Why should companies use recruiters?

1.    Access to candidates

First and foremost, the reason for using recruiters is to open up the pool of talent, right? Agency recruiters over time gain a vast network and database within their specialty and so have access to candidates that your business does not. Not only access but a way in, through a previous interaction, or through their brand recognition.

Often the best candidates are not looking and are instead being approached so much they don’t need to look at job ads online, therefore you could be missing out on accessing a majority of your “ideal candidates”.

2.    Save time

Ever heard the phrase ‘Time kills deals’? Well, the same applies when finding and securing a great candidate – time is so important in keeping candidates engaged and interested in the process. Recruiters can streamline the process, keep everyone informed, and give a nudge to both sides when needed – meaning your less likely to miss out due to another offer, or candidates losing faith in the process.

Also most companies cannot afford to have a job open for too long before it starts to hinder the success of the business. We know too well that this adds stress to those employees who are taking on additional responsibilities once companies scramble to cover workloads. It can take countless hours and weeks for internal recruiters to source job boards, review resumes from online job submissions, contact the applicants, pre-screen, and set up job interviews. And, don’t forget the difficult task of meeting hiring managers schedules!

When companies outsource the hiring to recruiting firms, the entire process gets handled by the firms, which allows employees to focus on operating the business. Recruiting firms are always building candidate pipelines who are thoroughly vetted and immediately available for consideration. This reduces the time-to-hire from weeks to days, without compromising on quality.

3.    Industry Expertise

Most recruiting firms specialise or focus in their industry niche, so they already will have a pool of highly skilled/relevant candidates for you. Employees and internal recruiters are routinely asked to fill positions across various departments which is time-consuming and can be overwhelming. Recruitment agencies bring expertise for hard to fill positions, something that internal recruiters may not be able to dedicate to, because of time or technical ability. 

The candidate market always evolving and so recruiters are able to keep you informed of new trends and highlight ways to get ahead of the curve.

4.    Salary benchmarking

Salaries and hourly rates are constantly changing, making it difficult for employers to stay on top of market standards. Working with recruiting firms makes this easy. Firms often do their own local market benchmarking and will publish their own salary guides. When employers know the current rates for the positions they want to hire, they are better prepared as they enter approvals, all the way to offer negotiations.

5.    Strategy

Recruitment agencies can work with you flexibly on finding the right hiring strategy, do you want to focus on one hire at a time, or do you need multiple hires across the business by X date, recruiters can get you quality and quantity and often have different departments within their firm which can help across the different hires in the business.

The recruitment agency will take over the whole process of hiring from sourcing, candidate identification, vetting and screening, interview process and management, references, and offer negotiations, allowing your business to focus on the bigger picture.

6.    Reduce turnover and save money

High turnover rates are very costly for companies and can be difficult to quantify. Studies have proven costs can range from £15,000 to £50,000 or more! Companies incur sudden costs during talent acquisition and onboarding, which can include weeks of orientation, training, and ramp-up time to learn the key aspects of the role. When companies make a poor hire, they lose money on time and resources spent, not to mention, a replacement. Turnover creates less productivity and directly affects morale for the employees invested in the training and development process. For these reasons, it is critical to find the right hire the first time around. Recruiting firms provide a helpful, thorough hiring process, which includes technical, intangible and cultural vetting, comprehensive background checks, and not to mention, helping clients reduce time to fill.

7.    Flexible partnerships to suit the business

The most popular ways recruitment agencies partner with clients is on a contingency basis, this is means that the company only pay the recruiter if they make a successful introduction which leads to a hire, with a pre-agreed percentage of the candidates salary paid to the recruiter. The benefits of this are of course that there is no risk, and you only pay on results. This is usually preferable when doing more AdHoc hiring.

The other popular route is via an RPO (Recruitment process outsourcing) which involves an employer turning the responsibility of finding potential job candidates over to a third-party service provider. Typically, this involves a guaranteed monthly payment to the agency and often a small fee per hire, which if doing a large recruitment drive may be more cost effective than the contingency option.

CONCLUSION;

Paying a recruiting fee holds immediate and long term value and a positive return on investment. Companies should learn to understand that the value and service performed by recruiting firms will save internal employees time and effort. When you factor in the ability to creatively access top quality talent, save time and cost, and have access to flexible hiring options, the value in working with recruiting firms is immeasurable.

Laetitia Gibbs - Senior Recruitment Consultant - Adaptive Tech UK

If you are looking to hire SaaS salespeople and need advice give me a call on +44 208 1449570 or email me on laetitia.gibbs@adaptivetech.io