Basic Boolean, Tips & Tricks (in my personal book)

Hey world!

Tomorrow I am giving a training here at Pontoon Solutions on Boolean and thought I would share some of my own tips & tricks with you also! 

Here is something I put together for understanding Basic Boolean - clean and simple:

BOOLEAN COMMANDS & OPERATORS

AND

• Searching for keywords – Add AND in between your keywords
• Example: Manager AND ITIL
• Example: Developer AND Sitecore
  
  

Quotation Marks “____”

• Searching for specific phrases – Add quotation marks around the exact phrases you are searching for
• Example: “Service Delivery” AND Manager
• Example: “Sitecore Developer”
  
  

OR and Parenthesis (____ OR ____)

• Searching for this keyword OR that keyword, as long as the resume has one of them
• Example: Manager AND (ITIL OR “Service Delivery”)
• Example: Sitecore AND (Develop OR Developer OR Developing OR Develops)
  
  

ASTERISK *

• Searching for a key term that could be many different variations (ie. Develop, Developer, Developing, Develops)
• Use this instead of OR on Monster and CareerBuilder
• Example: Sitecore AND Develop*
  
  

As far as some of my own tips and tricks that I do myself, I may have a mind to source differently than others and it is my own way, but it's worked for me so I wanted to share it with all of you! :) 

When I am creating my Boolean string, most Sourcing experts out there recommend to cast a wide net and start your search broadly, but I like to start with the opposite. If the Recruiter or Account Manager has not given me example resumes or profiles of what a perfect candidate would look like, I ask for them. Additionally, I review the job description to see what the Hiring Manager has in mind in writing for their requirements and preferences, and then I meet with the Recruiter to see what other special keys there may have been mentioned in the Intake Call for me to hone in on, or also stay away from. From there, I build my preliminary Boolean string - I am going to look for the perfect person, adding in requirements and even preferences. Sometimes doing this you may only get one person. BUT maybe that one person is the perfect person or perhaps that is a key person to be networking with that knows the right person. From there, I begin to take out preferences and start adding a lot of OR's in to see what I comes up. I also like to pay attention to other titles that this person could be listed as.

When it comes to building your Boolean string, there usually is not just one right string to use and that is it. A lot of times I have to play around with it to get to what I like to call the sweet spot. Sometimes doing this, I will see the person I am replacing in the company or someone currently in that role at that company come up, assuring me that I am on the right track. At that point, I know I have hit the sweet spot and I write that Boolean string down and use that as my main string from there on out. I will still use other strings though as well and search broadly near the end of my search because there may be people hiding under that broad rock.

To me, Sourcing is a fun puzzle to solve every time, having to crack the code and that is what makes it fun. It's also really fun to network with others as well. 

Hope this is helpful for someone! Happy Sourcing! :)