Questions you've been afraid to ask about recruitment as a hiring company

When companies are looking to hire, undoubtedly one of the initial decisions they need to make (or should at the very least consider making) is whether to engage a recruiter or to dedicate in-house resources to the task.

For some who may not have worked with recruiters in their bid to hire, sometimes you may not know how the process actually works when engaging recruiters. Similar to last week’s piece about candidates, here is a go-to list of answers to several common questions that hiring companies have about recruitment to help clear the air.

1.??????Do recruiters place people and then pull them out to fill other roles? Many companies are concerned with recruiters placing great candidates, and then later on poaching their staff for other roles elsewhere, so there is an inherent distrust of ‘letting the fox into the henhouse’ so to speak. We can only speak for our company, but we absolutely do not do this and would love for this to be a standard across the industry. Our ongoing policy is that we do not approach the staff of any client of ours, or anywhere we have placed someone in the last 12 months, for roles we have elsewhere. If they approach us, there’s certainly a conversation that is had to ensure that they are making any decision entirely themselves. Overall, we simply just stay away from staff of our clients.

2.??????What happens if I’ve engaged more than one recruiter and I receive a candidate CV from two (or more) of them? When you’re engaging with more than one recruiter, there is always the risk of having a double up in candidates they present to you. So who do you credit with the work and pay the fee to? There are actually two parts to this answer. The first is: Did you give both recruiters permission to send you candidates for the job? If the answer is no, you take the candidate only from the agency that you gave permission to put someone forward for. The other is unsolicited. The second part is if you actively engaged both recruiters, the generally accepted rule is whichever recruiter put forward that candidate first is the agency you would work with to progress that candidate further.

3.??????What reasons cause a delay in the process? Much like when candidates experience delays in the hiring process, hiring companies will experience that from time to time as well. Most often, it can come down to slightly off-centre expectations around the candidate’s ability to respond as immediately as the company might like. It’s important to remember that searching for a job and interviewing is something most candidates need to fit in on top of everything else they’re fitting into their day, including working full time. So sometimes finding a time they can interview is going to take an extra moment. If an offer has gone out, it's also important not to necessarily expect a same-day response. Particularly in today’s candidate-driven market, they might be weighing up more than just one offer, or are waiting for or wanting written confirmation of the offer instead of just the verbal one before they go ahead and prepare to quit their current job. In the instance that you’re unsure, we always recommend checking in with your recruiter and finding out if there’s anything on your end you need to share, send through or tidy up to help the process.

4.??????Do recruiters inflate the salary expectations to clients in order to get a higher fee? The short answer is no. Any good recruiter at least will definitely avoid pricing their candidate out of the job, which can happen if they were attempting to inflate the salary. Recruiters, however, are also the people in the position of most realistically knowing the market in terms of what kinds of roles are demanding what kind of salary, so will be in a position to let you know what you can expect – just as they will be doing with a candidate too. And that includes letting a candidate know when they might have their sights set on a number that is a little high for the role or their experience. A recruiter who is trying to do their job well is someone who is trying to help both parties get what they want out of the agreement, and if it’s regarding salary, it will be based on current market standards, prior experience and qualifications, and what works – for both.

There are a lot of misconceptions out there around what the standard is of working with a recruiter to help you build your team. While sometimes unfortunately that perception can come from direct experience, hopefully this helps to give you an idea of the standard you can expect of teaming up with the right recruiter for you.

We’ve got a whole podcast episode on this topic that you can listen to here on the 2 Recruiters 1 Mic podcast!

Source Junction is a part of the Talent United group of companies.