Are you considering a career in recruitment? Perhaps you are new to recruitment, and you’re wondering what you can do to improve your business development, networking, or billings and placement numbers.
The main objective for recruiters is to provide both candidates and clients with the best possible service. Understanding this, and knowing what these practices look like will help you enjoy a long, lucrative, and esteemed recruitment career.
Here are our top tips to help you become the best recruiter you can be.
Create trust.
Building trust is critical to the recruitment relationship. This is true no matter which side of the conversation you are having. Candidates are putting their careers in your hands. You need to demonstrate that you are worthy of this.
By actively listening to their requirements and concerns you will become a valuable and trusted part of their career. As a recruiter, you’re also in the best place to advise and guide. Immersed in the sector as well as the wider jobs market, you are in the position to offer a relevant and informed opinion.
Clients need to know that you are invested in their organisation. By sticking to deadlines and delivering candidates that offer true potential, you will prove that you have the best interest of the organisation at heart.
Your aim should never just be to “make a deal”. You should be invested in each organisation that you represent. You should be driven to understand what they need from the role and more widely, the culture of the business.
Be authentic.
Being yourself is critical in building transparent and honest working relationships. Candidates and clients can spot inauthenticity and it’ll be a real barrier to your professional relationship. In many cases, you won’t even get a foot in the door.
When you are in resourcing mode or reaching out to new clients, it’s easy to become robotic in your approach. You should always try to maintain a unique and tailored approach to every call you make.
Support and coach.
This tip refers most specifically to your candidate relationships. There aren’t many people that enjoy the job seeking or interview process. Nerves, rejection, and making tricky decisions are just a few concerns job seekers may have.
If you’ve been able to create trusting relationships, it’s likely your candidates will turn to you in their more insecure moments. At these points, you will need to be a coach and steer them through the process with empathy, understanding, and objective advice.
Need more advice on candidate expectations? Read our blog about what candidates expect from the hiring process.
Be consistent and reliable.
Do what you say you’re going to. If you say you’ll call, call. Check-in at each stage and make sure your candidates or clients are happy with your service and that you’re meeting their expectations. If you are busy and know there’s a risk you’ll miss a deadline, you may like to set an alarm or a calendar reminder to jog your memory.
And if you do forget…be authentic and honest. Own the mistake and apologise. We’re all human and make errors, but trying to cover it up will affect your credibility and affect the rapport you’ve created.
Use social media.
Current estimations cite that 75% of hires aren’t actively looking for new jobs. This is why social media has become a recruitment platform of choice. This method can reach and attract ‘browsers’ who didn’t know they were looking until it became an alternate option.
If you have a marketing department in your agency, ask how you can use their skills and company platforms to push out your roles. Use your own personal LinkedIn account to engage with candidates. As a starting point, join groups, comment on, like, and share posts, and go from there.
Networking.
Networking is critical in recruitment. Not only will it help you engage with candidates and clients it will enable you to further your own career. Endorsements and recommendations speak volumes within our industry. Recruitment and recruiters haven’t always enjoyed the reputation that good recruitment deserves. A LinkedIn profile that has professional endorsements is a good marketing tool that loudly speaks to your abilities.
Improvement and self-assessment.
Yes, your billings speak of your ability as a recruiter but that shouldn’t be your only metric. Your intention should be to continuously improve, and to do this you need to look at your own performance and commit to being better.
Work smarter, not harder.
When you are being measured on the volume of calls you are making to either candidates or clients, it’s tempting to go for quantity over quality.
It’s all well and good to make masses of calls, but if those calls are ‘blind’ then it’s unlikely your efforts will be fruitful.
Be strategic, and informed, and do your research. This way you’ll come across as knowledgeable and an “expert” in the area you are targeting. You’ll legitimise your professionalism and expertise. Candidates and clients will remember you as setting yourself apart and even if you get turned down, it’s more likely to be a ‘no for now’, rather than a flat ‘no’.
This is particularly important if you are working in a particular sector. Here at Ignite Digital Search, we are tech, digital, and data recruitment specialists. Hiring managers are not always tech experts. Our experience and efforts to become experts in the sectors we represent permit us to advise clients about the skills their talent will need, as well as the expectations of those candidates.
Be aware of current trends.
As a recruitment consultant, it’s important to be up to date with current recruitment trends and practices. This way you’ll be familiar with the market and be aware of candidate concerns and requirements. A great place to start is our monthly update on The Recruitment Landscape.
This monthly blog includes the most up to date of recruitment trends in the UK. We look at vacancies, placements, candidate availability, and salary. It gives you a broader picture of the jobs market from across the UK straight from the mouths of those on the front line.
Are you a recruitment consultant with a proven history of success placing tech, digital, or data talent? We are always eager to talk to consultants who are looking for new opportunities and new challenges. If you would like to join our esteemed fee earners we’d love to talk with you about our latest recruitment consultant opportunities.
Fill out our Join the Team contact form here.