Don't gamble with your recruitment
Richard May
Associate Director @ Construction Senior Talent | Construction Recruitment Expert
Selecting the right Recruitment Agency will save you untold time, money and headache. The alternative is playing roulette with your recruitment... who knows, you may get lucky, but I doubt it...
It may be cliched but it remains true that the most important part of any business is it's people.?
In an increasingly competitive labour market securing the best talent for your business via traditional methods such as advertising is incredibly difficult.
Almost all companies turn to Recruitment Agencies at some point (especially successful and growing ones!).
Attracting the right talent to your business has many facets:?
Using a Recruitment Agency (we'll call them Recruiters from now on) with expertise in your industry, a proven track record and who can demonstrate a process that works is a fundamental starting point.
So how do you go about selecting which one suits your business from the thousands of Recruiters out there?
?Industry specific
One of the fundamental starting points is selecting a Recruiter with a specialism in your industry.?
A Recruiter should have years of experience, in your sector, in your location.?
The old adage of "Jack of all trades, master of none" is especially apt.?
If a Recruiter says that they specialise in everything from IT to education and construction to healthcare - they are definitely not a specialist.
It doesn't matter how professional or likeable a Recruiter is or how good their processes are (more on that later).?
If they don't have the network of contacts and industry specific knowledge in your sector - they are never going to cover all of the market for you.
That means instead of identifying the best that the industry has to offer, you'll be choosing from the best of their limited knowledge and reach.?
Picking the best candidate from a pool of 25 people as opposed to the best of 250 people means you're only seeing 10% of the talent.?
You might get lucky but I don't think you want to rely on luck by choosing from the last turkeys in the shop.
Industry specific knowledge and a network of contacts takes many years to achieve - without it you'll be choosing from a very small talent pool.
Experience = Knowledge = Testimonials
You'd take references for someone you're looking to hire and you'd seek testimonials from a subcontractor you're looking to appoint - why not do the same with Recruiters?
You should interview a Recruiter like you would a candidate for a job.
Ask who their principal clients are.?
And even more importantly if they can provide testimonials or references from those clients.
If they have testimonials from businesses in your industry or direct competitors - you're on the right track.
A word of caution - if their top 3 clients are all your direct competitors in your particular niche - there may be a conflict of interest.?
Some companies who undertake large scale recruitment will have specific non-approach clauses in their agreements with Recruiters.?
This means you won't have access to those people who could be a perfect fit for your business.
Making an informed choice will mean you can be a lot more confident that you're interviewing the right people as a result.
Nothing works without a process
A solid Recruiter should be able to walk you through their process for attracting the best candidates for your business.?
They will explain the logical path to take, how to identify the candidate that will add the most to your business and how they will go about finding them. They will also be able to lay out the timescales involved and key milestones along the way.??
For example what dates you can expect to interview candidates, when you will be making an offer to a candidate and when you can expect that new hire to start their first day of work.
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They should be able to explain how they go about building a campaign, how they identify the total size of the talent pool they'll be searching in and the agreed selection and qualification process to arrive at a shortlist of individuals.
If you're receiving CVs within 24 hours - how much of a search process has been conducted? How confident are you that you're interviewing the best person for your business or department??
You may get the role filled quickly (if you're lucky!) but there's no way you can be confident that the candidate you've hired is the best fit for you business if you're taking the first one off the shelf.
Serious recruitment that contributes to a business's bottom line takes time and a well thought out and clear process.
Fees vs Investment costs
When is the cheapest version of anything ever the best? Or indeed when is it ever really value for money??
There are Recruiters out there who will charge 10% (I've even heard of 8% on one occasion!).?
Likewise there are executive level consultancies and headhunters who will charge 30% (or more) for some specialisms.?
As with everything in life - you get what you pay for.?
If you find an agency that has the right experience in your industry, in your location, with a proven track record and testimonials to boot - as opposed to a cheaper alternative that doesn't fully satisfy the above criteria - it will cost you far more in the long run to chose the cheaper option.?
You could be left with an underperforming candidate - how much is that going to cost your business?
You could be sifting through hundreds of CV, interviewing the wrong candidates or extending offers that are constantly declined - how much is your time worth?
Picking the wrong Recruiter because they're cheap will mean you miss out on the best talent in the industry.?
There is a very strong possibility that you will have to start the process all over again with the Recruiter you could have picked to begin with! And then pay another recruiter fee all over again!
?Time and time again
A couple of brief points on time.
Firstly selecting the right Recruiter will take time - to meet, view testimonials and explain your business needs.?
This upfront investment of time however will save you considerable amount of time later on in the process.??
The cost of a mis-hire, interviewing the wrong people, reviewing too many or poor quality CVs all use up far more time than you'd think.
Secondly you should invest this time as far in advance as reasonably possible.
The more time you can give a Recruiter to understand your business and conduct a full search for you the better the result.?
For the Recruiter to really understand your company, the impact on your business of hiring the right person, putting together a campaign to attract the right people and going through the qualification process will take weeks - not days.
Even once you've received the CVs you will then have to interview the candidates (often a two stage interview process or more); get the candidates availability to meet-up to match with your own diary; negotiate a salary and package; get the contract offer out; and finally factoring in a notice period of anything from 1 to 3 months.
Make sure you're giving a Recruiter as much time as feasibly possible to conduct a proper search and selection process for you. That means if you know you'll need someone in 9 months (for example due to someone retiring) you'll need to start selecting your Recruiter at least 6 months in advance.
If you're just receiving whoever is "on their books" within 24 hours of discussing the vacancy you're not going to receive the best CVs.
Ultimately you'll be hiring someone who is just looking for "a job" as opposed to someone who is the right fit for your business and vice versa.
Summary
In summary, don't play roulette with your recruitment. Do some research, invest time in identifying the right Recruiter for you and you'll save yourself a considerable amount of time and headache in the long run.
The right Recruiter should be:
It goes without saying (but would be remiss of me not mention!), Construction Senior Talent are construction specialists.
We have scores of testimonials and demonstrable process that has worked for our clients on a consistent basis over many years.?
So if you're serious about attracting the best person for your business - you know where we are.