As lessors struggle between the internet and recruitment
agencies for new staff, the creation of staff bonuses to reward
existing employees who introduce new colleagues might be the way
forward.
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As in discussion of training investments versus financial
incentives in acquiring experienced staff, companies must strike a
compromise in recruitment channels between cost cutting and making
efficient staff appointments.
This compromise is most visible in discussing online
recruitment, the lowest cost recruitment method. Despite advantages
in frugality, only six companies surveyed reported using online
recruitment, and only two stated it as first preference
Such low enthusiasm suggests that the burdens associated with
online recruitment may outweigh benefits. “The disadvantage of
these methods for employers is the ‘panning’ through mass
applications that becomes the responsibility of HR departments,”
said Colin Manning of Manning Solutions. “Loss of efficiency must
be balanced carefully with lower cost – the compromise is a
difficult one to make.”
Given the importance of back office optimisation, it is
obviously not desirable for recruitment systems to swamp hiring
structures – if online methods are used they must be limited in
scope, or backed up by strong IT and communications systems.
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By GlobalDataInterestingly, the surveyed companies keenest on online
recruitment were Azule Finance and De Lage Landen, the smallest and
largest respectively.Tentatively, this suggests the high volume to
success ratio of online recruitment may be least punishing in small
companies making fewer appointments, and banking behemoths with HR
divisions large enough to process truly huge recruitment
operations.
On the other end of the spectrum from online recruitment lie
recruitment agencies: costly, yet undemanding on HR due to the
outsourcing of processing work.Whereas two companies surveyed
claimed their recruitment needs were not precise enough to justify
the expense of agencies, all others reported recruiter use.
Particularly interesting was SME Eurofinance, which made its
first agency appointment this year to fill a highly specific back
office appointment.The increase of such back office positions
reported by this survey suggests that the use of agencies to fill
these roles will be a developing trend.
Compromise between low cost inefficiency and expensive precision
can be avoided by companies recruiting from known sources: internal
recruitment, referrals and poaching from competitors.These methods
provide the best of both worlds, offering staff of proven
effectiveness who do not have to be searched for. Recruiting from
known sources was the favoured channel of more than half of
respondents, with three companies offering staff bonuses for
successful referrals, and Close Asset HR director, Linda Fox,
considering the policy.
However, Sean Toms of Robinson Toms Recruitment issued a caveat
on internal recruitment, advocating parallel posting of vacancies
internally and externally so that “internal opportunities are kept
equivalent to those in other companies, and people are not
switching companies for a pay rise”.
Calling the shots
Another solution to recruitment dilemmas that avoids
concentration on any particular channel is to change the way that
recruitment decisions are made.
Criticism of employer culture amongst respondents focused on
overcaution in a tightening economic climate. Indecision and delay
in recruiting was held to be clogging up overburdened HR systems,
especially in appointment of senior operational positions, where
high availability of candidates and high-end recruitment costs were
pointed out as fostering further indecision.
The solution, said Matthew Winfield of MJM, is for “employers to
be more targeted, adopting aggressive approaches to acquiring the
right staff and fostering close relationships with them”. This
mirrors the increasingly personalised approach to company culture
discussed elsewhere in this survey.
Decisiveness, intuition and willingness to be flexible in
employment despite exacting skill needs will be vital
characteristics for successful employers in the current climate,
whatever methods they recruit by.
Katherine Amin of New Leaf Search highlighted the consequences
of inflexibility in explaining:“Positions remain open for long
periods and hiring managers come under pressure to find the perfect
match before they lose their allocated headcount.”
This situation has been pre-empted by Andrew Bullard, sales
director of State Securities, who countermands recruitment caution
with a “willingness to consider speculative applications even when
we are not actively recruiting – we never want to close the door on
valuable candidates”.
All respondents agreed that promoting decisiveness and
flexibility is best achieved by empowering line managers to make
recruitment decisions. To decrease pressure on HR departments, it
was suggested that HR should play a support role in hiring
decisions made by managers, who will be increasingly responsible
for the success or failure of the staff they hire.
HR has a positive and vital part to play in recruitment, but in
terms of support, compliance, and legal aid to hiring managers.
They should be instrumental in offering advice and evaluating
candidates, but in a climate of increasing individualism, it is
direct employers who need to be calling the shots.
Fred Crawley
