I read “Hiring Secrets of the NFL” for the first time about a month ago and I’ve picked it up several times since to recapture the author’s unique perspective on top talent selection .   I recommend it as a must read for recruiters and everyone else interested in creating exceptional teams.
 

Recruiting Impact Book Review

Hiring Secrets of the NFL

How Your Company Can Select Talent Like a Champion

by Isaac Cheifetz
 

In each chapter of the book, Isaac Cheifetz uncovers a number of hiring, selection and utilization “secrets” discovered over the years in the highly competitive world of the NFL.  The “secrets” are then offered as guide posts to better decision making in the selection of key talent for business teams.  There are 40 “secrets” in all.

The book starts with a “KICKOFF” and then drills through nine chapters of talent selection recommendations (“secrets”) for hiring executives taken directly from (drafting, trading, selection) lessons learned by owners, executives and coaches in the NFL.  It ends, of course, with “THE END ZONE” (a full summary of all the “secrets” revealed throughout the book).  You don’t need to be a football fan to gain a lot from the book, but you’ll probably enjoy it more if you’re familiar with the game of football and some NFL history.

At only 115 pages, this is a richly packed, thought provoking and important book for anyone involved in recruiting, selection and hiring.  Isaac Cheifetz brings a uniquely powerful perspective to the exploration of the devastating costs of critical hiring mistakes and the destiny-changing impact of right-fit talent selection.

This isn’t just another book about building teams by hiring superstars with “team player” attitudes.  The author digs much deeper and challenges some of the boxed-set philosophies still held by many hiring managers struggling to break beyond mediocrity, or even failure, in building their organizations.

Buy the book.  Read it.  Keep it on a shelf close by.  You may find yourself going back to it frequently.

The Minnesota Recruiters Spring 2008 (un)Conference was held on Friday, May 9th in the theatre at the Best Buy corporate headquarters in Richfield, MN.  The free event was “sold out” with 220 pre-registered attendees and a waiting list.  Actual attendance will appear on the Minnesota Recruiters Network blog in a day or two. 

Plenty of post-event information will appear on the network blog over the next couple of days, so I won’t cover details of the event itself in this post other than to say it was well worth attending.  Instead, I’d like to bring some attention to the remarkable efforts of a rising star in the Twin Cities recruiting community and a group of people dedicated to supporting his efforts from the very beginning.

Paul Debettignies

Paul Debettignies (pronounced “de-bettingz”/aka MN Headhunter) is a recruiter, blogger, social media aficionado and social networking star.  With more than 10 years of experience as a technical (IT) recruiter, Paul is currently a one-man-band recruiter with Nerd Search, a firm he incorporated in 2006.  But that’s just his day job. 

In May of 2005 Paul started his blog MN Headhunter.  In December of 2007 MN Headhunter was nominated by Recruitingblogs.com for “Best Third Party Recruiting Blog of 2007” (for the third straight year).  Last summer, as his blog continued to grow in popularity within the local and national recruiting community, Paul and a couple of other local bloggers, Steven Rothberg and Josh Kahn first discussed the (un)Conference idea.  Their meeting took place over some enormous burritos at a Chipotle just around the corner from where the fourth (un)Conference event just took place. 

The Minnesota Recruiters Network was born.  Paul’s efforts in building the Minnesota Recruiters Network (including the development of a web presence on a social networking platform) combined with his planning and promoting of the (un)Conference events have produced extraordinary results in less than a year.  As of today, 372 members appear on the Minnesota Recruiters Network roster. 

The Minnesota Recruiters Network has three key elements that provide events, networking portals and content:

1. (un) Conferences – four have been held so far and more are planned

2. Topical Sessions – the first of these was held on April 4, 2008 with Jason Alba, founder of JibberJobber.com and author of “I’m on LinkedIn, Now What???”.

3. MinnesotaRecruiters.com – a social network and blogging platform for recruiters on Ning with 372 members as of this posting

The co-founders and volunteers directly supporting Paul’s efforts from the beginning include: Don Ramer, Steven Rothberg, Josh Kahn, Nicole St. Martin, and Toby Dayton.  Paul Debettignies is credited by this distinguished group of industry professionals as being the driving force behind the effort.  In Josh Kahn’s words, “He won’t admit to it or take credit, but he’s the guy”.

Local recruiting-related businesses have shown a strong interest in the rapid growth of the Minnesota Recruiters Network and the (un)Conferences.  Sponsors of the (un)Conferences providing the support necessary to produce high quality events at no cost to attendees have included:  Arbita, Job Dig, Oberon, Jobs2Web and LinkUp. 

Paul Debettignies’ impact in the Twin Cities has received national industry attention for some time now.  He has been featured or written about by some of the highest profile recruiting industry thought leaders in the country.   Jason Davis (founder of Recruiting.com and RecruitingBlogs.com) recently recognized Paul in his May 1, 2008 blog post.  Jason’s post about sums it.

And he’s just getting started.