FourthLine consultant James Carter takes a look at the benefits to a client when working exclusively with a specialist recruitment agency.
Exclusivity is something all recruiters look for when working on a role, especially roles in London at a senior level, as this gives them a better chance of successfully placing a candidate in the role. But how does exclusivity benefit both the client and the candidate?
As a client, the main goal when hiring is to find strong candidates and ensure a quick and efficient process. On paper, releasing the role to multiple agencies should yield a better result... the more recruiters working on the role the better, right? In actual fact, releasing a role to multiple agencies is highly unlikely to result in a successful hire. Most recruiters will likely be working on multiple roles and will dedicate their time to those roles that they are more likely to place. The amount of competition is one of the main factors considered when deciding where to prioritise a role. As a hiring manager, would you rather have five recruiters dedicating 5% of their time over a two-week period or one recruiter dedicating 100% of their time over 3 to 5 days?
Exclusivity prevents a role becoming less attractive. If candidates are being approached by multiple recruiters for one role, this may look like the client is desperate and may become less attractive to candidates. I have worked on roles in the past where candidates who match the requirements are not interested as they have seen the role advertised by multiple recruiters and believe that the client is struggling to fill the role for one reason or another.
One of the reasons why a firm may decide to release a role to an agency is because they haven’t got the time to dedicate to sourcing candidates, reviewing CV’s and qualifying them against the role. Working with one recruiter will ensure you get a shortlist of 3-5 candidates who should match the requirements and are interested in the role.
If the hiring manager dedicates 10 minutes to review a CV, this would amount to between 30-50 minutes to review each candidate before progressing to interview. On the other hand, if five recruiters are each sending 3-5 candidates, hiring managers will either have to reduce the time they dedicate to reviewing a CV, or set aside 2.5 – 4 hours reviewing CVs, many of which are unlikely to be progressed to interview.
When partnering with a recruiter on a vacancy, it is important to understand that they will be representing you and your business, and how they liaise with candidates will be the key to how successful the hiring process is. If you are engaging multiple recruiters on a vacancy, you want to be sure that they are able to represent your business in the right way and will have a strong enough knowledge of the role and the market. A candidate’s experience with one recruiter may be very different to their experience with another.
Exclusivity isn’t just something clients should consider, but candidates too. If you are actively looking for a new role, take the time to talk with a recruiter who is a specialist in your field and gain an understanding of how they will represent you when speaking to clients, how they represent you will be key to securing the right role.
The next time you are either recruiting for a role, or looking for a new position, offer a recruiter exclusivity and see how quick and efficient the hiring process is.
