The business landscape is competitive and companies continue to increasingly look for external recruiters to fill vacant positions. Going by the benefits of RPO, it’s easy to see why this is the case (Linq HR, 2021).
If you’re thinking of hiring an external recruiter to fill any of your open positions, then you should shortlist a number of them and evaluate their ability to recruit the kind of talents you need.
What to Look For When Hiring an External Recruiter
Choosing the right external recruiter comes down to a number of considerations. Here are 7 things you should check to determine their suitability.
1. Recruiting Experience
How long has the recruiter been in business? What experience and depth do the founders and their recruiting staff have?
Generally speaking, the more experienced a recruiter is, the more chance they have in delivering. The number of years alone is however not enough to make the right choice.
2. Success Rate
One of the strongest indicators of a recruiter’s ability to recruit the right talent is their previous success.
Success in recruiting can be assessed by analysing metrics such as time-to-hire, conversion rates, first year attrition rates, hiring manager satisfaction and candidate job satisfaction.
3. Recruiter Specialisation
In today’s competitive talent marketplace, your company's best choice may be to hire a specialist recruiter.
As an expert in their field, they understand the skills required, are up to date with trends and shifts in the market, and know what skills to test for during interviews. They are likely to operate deep rather than wide and know many candidates in their specialist field.
4. Recruitment Process
Your recruiter should be comfortable telling you where they source their candidates, how they identify the right talents, and how they interview them such as using a certified competency based interview approach.
Just ask why you should choose them and listen to their answer. You’ll be able to determine whether they can hire the skilled talent your business needs.
Selecting a recruiter who can identify candidates that don't necessarily fit the traditional brief perfectly but they know can be effective, will not only constructively challenge the brief but also bring the widest diversity for consideration.
5. Recruitment Process Ownership
The right recruiter may be the one who understands your needs and takes full ownership of the recruitment process and its results. They have built their candidate pools, perfected the use of their sourcing channels, constantly improve their processes for efficiency, and keep all parties updated.
6. Adaptability
Since candidate expectations influence recruitment, you should consider working with a recruiter who can adapt accordingly.
38% of candidates have accepted job offers because of a positive candidate experience (PageUp, 2019). To get the right hires faster, partner with a recruiter who can create great candidate experiences.
7. Do They Provide a Guarantee and Offer Value?
Ask your recruiter how they deal with a situation where the hire they provided isn’t up to the task or isn’t a good culture fit.
With bad hiring decisions resulting in up to 80% of employee turnover, the recruiter should have a solution to cover you in such a situation (Panalyt, 2020).
External recruiters mostly charge a percentage of starting remuneration so ensure the cost of using an external recruiter represents value compared to hiring from the market directly yourself, or against the loss of not having the role properly filled in time.
Conclusion
Since HR vendors have to be comprehensively evaluated, Linq HR is always at hand to help. Besides recruiter effectiveness there are commercial items such as budgets to consider.
We’ll assess your HR needs, recommend the vendors who are qualified to meet those needs, then allow you to make the hiring decision.
References
Linq HR (2021) Top Five Reasons to Use a Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) Provider. Available at: https://www.linqhr.com/blogs/post/top-five-reasons-to-use-a-recruitment-process-outsourcing-rpo-provider [Accessed 24 May 2021].
PageUp (2019) 7 Recruitment Trends for 2020. Available at: https://www.pageuppeople.com/resource/7-recruitment-trends-for-2020/ [Accessed 24 May 2021].
Panalyt (2020) Employee Turnover in Asia: How People Analytics Can Help You Turn the Tide. Available at: https://www.panalyt.com/post/turnover-asia-people-analytics [Accessed 24 May 2021].
