Recruiter and Talent Management Professionals Comments
Print issue 1, 2016: Recruitment Disruption & Innovation: Buy Now >
Knowledge sharing supports innovation and service improvement. The Recruitment Times aims to provide a forum for recruitment and talent management professionals and managers to voice their opinions on a variety of issues involving their sector. No issue is to big or too small.
One of the lead issues of the inaugural print issue is that of the disparity in the behaviours and motivations of a great many recruitment consultants in comparison to the standards and ethics preached by the REC and the company line as presented to the public in agency literature such as their corporate websites.
Taking a look at the mission / ethics / standards statements on large and small recruiters websites, do these idealistic messages always tally with the way their consultants behave toward the client and the job seeker?
Quote from Adecco corporate website (the leading provider of talent acquisition solutions worldwide):
"If you’re committed to achieving professional goals, you need a partner that understands what it takes to succeed in a competitive market. Adecco’s reputation as an industry leader - coupled with its cross-sector expertise and national network of offices - gives you access to not only the best jobs in today’s market, but also the most practical career advice from the most experienced consultants. And as the London 2012 recruitment provider, you couldn’t choose a more trusted partner."
This is outwardly a perfectly reasonable statement. Adecco is a huge organisation with a vast number of clients. The more clients, the more jobs their (brokers) agents will be tasked with filling. Larger volume, however, does not necessarily equate to quality of job vacancy though, and herein lies the point of this message: it is a sales pitch to job seekers. The more attractive Adecco appears to job seekers, the more candidates they will register and the larger their database.
The larger their candidate database, the more attractive Adecco becomes to existing and potential clients (the employers).
DISCUSS: Are there any GOOD 'About Us' or 'Mission Statements' on ANY recruitment and HR services websites?
1. How Far Do You Go To Be Seen as Professional? How professional and efficient are you? What high standards do you try to maintain?
“As members of the REC we work to their guidelines but on a daily basis we work on the concept of quality over quantity. I don't have a target number of Business development calls to make or numbers of interviews attended. My MD would far rather that we concentrate on the quality of service we are giving our clients and also our candidates thus making us more efficient as we aren’t making phone calls for the sake of it!
We pride ourselves on our reputation for giving good service and for taking the time to put the right candidate in a job that is right for them. Our candidates stay in jobs and don't leave.
To increase my professionalism I am due to undertake the Degree in Recruitment Practice, I think that the more knowledge I can gain of the industry the better for myself, clients and candidates. I also think it shows that the company is committed to the industry we are in.
Recruitment gets a bad press and sometimes rightly so, when I was last looking for a new job I put my CV on websites with only my mobile number for contact. A large well known rec to rec company took it upon themselves to track down my office number and call me there!Š
Andrea Pillinger, DoveTail HRS
"I think professionalism has to be intrinsic to our business. We believe in transparency at all times when dealing with clients and candidates alike. As such, all parties are aware where their details are being sent to and what opportunities lie therein. Blakemore Recruitment deals with organisations that understand our professional approach and that helps with building long-lasting mutually beneficial rewards."
Desmond Menewe, Co-Founder, Blakemore Recruitment
"We invest in training, not just the technical skills but the soft skills and personal motivation. That includes the managers, fee earners and support staff. Everyone needs to know what their job is and what it achieves, how it plugs into other roles and what impact it has on the organisation. This is best started from a formal induction (ours lasts about seven days, including systems training). Technical skills are then added for each role.
A competency based approach means that managers can let staff get on with their roles, making informed decisions and feeding back initiatives. Management can get on with the business of managing the organisation, supporting staff and resolving issues that inevitably arise in business."
Del Hunter FREC FInstSMM, SSR Personnel
"There is a huge spectrum of quality of service within the sector. There really are some amazing recruiters out there who I've come to know that are at the top of their game and really know how to find, attract and place great people.
Equally, at the other end of the spectrum there's a type of recruiter who is more akin to The Wolf of Wall Street and will do whatever it takes to hit their targets. I've met and known both and it's unfair therefore to generalise about the sector. If as a company you are unable to have your own in-house recruitment expertise, there are roles and occasions where it absolutely makes sense to engage a recruiter. My preference would always be to recruit in-house, simply because I like having a direct relationship with candidates and there's less complexity in the project."
David Norris, Investor in early stage business, Forward Partners
Print issue 1, 2016: Recruitment Disruption & Innovation: Buy Now >
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