Recruiting smartly isn’t enough – keeping pipelines robust and using the latest sourcing techniques only makes you an average recruiter. To be a great recruiter, you need to contribute to retention – because how much of a rock star are you if you can close out reqs but your hires only lasts six months before they are running for the door? You’ve got another open req on your hands and an ugly, vicious cycle to deal with. Candidates with the right skill set aren’t enough, which is why I, too, am big on cultural and motivational fit being the focus of interviews and recruiting efforts.
But, in-house recruiters, if retention is really that important to ya, why are you turning to the outside for help with recruiting? I’m not shy about the fact that I only like third party recruiters (3PRs) in very limited circumstances – if I have a covert search to undertake, or maybe the skills I’m looking for are so hard to find. But even then, 3PRs can’t be any more involved in my selection efforts than just getting me resumes, because I just don’t believe they can truly screen cultural and motivational fit. (Read: 3PRs can’t help me with retention! Your view of recruiting is just too different! Good discussion on in-house recruiting versus agency recruiting here.)
Yet 3PRs all around – like the search firms in Workforce’s recent recruiting article – are trying to up their game by being more “retention focused” through stakeholder interviews to assess culture, or by having strong relationships with candidates both before and after the hire. But, let’s be really candid – do any of those activities really give a 3PR bragging rights? And how much can those tactics really clue you into an org’s culture or impact retention?
Let’s play out a scenario to illustrate the point. John is recruited by and placed at your company by a 3PR. Three months into the job, he’s frustrated with how he and his manager communicate, and it’s to the point where he has serious doubts about whether he should stay. John’s not a happy camper.
Hearken the retention focused 3PR. Would they know whether anyone else is facing the same challenge as John? If so, how are the others dealing with it? What about in the past – have others faced similar issues? What tactics did they employ to better communicate with this manager? Are there some new organizational issues affecting the team/manager/John that are now putting a strain on communication? Or could it be John is the one who is actually challenged in the communication realm? To get to the bottom of the issue, you need to know the organization and people intimately, which is why a 3PR can’t affect retention. To even prevent the issue from happening in the first place, you would have to have known the culture and dynamics pretty darn well and recruited for cultural and motivational fit. And, I’m thoroughly unconvinced you can really know an org and its culture unless you’re in there living and breathing in it.
I’m wary of 3PRs who promise you the moon and stars. There’s only so much they can do to impact retention, and besides – that’s your job as a rock star corporate recruiter. So go on – ask the right questions, make sure the cultural and motivational fit is right and then you’re golden with your hiring. And, as for satisfaction guaranteed of your hires? Blow that 90 days standard satisfaction guarantee that most 3PRs give you out of the water – heck, blow that one year guarantee that DSRB makes in the Workforce article. You’re a great recruiter focused on retention. A one year guarantee is nothing to you.
I’m not a recruiter, but because I do alot of community focused *things* companies are increasingly becoming interested in being a part of what I have to offer.
Their inhouse recruiters are increasingly getting little value from 3PR and when they advertise positions the response is low (this relates to the IT/Web industry).
I see a trend in moving away from 3PR and traditional recruitment to doing things to connect with potential employees. Things include being social, doing workshops, sponsoring local events. It does work and probably costs less and is more effective as the conversations happen openly and honestly giving people a better idea of what they are getting themselves into.
I am a recruiter in a non-traditional sense. I am the employee recruitment manager for our local economic development group which represents about 100 of our local companies. I concur with the previous post about company culture being key to retention. I am constantly educating our local organizations about reaching out to new employees through social interaction. Our community now provides several newcomer events a year and encourages sponsorship and participation by the local business community. Get them involved…in your culture, in your community, in your lives and they will be more inclined to stay.
There is a difference between hand-holding and babysitting. Hand-holding today will result in saved time and money in retention cost later!
Rosie and Darla- Both interesting perspectives! And I agree with you both. For example, rather than doing traditional college recruiting at job fairs, I prefer to get my hiring managers or other thought leaders within my firm to get into classrooms and do guest lectures. I think it’s important to think outside of traditional means and really connect by establishing meaningful relationships with students or potential candidates.
Thanks for stopping by.
Good post. But it’s not “can’t”, it’s “shouldn’t”. Many corps HR and internal recruiters are not tuned in enough to even understand the HMs in their own companies. Sorry, but that’s just the way it be. An outside 3PV can look at the situation from a long-term perspective and see where those issues lie. Even better? They don’t have some false sense of loyalty tripping them up like an in house team might. I come from a small firm so another great bene is the fact that my whole co, even when I count team members from client companies, is likely smaller than the teams that meet to decide on internal hiring (surely it’s lower to collaborate on retention efforts, short of the lame “well, let’s just offer her more $$” I hear from corp so often). You’re right, in house corp recruiters SHOULD be able to handle their own retention efforts, just like married couples SHOULD be able to deal with their problems alone. But like marriage counselors, we’re there for a reason.
I would add that a 3PR CAN source with a view to retention IF the 3PR is given direct access to the hiring manager. Bravo to those HR folks with the confidence to step aside!
Well Jessica, you are so right, external recruiters cannot do your retention hand holding for you and you know what, when you retain their services I dont remember the client paying for the recruiter to do so! What I do know is that if clients and external recruiters engage effectively and if interview processes are completed fully, there is no greater risk than if a company decided to use their own internal recruiter. Indeed, I might suggest that the external recruiter could be more valuable as they have exposure to the broader commercial world and often the varied cultures within a multitude of businesses!
So, the onus in my opinion ultimately rests on the employer taking the right decision to make a hire and then “managing” the individual’s employment effectively. Talent retention can be affected by the smallest of things and I can’t seriously believe, Jessica, that you would accuse an external recruiter of not having provided a quality service because of a company’s failure to manage their employees 6-12 months down the line.
Guess you won’t be calling me anytime soon
Gavin, Maren and Michael-
Thanks for your comments. I am the first to admit that there are a lot of baaaaad HR folks out there, including really insecure ones who won’t give an agency access to a HM or whose hands I’d hate to see an ER issue land in… Which is why I write about trying to make HR sexier and weeding out the duds. I am an “upscale HR pro,” though, a term Kris Dunn likes to use…and I recognize there aren’t a lot of us upscale folks out there so you probably haven’t had the pleasure to work on a search with someone like moi!
I think using 3PRs has a time and place… Ask me how much my org has spent on fees and how many agency hires I have! There are ways to effectively partner though, and I just think the roles of a 3PR and the HM or corp recruiter have to be clear and realistic.
Gavin, you are spot on in saying managing the talent is the employer’s onus which is exactly why I can’t understand why a 3PR would claim to be able to affect retention or even guarantee a placement one year out. That’s not your job- that’s a manager’s job and mine as their business partner.
Really, I don’t hate 3PR’s. There are a few that I trust and rely on as partners to our business but let’s just be honest about what our respective capabilities are.
Thanks again for your thoughts…
JLee -
Full disclousure for the others – I run a HR shop, but I’m an active recruiter who feels like all HR people should be strong recruiters. In fact, recruiters looking for career change would always ben on my list of non-traditional candidates for a HR Manager slot.
I think the key in this article, and the commments, is this. Recruiters aren’t willing to provide more than a 60-90 day promise because there are too many things they can’t control. Same thing with internal HR, you can’t control the factors once you release them to the unit – you can check in, try to block and tackle, but at the end of the day, it’s going to come down to fit and relationships. And the free market if things aren’t going well.
The firm depicted giving a 12 month promise? Great marketing, and it probably helps them get greater access to the execs they work with, which helps their book of business. A couple of refills along the way is worth that access from a marketing and mindshare standpoint.
Are they better off than the recruiter without that access from a retention standpoint? Marginally, they’re still doing a dice roll – they won’t control a thing after the fact.
But the access is a sweet thing to have from a marketing standpoint. It’s their secret sauce, and they can gain access for future marketing because of it. I’d do it as a recruiter for those reasons, but at the end of the day, I’d realize that’s the reason I was doing it, not because I was some retention guru…
KD
Hi Jessica,
I agree with most of your post. I’ve done both corporate and agency side recruiting and I don’t think that a third party recruiting can have much of an impact on retention.
However what a good third party recruiter CAN do is to screen for cultural and overall ‘fit’. The best third party recruiters, the ones you will feel like you are truly partnering with will just ‘get it’, they will have a true read and feel on your company and culture, especially after making multiple placements there. Doing this well on the front end, can prevent the majority of retention issues.
But, there will be issues that recruiters just can’t screen for, internal dynamics such as manager changes, company reorgs, toxic co-workers….etc. The corporate recruiter can have some impact if they are aware of the problem, but the third party recruiter will generally be in the dark….unless this happens within the first month or two, and something can be done to resolve the issue.
In general though, I think the third party recruiters should be highlighting what they do best, finding great talent, and let the company focus on retaining them.
Pam
JLee, I like your posts – I also like your writing style. In that regard, let me play Devil’s Advocate here – I will focus on one of your statements not so much to disect it, but because much of your supporting argument revolves around it:
“But even then, 3PRs can’t be any more involved in my selection efforts than just getting me resumes, because I just don’t believe they can truly screen cultural and motivational fit.”
In complete honesty, I can assure you that 3PRs’ can help with retention efforts . . . and if you operate under the mindset of “can’t be any more involved . . . than just getting me resumes”, your own psychology is holding you back. At the very point that you’ve bought into the chasm that exists between 3PRs’ and Internal Recruiters, your psyche will find a way to embrace that notion. Digest what I’m saying for a minute: the minute that our brains are wired in this fashion (mine included); the minute our neural nets fire in this defensive-sequence; the more difficulty we’re going to have in honestly overcoming the challenge . . . and/or the more difficulty we’re going to have in breaking that mental pattern and the coinciding chemical releases (classic Quantum-Physics meets Neuroscience stuff.)
I will also suggest a difficult point that I run into very often — the issue of cultural fit (for ‘retention’ purposes) taking precedence over results. Most VPs and Directors I work with “on the line” have their own battles with Internal Recruitment because of candidates being passed over due to ‘lack of cultural fit’ and/or lack of a ‘personality fit’ as a result of taking a Myers-Briggs indicator. I can honestly say that many Money-Players are tough cookies in the bullpen, particulary sales candidates. But you work around their character flaws; Managers find a way to take the leadership approach of integrating their narcissistic-personas . . . because they’re Rainmakers and it comes with the territory. Their flaw is also their strength — they refuse to be bested. They win.
Although it may sound contrary, I don’t mean it to come across that way . . . however, I am looking forward to the day that the achievement of results takes precedence over personality tests or ‘gut feelings’ about cultural fit.
Crushing the chasm starts with me and you . . . the 3PR and the Internal Recruiter . . . the Internal Recruiter and the Hiring Manager . . . and the 3PR and the Hiring Manager. We need to find common ground, give up the straight-jacket thinking, and move forward together. Ok, I’m off my pie-in-the-sky box, so let’s get back to work
pam – thanks for stopping by and good points… 3PRs should stick to doing and marketing what they are great at – recruiting! no doubt on my end that they’ve got the game locked down on “recruiting.” i’m not a cold-call queen. with passive candidates, i’m kinda a mess. i have to work hard at recruiting and there are situations where i have to bring in the big guns to get the job done because i’m not cut out for it. but retention? that’s more of my domain and i don’t think 3PR’s should sell my goods when they really can’t deliver like i can.
mr. letourneau – thanks for your thoughts. start with a complement, then go to the feedback, and then go warm again. you’ve been well trained on the art of giving constructive criticism, haven’t you? after getting to the last paragraph of your comment, i wonder if you would you like for us to hold hands! kidding. just kidding.
i appreciate your thoughts but especially with your example of sales folks, i can’t help but to wonder at what cost do you take a rainmaker over someone who is a good fit culturally? if it’s at the expense of a team, if it’s at the expense of having to deal with all the residual ER issues because the rainmaker is a total ass and solely focused on achievement… that’s a nightmare to me. and in the long run, sustained results cannot be achieved by just one or two great rainmakers. it’s gotta take a team of like minded individuals to move forward together.
and of course, there are orgs who are cool with all bottom line and where culture isn’t king… but that’s not my kind of place and i don’t think i could ever be a part of that. because if you make widgets, and the company down the street also makes the same kind of widget… then what sets you apart from one another? it’s gotta be the cultural factor.
okay. that’s it for me. back to work as well.