Top Reasons Why the Recruiting Industry Needs a Major Renovation

Based on decades of experience on both sides of the recruiting fence.

The majority of recruiting agencies today are failing both the companies that hire them and candidates that put their hope in them. Today’s recruitment industry is broken; in complete need of a significant overhaul on all levels.

I know this as fact after having spent two decades on both sides of the fence.

While working in marketing departments during my career, I have worked with dozens of staffing agencies to find qualified and passionate marketing professionals across all levels and areas. On the other side of the fence, as a candidate, I have worked with several dozen (at least) recruiting agencies and individual recruiters to help me find an awesome marketing role. My wanting experiences in both scenarios were, for the most part, overwhelmingly poor, frustrating, unprofessional, highly disingenuous, and lacked transparency.

Here are my top reasons why the recruiting industry needs a thorough and herculean renovation.

Little to No Transparency

The processes and procedures that a staffing agency follows the second they start working with a client should be documented, well thought out, thorough, client-centric, and account for the wants and needs of both the hiring company and candidates. In other words, it should both excite and convey confidence to
both parties.

An awesome, transparent recruiting agency should be eager and proud to voluntarily share and discuss their processes and procedures. Consider it a red flag if they don’t or if their processes and procedures don’t give you complete assurance that you hired the right recruitment agency.

Of all the many dozens of recruiting agencies I partnered with to find marketing professionals when working in marketing departments, I could count on one hand how many voluntarily offered to share their processes and procedures. And of those, only a handful were impressive, gave me confidence and excitement in the agency, and included all the characteristics I listed above. On more than one occasion, when I asked a staffing agency to forward and take me through their processes and procedures, I received what seemed like hastily put together bullet points in the body of an email.

Another way recruiting agencies lack transparency today is how most do not report and share their work and progress with their client on a real-time or daily basis. Potential reasons for this? The recruiter:

• is terribly extended in the number of searches on their plate (and cannot deliver this reporting even if they wanted to),
• simply lacks the desire or motivation to do so (i.e., they don’t care), or
• fails to see this as something they should share with their client

Poorly Executed Interviews

Unfortunately, I have had to work with many dozens and dozens of indifferent, money-focused, placement-driven recruiting machines of all sizes after being laid-off over the years. Rarely was my experience with a recruiter even half-decent on any level.

My best experiences with a recruiter were those that had spent many years in marketing before becoming a recruiter. Not two, three, or four years; but many years. They spoke the language of a highly experienced marketer, were able to confidently and accurately convey their client’s marketing candidate preferences, were able to better answer my questions (and know the right questions to ask me), and were able to relate to my experience, wants, and needs.

Needless to say, it was just a far superior interview and overall experience. But of the 100+ individual recruiters I interviewed with over the years, maybe five had spent any significant time in the marketing trenches. How can this be? How is a recruiter with little to no marketing experience allowed to recruit for marketing talent, especially a senior level marketing role? Rarely did I feel confident the recruiter truly understood my value and marketing expertise, or felt my passion for marketing…and even less confident that s/he could or would communicate that to their client (the hiring company).

And then there is the yucky feeling I almost always got after speaking with a recruiter. Most recruiter interviews felt disingenuous, robotic, rushed, shallow, rehearsed, unfriendly, and cold. I suppose this is par for the course when you have way too many openings on your plate; have little to no experience in the industry you are recruiting for; all you care about is making the placement; and/or work for not an awesome, client-first recruitment agency but an indifferent, money-focused, placement-driven recruiting machine?

Poor Assessments and Candidate Identification

Applicant tracking systems (ATS) should never be used to assess or identify qualified, passionate candidates. Period. Staffing agencies are doing their clients a huge disservice by using easily manipulated ATS to identify candidates as they routinely miss qualified, awesome, passionate candidates.

Resumes need to and should be reviewed and assessed by human eyes with many years of experience in the industry, not a computer. Candidates should not be selected based on keyword and terms stuffed resumes.

ATS are quite popular with overwhelmed, indifferent, money-focused recruiting machines of all sizes who care more about the placement than the quality of placement. When researching which staffing agency to partner with, a company needs to ask the staffing agency (in regards to proper resume assessments and candidate identification):

• is an ATS or a human identifying qualified, awesome candidates;
• who is assessing resumes for the open role; and
• how many years of industry experience does the primary recruiter (assessor) have

Honorable Mentions Reasons

• Too many recruiters sadly lack little, if any, real world experience in (or passion for) the role they are hiring for.
• Primarily concerned with the end (placing a candidate) and not the means to the end (building and nurturing a genuine, lasting, fruitful, fully transparent, empathetic, professional, highly communicative, pleasant working relationship built on trust and respect).
• Ghosting candidates without a blink of an eye; an unempathetic, highly unprofessional, and all too common practice today that needs to stop.
• Little to no authentic desire to know (or research) the company on a deeper level.
• Little to no desire (or time) to be a strategic partner to their clients.

Every facet of today’s recruiting industry needs a tremendous overhaul. It needs to be completely transformed, re-thought, and carefully re-examined from the bottom-up.

That is why Periphery Staffing Solutions was founded.

We promise you noticeable benefits, professionalism, and thoroughness from our decades of experience in the marketing and IT trenches and our wanting experiences on both sides of the recruiting fence.

When you partner with us, you can expect better marketing and IT candidates and a superior, fresher, more engaged experience.

Christian DeGobbi
Founder and Marketing Recruitment Lead

cdegobbi@peripherystaffing.com
201.446.2217