How Effective is Your Recruitment Process?
I have been blown away at the reception my blog about talent shortage received. It has really got me thinking about the major issues within recruitment processes and what causes most businesses to sigh in dread whenever they are confronted with the need to recruit.
In my experience, there are many reasons why recruitment processes fall down and why people find them frustrating, time-consuming, unproductive and stressful. Today I would like to talk about two major factors in a recruitment process – time and quality.
Below is a graph I have created to highlight the dynamics and issues caused in recruitment by time and quality factors. Where does your recruitment sit on this graph?
Box 1 – Low Quality, Short Timescales
I have already talked about contingent recruitment in an earlier blog, and the reasons why using multiple agencies can severely reduce the quality of service and the benefits you receive from recruitment agencies. I therefore won’t go into too much detail here, but the point is very relevant – if you use multiple agencies then the process becomes all about time – who can get CVs into your inbox the quickest because in contingent recruitment, it’s all about first come first served. Obviously this has a severe impact on quality. Not just the quality of candidates you get visibility of, but also the quality of the process. The phone ringing off the hook from various recruiters wanting to know if you have received CVs / asking for feedback / arguing over who got the CV to you first in the usual event that a candidates application is duplicated by multiple agencies. Sound familiar?
You may get the CVs quickly, but the time you spend dealing with all of this, as well as the volume of CVs you have to sift through, means that one of the major reasons you go to an external recruitment business – to save you time – becomes redundant.
Box 2 – Low Quality, Long Timescales
There are various scenarios that can play out to mean that you receive poor quality, or irrelevant candidates and that your process can take much longer than expected.
Obviously the first one relates to Box 1. If your process is quite chaotic with a number of agencies working on one vacancy, then the result of Box 1 means that the process gets longer and longer because you are not getting the quality of candidates you require.
The second reason you may fall into this box is if you don’t select the right recruitment partner, or your in-house recruitment isn’t qualified enough to recruit the position they have been asked to, for example, if it is a specialist role that the recruiter does not fully understand or have the network to be able to access the required candidates. In this instance, it may take a long time to get CVs coming through to you, and when they do, they are not of the standard required.
The final reason is that you are being unrealistic with the specification you are looking to fulfil. No matter how thorough the search is, you just won’t get what you are looking for. HOWEVER, I do think this then reverts back to choosing the wrong recruitment partner. Any recruitment business worth their salt should be advising you as to how realistic your specification is at the point they take the details from you. It may be disappointing to hear that you may not get your “perfect” candidate, but it saves a lot of time and effort to get it right first time.
Box 3 – Short Timescales, High Quality
This is the sign of a great recruitment business. Recruiters who can offer you good quality candidates quickly, know their market, proactively interview candidates and can offer a true consultancy service.
If this is your experience of your recruitment partner, then you are getting things right as to enable recruitment businesses to provide you with relevant candidates quickly. You will most probably have built up a good relationship with them, spent time with them to allow them to get to know your business and given them all the information they need to provide accurate and relevant professionals.
This method is sometimes rebuffed by hiring managers as taking too much time. However, as I hope my graph proves, this view is flawed and very much a false economy.
Good recruiters will use box 3 and box 4 in conjunction with each other to create a high quality shortlist for their client. A good business who understands the importance of a defined recruitment strategy will afford them the time to do so.
Box 4 – Long Timescales, High Quality
When I speak of “long timescales” I am referring to the time allowed to conduct the search. The time from when you first engage with a recruiter, to when you receive the shortlist.
In this instance, a recruitment business will be given the time and space required to go and source high quality, relevant candidates for a vacancy.
Often the recruiter will be retained, if not then used exclusively.
The relationship between recruitment and hiring business is an absolute partnership, where time has been invested in the start of the process, primarily to ensure that you choose the right recruitment partner, and then to engage with them to provide as much information as possible. More often than not the hiring manager will be heavily involved with the information gathering stage.
The benefit of this initial time investment will be reaped tenfold. Gone are the multiple phone-calls and stressful conversations of who got their CV to you first. No more will your inbox be full of irrelevant CVs that take hours to go through.
Instead you have a true strategic recruitment process that leaves you free to do your job whilst the recruitment partner does theirs. At the end of an agreed timescale (usually two weeks or so) you will instead be given a shortlist of 4/5 individuals to interview of which you will absolutely be able to select one. By investing the time and (potentially) money, your recruitment partner will be empowered to do their job properly, resulting in a win-win for all involved.
So to recap
- Contingent recruitment with multiple agencies is very much a false economy
- Invest time researching potential recruitment partners before appointing one
- Spend time with this partner at the start of a process to give them as much info as possible and you will reap the rewards!
- REMEMBER – recruitment is a process like any other. As your manufacturing process, procurement process etc. have all had time invested to ensure that the strategy behind them is effective, efficient and successful, so should your recruitment process!
Director, specialist in DEI, Alternative Talent Solutions and EVP
9 年Some great food for thought Matt. At JPS we absolutely try to position ourselves as a "partner" for long term talent acquisition and management strategy as opposed to a "fill a job and move on" type of agency. We have this in mind in everything we do, which I hope is highlighted in blogs like this one. We are all about adding value through providing consultation and advice to our clients, not just filling jobs. Like the idea about benchmarking current employees. Its definitely something I will think about using and work out how to include it successfully within our portfolio of services. Its all about trying to breakdown peoples preconceptions about what recruitment businesses do and what their service offering is. It will take time but I am determined to get there!
Senior Operations Executive in Distribution, Logistics, and Manufacturing
9 年Good Article Jennifer, I have worked for and with businesses that have this engaging process with suppliers. Linking supplier management with their strategic aims and goals. Some do this because it is simply the right thing to do, some will always revert to type once they have what they want. So let's look at the differences in the services that recruiters offer vs. suppliers who fall into tactical partnerships. I speak with experience in these matters: 1. Length of agreement Relationships build over time, as does trust in competence and effective results. Yet the recruitment industry continues to fix one problem at a time. The client needs somebody, your at the door, closely followed by many others. In short you've fixed the problem but not provided a solution. 2. Innovation opportunities Product suppliers guide customers toward new innovation, cost saving opportunities, lean initiatives and the key win-win position, Making the customer look good to their boss! The Recruitment industry presents the best candidates based upon a number of initial discussions. New position, fee opportunity, go. I have yet to be told, eh.....no, what about if we assess the current team you have using benchmark candidates and assess the skill gap for you! we can then provide coaching from our network or perhaps then we know this problem can only be fixed by bringing a new person into the business. just a silly example, but innovation captures commitment from customers and clients. I appreciate that I am glancing over some of the excellent work the recruitment industry does, but I have worked with them, the biggest, the smallest. I'm exited about the new innovations to come.
Director, specialist in DEI, Alternative Talent Solutions and EVP
9 年Matt Guixe I just read this article in supply management https://shar.es/1pbumv it would be so lovely if this approach was extended to recruiters as a supplier too!
Director, specialist in DEI, Alternative Talent Solutions and EVP
9 年Thanks Matt, and what a refreshing, heartening and wise comment! It always strikes me that the people who do value our industry and work with us transparently, are the A Grade candidates you speak of. I think people who really do understand the importance of communication, transparency, time etc in any process, automatically apply this to recruitment too. It's potentially the ones who "learn" these practises as opposed to fully understand them, who do not.
Senior Operations Executive in Distribution, Logistics, and Manufacturing
9 年It is remarkable that we are told that success is achieved "when the right people are doing what they do best and are most passionate about" In the supply chain industry we push to make those businesses with this expertise our partners. We fall over each other to collaborate, communicate, score and measure suppliers, 3pl logistics partners, ERP solutions providers etc. Yet for some reason, out on a limb the recruitment industry is left on the pavement knocking on the door with expertise. "A" Players create "A" Players, this is clear. In every root cause that points to lack of communication, project failure or non achievement of KPI's, your inability to recruit correctly is a major factor. Let take a fresh look our recruitment processes and partners. Remove the cynicism and evaluate the real value proposition. Both industries have an obligation to review their practices under the terms of the continuous improvement banner we all speak of daily, but often fail to execute. Lets be clear, communication creates relationships, relationships create joint business plans and partnerships. Ignore each other at your peril.