Third-Party Recruiting: Expense or Investment?

Don’t be Penny Wise and Pound Foolish in Your Recruiting Efforts

An interesting trend is emerging in the Twin Cities employment market right now. With the economy improving and with companies consequently loosening their purse strings,  a number of businesses are now choosing to staff up their internal recruiting teams.

On first blush, this sounds like a great thing. After all, companies are hiring again. Recruiting is happening. The employment market is moving forward. Companies think that building a robust internal recruiting team will save thousands of dollars in third-party search fees.

But, wait just a minute. Just because internal recruiting is ramping up and finding candidates doesn’t mean these searches are netting the right candidates. 

South Carolina-based recruiter Frank Risalvato talks about this very phenomenon in his recently released recruiting handbook, A Manager’s Guide to Maximizing Search Firm Success. Many companies make a huge mistake, he says, by viewing third-party recruiting as an expense rather than an investment. As a result, this leads companies to take shortcuts, to seek out the least expensive methods of recruiting. Unfortunately, these shortcuts can also lead companies to come up empty-handed.

I’ve experienced this phenomenon in my own practice—probably more times than I can count. Recently, for example, I was contacted by a mid-sized company to help with a senior-level search that had gone on for months and months. The company, hoping to save a few dollars, had gone about the recruiting and hiring process using internal resources and job postings. After significant time and energy, they found an active candidate and offered her the job—only to learn that she had accepted an offer from another company. The upshot? After all that time, energy, expense and effort, the “big fish got away.” By the time the hiring company contacted me, they were exhausted and weary. They were under extraordinary pressure to fill such a critical role, and they had come up empty-handed. If the internal recruiter had spent more time developing a relationship with the candidate and keeping in close contact during the lengthy interview process, they might have known about the competing job offer before she was off the market. But…that takes time, and internal recruiters are busy with tens and even hundreds of job requisitions. Fortunately, I was plugged into that market and recruited a top-notch working candidate in a month. If they had contacted me from the beginning, they probably would have saved more money than they paid in a search fee. Not to mention the aggravation and lost productivity. Again, expense or investment?

Rather than think of recruiting as an expense, think of it as an investment, argues Risalvato. You get what you pay for. When you invest in working with an executive recruiter on a retained search, your investment will buy you a lot of value, including:

A network of candidates larger than the eye can see.
Networking is what retained search recruiters do. Unlike internal recruiters who typically are desk-bound all day, we spend our professional lives “out there,” meeting people, discerning their skills and interests, and making connections. (One of the reasons my logo depicts “running Marni” is because much of my time is spent meeting, meeting, meeting people—in their offices, at coffee shops, at networking events, through social networking, at parties and social functions.) I’m a ‘talent scout’ for my client companies!

Serving as your “soldiers” in the war to attract top talent.
There is a huge misperception among businesses that there are “lots of good people out there.” While it’s true that it’s still somewhat an employer’s market for unskilled and entry-level positions, it’s also true that top-performing talent is hard to find. These are the people who are consistently snapped up immediately. They most likely not out there actively seeking employment right now. An experienced executive recruiter can help you find those high-caliber executives who are currently employed elsewhere, are not actively looking and may not even be as much as a “blip” on your radar screen.

Selling your company to the right candidate.
Remember the story about the company that lost their top candidate when she accepted another offer? Working with an executive recruiter can help you avoid this embarrassing and frustrating situation. That’s because we are the ambassadors and salespeople for your company. We “sell” candidates on the benefits of joining your company. We stick with them through the entire interview process until the hire has been made and even during the weeks leading up to the candidate’s first day on the job. We help them get—and stay—excited about working for your company, and we stay in touch during the first few months to make sure things are going well.  

Contact Hockenberg Search today if you are frustrated with finding the right hire! I can show you the value you’ll receive when you invest in your recruiting efforts through the benefit of a retained search.