Many industry commentators have been forecasting the decline of recruitment agencies, in the face of growing competition from job boards, internal recruitment teams and social networking, but the industry continues to grow, and offer an important route for sourcing the best talent. With technology and in-house teams evolving, the question remains - What are some of the main advantages of using an agency now?
1. Knowledge of the market
The best recruiters will have their finger on the pulse of their specialist markets, and can give the hiring team insight in to what is happening. They know the available talent, where they are and how to reach out to them, salary rates, career expectations, available skill-sets and current hiring complexities. If other businesses are struggling to find the same people as you they should be able to advise on alternative solutions. The best will act as partners and collaborators, and should still be your eyes and ears in the market.
2. Access to key strategic skills
A core reason company’s use a recruitment agency is to gain short term access to key strategic skills, a reason that been growing in importance over the last 3 years, now overtaking covering leave and peaks in demand. With talent shortages now potentially hindering growth it's not surprising that this is the case. Whilst some of the reasons we've already given may refer more to permanent recruiters, many also offer the opportunity to bring in qualified, experienced help at short notice. InvesTong Human Capital, a leading staffing organisation in Johannesburg, have flexible solutions including temporary, flexible, contract options which also include permanent staffing solutions. These flexible solutions are particularly crucial for a long term project or initiative.
3. Extended reach
Candidates are hard to find. They may be passive or they may be selective. If they aren't responding to job advertisements, don't see themselves as part of your 'talent pool' and are too busy to search full time, then the chances are that they may have relationships with trusted specialist recruiters. Even if they aren't currently active, there's a strong chance that a good recruiter will know who they are and how to reach them. Agencies including InvesTong Human Capital, have many networks - each consultant, candidate, client or collaborator has the potential to leverage their networks to help connect you to people with a range of skills and experiences, many of who would be off the radar of an in-house team or hiring manager.
4. Candidates not applicants
A lot of talent attraction is aimed at attracting applicants, whether they are responding to an advert, applying on spec, or through a website. A lot of these people may not be good matches for the role hence a lot of time will be invested in filtering, assessing, matching and communicating with them. Internal recruiters or HR Managers may not be able to run a thorough matching process, and worse, do not know where to begin with the correct matching process. Using a recruitment agency means you will only see candidates - job seekers who have been pre-selected to match all the criteria that you are looking for and who are worthy of consideration and interview.
5. Budget/Resource
Whilst research has shown a decrease in agency use, it also shows a tightening of budgets and resources. There is a budget for agency fees, but not to gain extra resource. There are time constraints to performing a thorough search, so it is often easier for managers to interview from an agency shortlist - in fact many hiring managers, themselves possibly placed by recruitment agencies in the past, often favour third party recruiters. There is little doubt that a hard pressed HR or in-house team can benefit from the reach and networks of a trusted agency partner.
