Recruitment Agencies - Is there an alternative?

[robertsmith]

I am working for a new start-up looking to help job seekers and recruiters by exploiting new technologies and cutting out the middleman, saving money and time.

I would be very grateful on any advice you could give on how the recruitment process could be simplified and what you believe are the main pain points as both a job seeker or recruiter within the industry at the moment.

Regards,

Robert

[LondonManc]

If you're looking purely at a contractor to client relationship, the key issues are:

For a client, sifting cvs, getting bombarded by 1001 agencies all trying to get their foot in the door, etc.
For a candidate, getting lucky with the cv sifting, getting a contract and terms that you're happy with, getting paid in anything like a realistic timeframe (I've done B2B and you've got to be prepared to wait up to 90 days for your money). Contractors want as little of their money at risk as possible (i.e. paid weekly ideally) and agencies facilitate that process.

What's your beef with recruitment agencies in this particular case?

[sal]

The bare bone recruitment process is simple enough and works fine:

- You apply for a role
- Agent calls you for a chat, asks for right to represent etc. and forwards your application to the client
- Client reviews the application and eventually instructs the agent to call you and schedule an interview
- You attend the interview
- If the interview was successful you get an offer and some paper work
- you sign the paper work
- you start working

The devil is in the details - All bogus calls, 2 references, fishing, false ads, rate cutting, lying through their teeth, data gathering etc. nonsense that is annoying and it varies from agency to agency.

[Lance]

I am working for a new start-up looking to help job seekers and recruiters by exploiting new technologies and cutting out the middleman, saving money and time.

Sounds like you want to become the middle man rather than cut him out. You are expecting to charge sonme sort of fee I presume for matching candidates with clients?

What can you offer that an agency cannot? Experience certainly isn't it.

Forgive my skepticism but it sounds like your startup wants to be an agency and hasn't worked out it's USP yet.

[FrontEnder]

Stick to writing Goth-pop songs mate.

[Freud]

Here are my thoughts on this based on many years as a permie hiring contractors (and other permies) as well as an independent consultant.

As a manager, I don't want to, have the inclination to, or the time to wade through hundreds of CVs, I just want the best person for the role.

I draw up the role and pass it on to a couple of agencies, usually ones where I know the agents and they know me, or a from a roster of preferred agencies the company's HR department has negotiated preferential rates with. I explain what I want and I only want to see the CVs from the best 5 candidates they have.

If they are a good agency, the 5 CVs will hit the spot. If they are not very good, I probably won't use that agent/agency again. I find that the likelihood of getting the right CVs is better if the agent knows me and my expectations. Often, they will offer advice, even a few times where they said they didn't have access to the right people, in which case I would use another agency.

On the other side, as an independent consultant/contractor, a good agent will know your strengths and will put you forward for the right jobs. It is in their interest to get the right person in front of their client in order to secure the contract. This is potentially the reason they may do a bit of CV farming as they want to be able to access the best candidates in the future, even if they don't have a role today. The methods some agents use to do this may not be the most ethical which gives them a bad name.

Also, I would get cold called from agents asking if I had any roles to fill. They would get a very short conversation, usually handing them off to HR to deal with.

Getting back to the OPs original question, LinkedIn has already started to fulfil some of the criteria you speak of.

It allows HR departments to go direct to candidates. Not only to advertise but they have a specific membership that allows them to search the whole of LinkedIn based on search criteria to 'head hunt' appropriate candidates.

It does seem that most use LinkedIn for permie roles but I guess there is no reason they could not use it for Contractors other than the larger companies will put contractors through an agency for billing and admin anyway, so may not see the value of using their time to advertise and search for contractors on LinkedIn.

You should really be asking the recruiters if there is a need for such a system as there is no point in contractors registering their details if no recruiters use it.

[quackhandle]

You can try looking at companies local to you, see what vacancies* they have then contact the HR bod on linkedin. Bare in mind that they are normally looking for permies and not contract/freelance so trying to convince them is mostly a waste of time, but I've had a few take my CV and it builds my network up.

*NB: This is also an agency trick they claim they have a role but have just spotted a vacancy on a client website they will then take your CV (+ many others) and pester the HR people with it. I asked one pimp for a spec and he simply copy & pasted it from the site including the URL so I could have a look myself at this permy role, that stated at the bottom NO REC AGENCIES!

Tons of threads on here about going direct, it is very hard to do.

qh

[billybiro]

As a manager, I don't want to, have the inclination to, or the time to wade through hundreds of CVs, I just want the best person for the role.

Then I have no idea why you'd use any recruitment agency at all since they don't know the first thing about the any of the technology for the roles they're recruiting for. Hence we get roles advertised for "JAVER Developers" and "ESS QUEUE ELL administrators" so they're certainly in no position to be able to effectively evaluate the fit of any of the candidates that they may forward to you.

On the other side, as an independent consultant/contractor, a good agent will know your strengths and will put you forward for the right jobs. It is in their interest to get the right person in front of their client in order to secure the contract. This is potentially the reason they may do a bit of CV farming as they want to be able to access the best candidates in the future, even if they don't have a role today. The methods some agents use to do this may not be the most ethical which gives them a bad name.

In my experience, the only business model used by any and all agencies is the "throw enough mud and some will eventually stick" and therefore there's no requirement to be more discerning to either their clients or their contractors.

[MrMarkyMark]

Then I have no idea why you'd use any recruitment agency at all since they don't know the first thing about the any of the technology for the roles they're recruiting for. Hence we get roles advertised for "JAVER Developers" and "ESS QUEUE ELL administrators" so they're certainly in no position to be able to effectively evaluate the fit of any of the candidates that they may forward to you.



In my experience, the only business model used by any and all agencies is the "throw enough mud and some will eventually stick" and therefore there's no requirement to be more discerning to either their clients or their contractors.

Also true in my experience, but do have a couple of exceptions to that rule.

[Freud]

Then I have no idea why you'd use any recruitment agency at all since they don't know the first thing about the any of the technology for the roles they're recruiting for. Hence we get roles advertised for "JAVER Developers" and "ESS QUEUE ELL administrators" so they're certainly in no position to be able to effectively evaluate the fit of any of the candidates that they may forward to you.

I think that is a little unfair.

Don't get me wrong, there are many agents/agencies who don't have a clue but I have worked with a few agents that did know their tech and know exactly the type of candidates that have the right skills, attitude and experience.