Agency Interviews

If you are registered with a Recruitment Agency you need to know what goes on behind the scenes.

Recruitment Agencies are in the business of placing candidates with a client for a fee.

Why Are They There?

Recruiting the right people is rarely anything less than complex, time-consuming and risky. Many organisations either do not wish, or do not have the resources to , attract and screen large numbers of candidates. Professional recruitment agencies have coded and categorised databases which allow them to match both client and candidate - generally with a reasonable degree of accuracy.

For the client the benefit is that only the most suitable candidates are presented to them and for the candidate they should only be put forward against the most appropriate job spec and indeed many agencies have specialist knowledge of specific market sectors.

How Do They Operate?

Professional agencies have developed and cultivated close working relationships with companies over time. They have won their trust through coming to understand the business they are in, the structure they have and their ethos. This takes time, effort and money since no fee is due until the candidate is placed, has started work and in many cases has completed a time-based probationary period.

Who Pays Them?

Their clients pay them. Candidates generally do not. First and foremost their allegiance is to their client and not to you. Naturally, since this is a matching process, it is in their interest to develop a good relationship with their best candidates in order to ensure they are successfully placed. That way they earn more money.

Targets / Quotas

Recruitment Agencies are staffed by sales people. They can be called Recruitment Specialist, Recruitment Advisor, Placement Consultant but they are all commission based sales people. The business has in the past been notoriously ruthless in axing staff who do not make their quotas which in turn leads to a high turnover of staff and therefore less stability for the candidate.

When you are in sales your first concern is for yourself - fail to make target and you could be out of a job yourself.

The Pressures

Targets, quotas - call them what you like, but they impact both the recruitment consultant and you the candidate. You must understand that the consultant is there to make target - not to find you the perfect job. They are under pressure on a weekly and monthly basis to make their figures. They therefore, quite understandably, look for those candidates who, in their judgement, will give them the best chance of making that all-important sale.

There are only so many working hours in a day and a consultant needs to use them wisely. They must "cold-call" companies looking for opportunities, maintain contact with existing clients, read countless CV's, interview promising candidates, evaluate job descriptions, keep tabs on the competition, attend sales meetings, prepare sales reports, scan databases for candidate matches, arrange interviews, follow up with candidates post-interview, provide two-way communication between client and candidate, ease the blow if a candidate is considered unsuitable, explain to their client why a candidate isn't going to accept their offer - the list goes on!

They also need to make sure that a candidate they put forward for client-interview is regarded as a high-class match. Mismatch enough times and they will probably lose that client on the basis that they cannot be trusted to match the brief to the candidate. They waste a clients time at their peril!

What Do They Want In A Candidate?

• They want a clean, clear CV (see effectivecvwriting.com)
  
  
• They want a professional, reliable, presentable client
  
  
• They want a candidate who will follow through if offered the position. The ultimate waste of their time is when a candidate decides not to accept an offer which has been made
  
  
• They want a candidate who isn't going to waste their time
  
  
• They want a saleable candidate

     Questions To Ask Them