When Dave Brailsford took over the British cycling team in 2002, it had only been awarded one Olympic gold medal in the previous 76 years.

When originally applying for this leadership position, he was asked how he planned to turn around this poor performing program.

I’m going to apply the aggregation of marginal gains—we’re going to make a 1% improvement each day and let those changes compound into remarkable results.

Many doubted such a simple strategy would produce the results Brailsford hoped to achieve, but they gave him a chance anyway.

Did it work? Far more than anyone thought it would.

Brailsford’s initial goal was to win a Tour de France within five years. It only took him two years, and then they won 3 more times in the next 4 years.

At the following two Olympics (2008 and 2012), the British cycling team won gold medals in 70% of the biking competitions.

There is more to this story than I can cover here (here are a couple of extra resources to read or watch if you want to learn more), but the principle behind these remarkable achievements applies to recruiting.

To many of you, recruiting seems like a large and insurmountable mountain.

You don’t have a track record of success, your competitors are strong and more experienced, and you really don’t know where to start to solve the problem.

Try taking a page from Brailsford’s playbook by making a 1% improvement in how you execute one or more of your recruiting tasks today.

Make one additional call, talk less during your next conversation, or follow-up with something more thoughtful for a warm prospect.

And then make another 1% improvement tomorrow.