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The recruitment industry is either seen as an evil necessity or at worst loathed by both applicants and

HR Managers alike

The following list derives from a reaction to an article written by firefish software of why the recruitment

industry has earned itself such a despicable image.

1. Candidates have to tailor CVs to adverts without knowing the end client. This wastes time as

the candidate has to tailor the CV to a job that they may or may not be interested in.

2. Recruiters claim they have a relationship with the client but don't. Normally that would be

called a lie.

3. Recruiters cannot see beyond a few keywords on the CV.

4. Recruiters get people in for interviews in order to build the relationship for future business-

Waste of candidate’s time.

5. Recruiters place fake adverts to gather CVs.

6. Recruiters use high pressure sales to try and get you to accept the job

7. Recruiters are obsessed about taking people from one competitor to a company to another.

They cannot see the broader CV or person.

8. Generally recruiters are a gatekeeper rather than an enabler.

9. Recruiters use simplistic filters to screen CVs. A 2.2 from the local polytechnic is not the same

as a 2.2 from Cambridge Uni.

10. Recruiters have created so much advertising noise that nobody knows what a real job is or

not.

Why do many of these problems arise? We believe that this is whittled down to 2 facts.

1. Recruitment is not an industry one studies to get into. I will never forget during my interview

for my first position in the recruitment industry with Computer Futures in London, my boss told

me that everyone in the business, just slips into it. No one aims to get into recruitment. This

means that many consultants, especially in niche areas, do not have the understanding of the

technology and processes behind the position they are working on.

2. Many of the larger recruitment firms have serious problems in their management structures.

Especially Anglo/American recruitment companies operating in Europe treat niche recruitment

as a commodity business. There is a serious amount of pressure put on the individual

consultants to perform. The consultant is constantly asked how many CVs he or she has sent

out, how many interviews have been set up etc.

Many recruitment companies hire their managers based on success and not on whether they are able

to manage teams or not. This leads to the fact that the recruitment industry has become an

environment of micro management and is years behind understanding that long term profitability can

only be gathered when Management trusts its employees and sells by strategy rather than numbers.

This leads to the following problems.

1. The recruiter does not have time to spend with the candidates; recruitment loses all aspects of

being a “people business”

2. CVs are sent to numerous companies at one time without the consent of the applicant, hence

breaking any form of data protection laws

3. The qualification of the candidate and preparation to interviews is poor

4. Consultants lie to the candidates to gain more leads for possible deals in order to hit their

targets.

5. Those who have problems performing are mobbed. In some cases the recruiter does not

receive the same tools to do the job as those who are successful. There is no help given to

solve the problem just more stress caused by micro-management and scare tactics

6. Managers openly speak about their employees in front of other employees, to create fear

among the rest of the team.

In few industries is the fluctuation as high as in the recruitment industry. This is a homemade problem,

which can be solved if more focus would be given to put people into management who can motivate

their staff, who have a clear strategy how to build up the market and retain their employees. Many

recruitment consultancies boast how they help companies with their employee lifecycle processes;

however there is no sign of best practice HR / Management within their own 4 walls.

We believe that it is time to set standards in the industry, standards for management and HR

processes and standards for the recruitment practice itself.

In the coming months we plan on setting out a plan as how this could look and are interested to get

feedback from other recruiters as to their experiences and how they think that the recruitment industry

can become more human again.

Author: Andrew Lawrence

Manager – ORSON Consulting