Having spent over 25 years working in Search Recruitment; the single biggest issue I’ve found is explaining to clients what is it that we actually do? How do we “add value” to their business?
And why does Search Recruitment beat advertising & work so much better than other “reactive” forms of recruiting? Why does Search Recruitment gets results in the war for the top talent in your market?
The answer comes in 3 forms:
- Search finds the cream of the crop; we call it the “Hidden Elite” that Recruitment Agencies, advertising and CV Websites can’t find
- Proactive search gives us much better control of the timescales of a search. We are in control; we’re not relying on the right candidates coming to us. We go to them.
- The top companies need the top talent, not just a “bum on a seat” to do a job. Bad hires cost huge amounts of time and negative energy.
So let’s explore the 3 most common questions we are asked by prospective clients:
Surely companies can source the same candidates as a search recruiter?
Although the world is now predominantly “online”; the mechanisms for the job market haven’t really changed with the advent of technology.
In 1990; people who were looking for jobs used to “register” with agencies, read job adverts in the newspaper & ask companies direct whether they had any vacancies. These things still happen, agencies register “active candidates”, job adverts are now online & companies have websites with job vacancies on their “Jobs” page.
But that’s missing the point; companies can only recruit candidates that are actually looking for a job; which is roughly 5% of the working population at any one time. So what about the other 95%? How do we as an employer access them?
Well that’s where a search recruiter comes into play.
We work in very niche, specific industries & we make it our business to know all of the companies in the space we operate; and then find out who the people are that work for those companies.
We spend years forging relationships with the top talent in our chosen market sectors; both to recruit them but also to use their huge network of contacts to unearth the right individual for the right job. This level of network is our secret weapon that allows us to fill even the most difficult of roles.
This unique network is our expert knowledge; and it’s core to the service we provide. Quite simply, we can unearth candidates than nobody else can access.
So when we have an active search we are able to then tap into this “network” to identify the individuals with the right skillset we require. That’s why it’s called “Search”. We truly search for the skillset our client requires.
With Advertising, Agency or posting jobs on an employers website; there is no searching whatsoever – success relies on the right talent being in the right place at the right time. Which is a pretty unlikely set of circumstances.
HR & Internal recruiters can source the same calibre of candidates.
Search recruiters spend their time doing two things; finding talent that companies cannot find themselves & recruiting that talent into client companies’. That is our reason for existence.
We are experts in “recruitment”; getting the right candidate to take the job.
There are a seemingly endless number of reasons the right candidate rejects a job offer. Salary, package, working hours, job poorly defined, etc.
Finding the right candidate is critical; but the reason we are expert “Search Recruiters” is we know how to work through the interview and offer process to give you the client the best chance of recruiting the talent you need. Our livelihoods depend on it. Recruitment to us is the ability to actually get the talent to accept the job. Most of the time it’s a mix of managing expectations coupled with strong communication. Specifically, through the inevitably complex negotiation of a salary package.
In our experience; companies themselves (whether it’s hiring managers or HR) tend to be weak in this area and although they have “selected” the talent through the interview process; an amateurish handling of the offer process leads to an eventual rejection of the job offer.
We’ve huge experience in every conceivable eventuality when it comes to managing job offers; and we use our unique 3rd party position to our advantage – so that we are able to work as a conduit between the 2 parties to facilitate a deal that works for everyone.
Search Recruiters are expensive.
A common objection we hear is that our one-off fees are expensive.
This typically comes from companies that are employing both HR & Internal recruiters on activities to recruit people. As mentioned earlier; HR & Internal Recruiters are primarily talking to and interviewing active candidates; who are either rank average or not suitably qualified for the role. It’s understandable to employ internal recruiters who are hiring large volumes of generically skilled people; but within highly specialised, knowledge based industries paying their people high salaries; it makes no sense to ignore expert recruiters in favour of salaried generalists that simply have to tools to recruit the active job seekers.
It’s the norm in every industry that the top performers never actually “look” for a job. Opportunity seeks them. Whether it’s upward movement within a group of companies; an “old boss/colleague” approached me; or a “Headhunter” approached me. The common theme here is opportunity finds them. Their individual career achievements make peers & management take note; and their reputation gets noticed.
That’s what we look for – people who are “noticed” and then subsequently recommended by others. Referrals are our No1 source of top quality people. It’s what we are all about.
So it makes financial sense to use an expert search recruiter in your market to hire the best talent in your specialist industry.
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