As a career coach with deep and profound experience in Amazon, my job is to help you land a job with your dream company; especially with Amazon. There are a lot of questions that we can ask about Amazon recruiters; why are they so powerful? Most other companies work differently with the recruiter not having the utmost importance in the selection process. Still, that’s an important part of the game; companies are different and so is each debrief process of each specific company. I’m personally a huge fan of the Amazon process.
In this article, I will navigate the importance and power of the recruiter in the hiring process and I will underline how you can build rapport with your recruiter and impress them in order to get hired.
How much power do recruiters have at Amazon?
Since their contract and potential business reputation are contingent on the selection of new recruits they receive, a recruiter working with a corporation to attract workers would be more discriminating than a traditional HR department recruiting manager. Recruiters often choose the applicants to participate in a recruiting process, so they have complete influence on that front.
They will have a say on how much planning they offer an applicant for what to expect at each time in the campaign. Imagine that I spent the extra time asking you precisely what types of questions you’ll be asked and how you can prepare for them, rather than providing you with no detail at all.
A recruiter is a driving force and a leader of the company/team at the bid stage. They will have a say in the negotiations, location, and title, among other things. These factors are crucial in assisting an applicant in making a decision and leading the organisation in presenting itself in the best possible light for that person.
So, how much of an effect does a recruiter have on a candidate’s prospects? Quite a lot.
What does the recruiter at Amazon have to do with your Amazon salary negotiation?
In the Amazon process, the recruiter can make sure that the candidate is well-prepared and ready for the interview. Let’s say you flew from India to have your interview and you didn’t have enough time to rest and get ready for the interview, no matter how good you might be, you can always lose to exhaustion. Most companies forget to give their candidates the time to recuperate. As a recruiter, I believe that should never be a deal-breaker and this says a lot about the role of the Amazon recruiter in the process. It’s one of my favorite examples of how a recruiter can get you that offer. For the recruiting professionals reading this, you really need to focus more on candidate experience. Also, please keep in mind that having a lot of pipeline in making your hire should not make you ignore your candidate recruiters or not prepping them on the phone for the onsite. I believe recruiters need to stop focusing their efforts on emails; they’re not as efficient as other means.
Influence of an Amazon recruiter in your Amazon salary negotiation
The role of the recruiter isn’t limited to a specific position; their role lies in helping you create great storytelling so that you can answer all the behavioral questions and tie them into the leadership principle specifically for Amazon. For example, an Amazon recruiter can ask “walk me through the most innovative thing you’ve ever done as a category manager” and I believe that if you answer that well, you will score 80-100% in the leadership principle.
Regardless of the position you’re applying for, you must answer every question the interviewer asks and you need to provide the most accurate answer possible. A vague answer will sound shallow and vague and the last thing you want in your interview is to appear incompetent through general answers. You want to be an expert in the position you’re applying for otherwise, it will be very hard to get an offer. I hate saying this to you but I have to because the majority of people jumps to the most obvious (and general) answer while the best choice is to take some time to dig deep and respond with the most specific answer that tells the recruiter why they should hire you.
Building rapport with your Amazon recruiter
When attempting to build rapport with your Amazon recruiter, you need to keep in mind that the last thing you want is to appear as a general person. As we said in the previous part, you always want to take a few moments and dig deep and deeper into answering every single question. Depending on the situation, you need to highlight what your potential tasks are and which problems you would be solving.
You should always keep in mind that 90% of candidates miss this chance; they state a situation briefly and say what they’ve done to respond to it. As a recruiter, I have no clue what you have done so I will need you to say as quickly as possible (in a few sentences) what exactly you would be able to add in terms of business impact. 99% of the people that I’ve worked with, even when I was an Amazon employee, they don’t know how to end their story.
This is what I mean by the STAR format; it’s not an Amazon thing and I didn’t copy Amazon’s process or whomever that invented the basic STAR approach. However, I invented my own version to keep the STAR approach extreme and concise. Thus, to build rapport with your recruiter and impress them, you need to fascinate them with your STAR storytelling.
Finally, I want you to always keep in mind that you should never underestimate your recruiter. The best recruiter does their homework on the market needs. They can identify the top candidates for a job and direct them wisely to the firm that best serves the interests of the employee and the employer. Hence, the best recruiter isn’t determined by the number of hires or how fast they hire. I believe a recruiter is evaluated by the quality of their hires.