A Recruitment Consultant's perspective

wimblewomble_2

teffers wrote: »

Agencies exist to do one thing: Generate income by introducing a new layer of profit obtained from reducing the money the person actually doing the work gets paid.

Recruiters are little more than sales people, the people working for them are their product.

My point of view is derived from 10 years of having to work for them.

Having been on the contractor side, and now the recruiter, I can see both sides.
Temps get paid weekly, while the invoice the agency sends, wont get paid for 30 days. So, there is a lot of money churning out there, but no-one gets to play with it.

I am working with a couple of people to introduce a new model, gleaned from experience on both sides. (only for IT contractors though)

Are we sales people? Yes.
Do we take a cut for other people doing the work?
Well, yes. But only because the client company doesnt want the hassle of employing you directly, and doesnt want the admin overhead of managing you.

PS: recruiters exist because companies simply cant be bothered, usually, to do the sifting of CVs in-house.

CCFC_80

My experience of using recruitment agencies has been nothing but bad particularly with the usual High street brigade of Brook street,Pertemps, Manpower,Office Angels,Best connection etc,etc

Without wishing to tar them all with the same brush, I have found from experience, many of the consultants to be liars, deceitful and downright arrogant.

Southernman

I got my current job through an agency (ManPower). The company took me on as permanent staff after five months and i haven't looked back!

I'd only finished uni as a graduate the week before!

I'd like to thank the Irish man who recruited me

marybelle01

Marie88 wrote: »

So to sum it up, from most people's experiences as well as my own, when dealing with recruitment agencies they fail on the following three factors. Firstly, poor customer service when discussing a job or sending a CV on to the employment, where you never hear back from them. Secondly, people apply and get interviews, and then hear nothing back from them. Thirdly, they can't even read CVs. So really, I wonder why they must be so busy, if they can't even do these basic elements of the job and provide an effective service in any of those three areas. Maybe the people doing these recruitment jobs aren't skilled people, and shouldn't be doing a job in recruiting as they don't have the ability. Maybe they are too lazy, or maybe they just have poor ethics and morals. I guess all three may apply for most of them.

Sorry I can't agree. Maybe this is the experience of high street agencies dealing with loads of applicants. It isn't my experience of agencies. The longest period I have been out of work involuntarily is two days. But I am under no illusions - ethics and morals have nothing to do with anything. Making a profit does. My agemcies can provide a superior service, It has nothing to do with morals or ethics. It has everything to do with what makes them a profit. Which is fair enough, because unless you are only willing to work for an ethical company, the only reason they will employ you is for a profit. High Street agencies are the "value brand" - high volume, high turnover, low profit end of the sector. Like any other business, you get what you "pay for".

ktothema

I recently took a phone call from an agency worker who was trying to put me forward for a £250 a day role. Not saying I wouldn't have liked that but I've never earned anything near that before. He kept going on about how perfect I'd be with my contracts management and bid writing experience. I listened stunned for a few minutes as I thought he must have the wrong cv before remembering that he was describing a job I undertook over 10yrs ago. The guy was shocked and embarrassed when I told him to look properly at my cv and the dates.

SueC_2

wimblewomble wrote: »

Are we sales people? Yes.

But how can you sell a product you know nothing about?

SueC_2

marybelle01 wrote: »

Sorry I can't agree. Maybe this is the experience of high street agencies dealing with loads of applicants. It isn't my experience of agencies. The longest period I have been out of work involuntarily is two days. But I am under no illusions - ethics and morals have nothing to do with anything. Making a profit does. My agemcies can provide a superior service, It has nothing to do with morals or ethics. It has everything to do with what makes them a profit. Which is fair enough, because unless you are only willing to work for an ethical company, the only reason they will employ you is for a profit. High Street agencies are the "value brand" - high volume, high turnover, low profit end of the sector. Like any other business, you get what you "pay for".

Unfortunately I don't think the problem is restricted to the low end High Street agencies any more. They're certainly not the ones I'm trying to deal with anyway.

I'm not doubting that there are good agencies out there, and clearly you have long-standing relationships that have stood you in good stead. However, I suggest it might be a bit different if you were starting out today to try to establish those relationships. Really, it's a very very different story to the one a few years ago - even at senior level.

SueC_2

ktothema wrote: »

I recently took a phone call from an agency worker who was trying to put me forward for a £250 a day role. Not saying I wouldn't have liked that but I've never earned anything near that before. He kept going on about how perfect I'd be with my contracts management and bid writing experience. I listened stunned for a few minutes as I thought he must have the wrong cv before remembering that he was describing a job I undertook over 10yrs ago. The guy was shocked and embarrassed when I told him to look properly at my cv and the dates.

Think yourself lucky... the approach I mentioned earlier in this thread was to see if I'd be interested in a role I have NO relevant experience for, even 10 years ago, and paying a third of what I currently earn.

Still, computer says "Yes" and therefore I must be a good fit.

Loanranger

A great many companies circumvent agencies and continue to advertise on the company's own website.
Jobseekers should always look at a firm's website. It's pure laziness to rely on agencies.

Wellery82

Regarding the automated e-mails people get, these are a way agencies can contact literally hundreds of people in a minute. A quick e-mail, and then the potential of someone expressing interest who may be suitable, can be a good use of 10 minutes of their time. It can be argued that it may annoy potential candidates, and this is something the agency will have to weigh up. I tried it a few times when I was in recruitment as we had the software to do this, and every time I had negativity, but it also helped me find someone a job I would never have otherwise found a job for.

I never once in my years in agency work saw CVs filtered on the basis of CV words, although I appreciate other say this happens. In my own opinion, given you can skim a CV in a matter of seconds, it isn’t the best way to approach this. That said if you are looking for a “Design Manager” and the word design doesn’t appear on a CV maybe it is a quick way of filtering down the applications

Many people say consultants are poor at their job, and often that can be the case. I guarantee however if so they will not last a year at the company. My experience was of witnessing a sacking at least once a month over a number of years, and many more resignations, simply as people could not generate enough profit. It is not an easy job though by any means, and the lucrative offerings demonstrate that. Recruitment is an easy industry to get into – if you ring any agency now and convince them you will generate profit they will take you on. It isn’t an easy industry to be successful in however