The Digital Experience Awards 2019
10 July 2019The Culture Code for Customer Experience and launch of The Judge Club.
2 October 2019Retained Search is not just for the C-Suite. It is a highly effective, thorough, professional process to enable you to make informed decisions targeting and hiring the right talent, skills and behaviours you need.
When hiring the right person is so critical, why do so many organisations rely on internal recruiters, PSL’s, advertisements, or contingency recruitment, many of which will fail to secure the best talent available for the role.
Most internal recruiters are great, we work with many of them, however, they typically have a lot of open roles, many of which are volume, regular hires. They have a variety of stakeholders to serve, with multiple disciplines. They are time short and recruit specialist, senior, or subject matter expert roles rarely, perhaps once, or only a handful of times a year. We often speak with and advise our colleagues in internal recruitment, as they will have very little understanding of some of the technical positions and markets for these individuals.
PSL’s seem a necessity for process and order, especially with volume hires, however, specialist skilled hires and their specialist recruiters are often added to a PSL when the recruiters who deliver more of the regular volume hires fail. The specialists, who will likely be successful on this one-time role, will then generally face a cull, come PSL review time as they were not needed again and the recruitment team inevitably need to reduce their now, much larger PSL.
Adverts can work, they are a great branding exercise, a quick and easy way to reach out to those looking for work right now. However, 80% of the advert response will not be suitable, will have been out of work for some time, not right for your role. They also do not attract those talented individuals who are not actively looking for a new role.
Sifting an advert response takes a lot of time and commitment, they likely have a close date a week or, two away. Whilst you are busy waiting and wading through all these unsuitable applications, the one or, two great candidates are being interviewed swiftly, engaged and hired. By the time you invite them for an interview, they will likely be off the market and you could have lost them, reducing your shortlist significantly, with many organisations having to go back to market a second, or, even a third time.
Perhaps your initial approach failed, or you have a confidential role and you decide to engage a recruiter. Do you choose a contingency route, or maybe more than one recruiter? No placement no fee sounds like a win win, with the competition between the agencies delivering the best candidates….Not really!
Recruiters who work no win no fee are constantly gambling on red or black, betting their time and resources on the company who is giving them the most commitment, exclusivity, speed of response etc, to try and ensure they can hire the successful candidate. Competition amongst recruiters with many of them approaching the same people, is not the best advertisement for your brand and your recruiters, knowing it is a race to be first to the talent, does not have the luxury of holding your role back waiting to assess who is the best person, they have to present the candidate first, or they may lose out. This reduces your chance of getting the right candidate and the recruiter’s chance of hiring the right person. Contingency conversion rates typically range from 1 in 4 which is good to 1 in 8.
Retained Search offers a confidential service, with the time and commitment to go to market with a full proactive search; extensive research, market insight, talent mapping, and networking to produce, initially a long-list of candidates.
This is followed by a thorough screening, interview and selection process to generate a shortlist of candidates presented for interview.
A transparent, open, collaborative and committed partnership, we are with you at every stage of the process.
As Douglas Jackson are established recruitment experts across customer disciplines, we have a distinct advantage over many of the more traditional, larger Executive Search firms. We already have 14 years’ worth of success, established relationships, talent pools and professional networks, giving us an excellent starting point and removing the time to market and initial research required by a provider who is less entrenched within this market. We already know ‘what good looks like’.
With a flexible fee structure available, retained search can be no more expensive than a typical contingent campaign. There is a one-off up-front payment for the retainer but this allows your recruiter the time and commitment to work exclusively for you.
We also offer Douglas Jackson Search, an award winning, innovative, digital retained solution, due to the success of this process with 96% of new employees recruited using the Douglas Jackson Search methodology are with the same employer after a minimum of 12 months! We are so confident in the process we offer extended guarantee periods and even a money back guarantee!
Retained Search it is not just for the C-Suite, it is an intelligent, insightful process, designed to help you make the best decision and hire the right talent, in a timely, efficient, cost effective partnership utilising the skills, network and knowledge of a subject matter expert recruitment consultant.
If you would like to have a no obligation conversation please contact us on 0345 620 9720
