Sales and Client Management.

Are there any specific networking opportunities of which job seekers should be aware in order to build their network/create new relationships?

There are many great resources and organizations to be a part of for networking within the transportation and logistics industry. Local round tables and organizations like the Traffic Club of Chicago are a great way to meet new people in the industry for networking opportunities and to learn about different career paths within the industry.
I also encourage job seekers to think outside the box within their network. Consider vendors, carrier partners and shippers that you have worked with over the years. It is highly likely that your skill set is more versatile than you realize, so always go into your job search with an open mind and be eager to take advantage of your contacts and their rolodexes.

What makes someone stand out to recruiters?

Recruiters are often reviewing high volumes of inbound applications for their job postings and they are focused on relevancy, so titles, employers and keywords must stand out. Recruiters will spend about 5-7 seconds looking at a resume before making a decision whether to continue reading or move on. General grammar and formatting are also incredibly important and templates and tools out there make it easy to spruce up your resume.
You should also consider that recruiters are looking for you and they are using search techniques to hand pick the right profiles to solicit for a role. Treat your LinkedIn profile/resume like an SEO strategy on a website by strategically planting as many relevant keywords as possible.

How should a job searcher reach out to recruiters?

It’s important to find a recruiter that understands your background and has a network of clients and portfolio of jobs that appeal to you. If you are reaching out blind to a recruiter, I’d always suggest attaching your resume and/or sharing your LinkedIn profile. A recruiter will be more responsive if your background is in their wheelhouse and they believe they can assist with your search.
If you apply to positions that recruiters have posted, it’s always a good idea to connect with that recruiter on LinkedIn. It usually doesn’t hurt to send a follow up email but avoid multiple reach outs to the recruiter—if they have a fit for you, they will reach out!!

What’s the best way to follow-up with a recruiter?

It’s always good to stay on a recruiter’s radar but there’s a fine line between showing interest and checking in too often. If you’re passively open to new opportunities, an email every month will keep you on their radar. If you are in active search mode, once a week max. While we do our best to inform candidates when a potential match hits our desk, we also encourage them to keep an eye on our active job postings on our website. That way they can reach out if they see something of specific interest.

What are some of the major complaints that you hear from clients regarding candidates you send to them?

As clients review resumes, “job hopping” is a common concern. Most hiring managers look for a track record of loyalty and vertical movement within their career, so if you’ve made many moves with reasonable rationale, I’d suggest referencing that on your resume.
The most common reason for a company to eliminate a qualified candidate after an interview is when they believe the candidate is not a cultural fit. Employers generally put equal weight on a candidate’s skill set and personality as culture continues to become increasingly important when hiring.

What are some of the “pet peeves” of recruiting companies and/or recruits that one should make sure to avoid?

If you are engaged with a recruiter, trust that the recruiter is going to be working on your behalf. There are sometimes situations where we inform a candidate about an opportunity and the candidate applies directly to the client while the recruiter is preparing their information for a formal introduction. These situations usually do not end well for the candidate as it can complicate the process with the client.
Keep in mind that recruiters and candidates want the same outcome and your recruiter is motivated to find you the right job!

Have you recently seen companies make any changes to the recruiting process (ie. speeding up the offer process, new ways of testing candidates, etc.)?

Every company’s interview process varies. We are seeing more online assessments factor into decision-making and Skype interviews are increasingly common. At the end of the day, most employers will make decisions after some sort of face to face interaction and ideally extend offers through discussion.

Have you seen any new and interesting ways that companies are attracting talent?

Employers are definitely learning to go where the candidates are and social media recruiting is on the rise. Having a LinkedIn profile is a must these days, and almost every employer offers a mobile option for the application process.
I have seen some companies host recruiting happy hours where candidates are invited to network with their team in a casual environment. This can work for the right audience, although passive candidates likely won’t risk participating if they are currently employed.

Charlie has over 12 years of direct recruiting experience within the Logistics, Transportation and Supply Chain space. She has worked with many small to medium sized businesses, as well as with Fortune 50 companies to help them identify the right talent for their organizational needs. Clients have included Third Party Logistics providers (3PL’s), Asset Based providers, Shippers (Manufacturers and Distributors) and Vendors to the industry (transportation technology/fleet solutions). Charlie’s team of dedicated recruiters have experience filling positions at all levels, including C Level and Executive positions, Management roles and Independent Contributor seats. Their network of talent spans all functions (sales/operations/analytics/leadership), and the CS team prides themselves on knowing how to identify and evaluate talent for key positions. CS Recruiting’s goal is to partner with clients and candidates to develop long lasting relationships and make appropriate and time sensitive career matches.

As a reminder, any member company can post their job openings on the Traffic Club of Chicago website for free. Also, members searching for new careers can post their resumes on our website for free in order to provide another outlet for companies like CS Recruiting to search them out for potential employment opportunities. For more information on how the Traffic Club of Chicago can help with your company’s hiring needs or information about opportunities for those seeking employment in the industry, please reach out to the Traffic Club of Chicago.