Recruitment

The UK recruitment industry is one of the most highly competitive in the business arena. The fast-paced nature and lucrative salaries on offer make jobs in this sector particular attractive for the right sort of ambitious, driven individuals. The UK's recruitment industry annual turnover is approximately £23 billion and its growth shows no signs of slowing. There are always new areas of employment fueling this growth, most recently examples of which are Scientific recruitment and Online Marketing recruitment.
The recruitment industry serves all business sectors, forming strong partnership with organisations from sole traders to multinationals. These partnerships can be incredibly lucrative, so naturally recruitment agencies will pursue exclusive deals with as many companies as possible.
Recruitment Agencies act as a filtering service, attracting candidates and matching them to jobs in client companies on a temporary or permanent basis. The Consultants' job is the vital link between candidates and clients and they operate in almost all sectors of the employment market. There are a number of publicly quoted companies and firms that operate multi-nationally as well as thousands of small independent ones, such is the attractiveness of the rewards on offer.

The role of the recruitment consultant is diverse, demanding and very fast paced and requires a certain type of person to succeed. Recruitment Consultants often come from a sales background however the 'hard sell' approach is not applicable in recruitment. Consultants must demonstrate excellent relationship building skills and must be able to just the character and credentials of an applicant in relation to the company and position they are applying for. Putting forward a totally unsuitable client reflects very badly on the agency in question.
The role itself involves attracting recruiting business from companies using sales, business development and marketing techniques. This includes meeting with clients on a regular basis in order to establish strong working relationships, keeping in touch over the telephone and also in writing. It is essential that consultants know about the companies they are recruiting for - what they do, how they operate and the general culture or atmosphere of the workplace.
Consultants are also required to attract candidates by drafting advertising copy and creating maximum exposure for their job adverts using a wide range of media. Screening candidates thoroughly by meeting them face-to-face and testing their interview skilld is incredibly important, as it helps in selecting suitable candidates to put forward to client companies. Recruitment consultants are also involved in negotiating pay and salary rates and finalising arrangements between client and candidate.
Salaries for Recruitment Consultants vary from one company to the next but it is usual for recruitment businesses to pay Recruitment Consultants a basic salary plus performance-related bonus or commission. For those who are prepared work hard and are good at their job the rewards can be substantial.
The recruitment industry generally employs candidates from various educational backgrounds and there is a great future for those with the drive and determination to succeed. It is generally said that personality and attitude is more important than educational achievements when it comes to recruitment. There is, however, a lot of copy writing involved in the role of a Recruitment Consultant so a good grasp of the English language is essential.
Some employers may have dedicated career development programmes for graduates or those wishing to progress quickly.

There are two main types of recruitment websites: job boards and CV databases. Essentially they are the same thing catering for different ends of the job market. Job boards allow companies to post job vacancies in order to attract suitable applicants. CV databases however, allow candidates to upload their CV so that recruiting companies can identify suitable candidates for their vacancies.
Of course some recruitment websites have evolved into all encompassing recruitment entities, capturing candidate details and then pooling them in online client areas.
Recruitment websites are very helpful in finding candidates when they are actively looking for work, but they don't generally do well in attracting "passive" candidates who might only find out about an attractive position and respond favorably, if it is presented to them using other means. In addition to this, some candidates who are actively looking for a new job are hesitant to put their CVs online due to the risk of colleagues and company management coming across them.

Headhunters are usually only employed when others methods of recruitment have not yielded the desired results. If in-house recruitment efforts or even recruiting through an agency has failed to deliver the right candidates, a company may choose to seek out suitable employees using more aggressive tactics.
Headhunters often use advanced, under-hand techniques, such as posing as clients in order to ascertain employee details, and they may be so bold as to visit candidate offices. Another tactic employed by headhunters is the purchasing of expensive lists of names and job titles, but most will generate their own lists over time rather than go down this route. Headhunters perform many of the same tasks as a regular scientific Recruitment Consultancy eg. prepping a candidate for interview, negotiating salaries and conducting closure to the search. Headhunters can often be seen at trade shows and other meetings nationally or even internationally as there's a good chance or them running into managers who are hiring, or alternatively relevant candidates.
Headhunters are typically small operations that make high margins on candidate placements (sometimes more than 30% of the candidate's annual compensation). Due to their higher costs, headhunters are usually employed to fill senior management and executive level roles, or to find very specialized individuals.

We all know that at some point we will need to recruit employees, yet all too often we are reacting to someone leaving, have to move quick, and consequently have a weak structure in place.
This is a bad way to do things and it often leaves us with a sub-standard candidate while the better fish pass us by.
We therefore should be planning to recruit permanently - you could work with your scientific recruitment consultancy during quieter periods to put a strategy in place, thereby avoiding the hasty recruitment decisions that can lead to mistakes as a result of recruitment knee-jerking.
Of course, in these days of on-line job boards and virtual recruitment agencies, it could be argued that there is no longer a need for a traditional recruitment agency at all. While the internet has automated many of the processes involved in sourcing candidates, it has also caused problems as well. By enabling candidates to post their CV on numerous databases simultaneously, the net is causing CV overload, and the possibility of the same CV arriving on a recruiting manager's desk twice is greatly increased.
The HR manager ideally wants a small selection of excellent CVs, not have to wade through hundreds of specs, many of which are duplicates.
These days unemployment is low, and people are more conscious of what they spend. This is why the role of the human recruiter is still very important.
Employers need someone who knows what is happening in their own market.
Someone who knows people who may not be on the market, but are certainly 'in the market and who can be at least be encouraged to talk. Someone who knows people who know people.
Therefore, if you employ scientific staff I would urge you to become proactive in your approach to laboratory recruitment.

According to a top UK recruitment agency the UK has one of the most unhappy workforces, and the science and pharmaceutical sector is one of the biggest sufferers.
A survey has found that British workers are among the unhappiest in the world - around 48% of employees surveyed claimed to be unhappy with their current job, and out of 28 countries surveyed, the UK came in equal 23rd with Thailand which is shocking considering how much more developed the UK is.
UK bosses were actually rated 11th best amongst the 28 countries which was a surprise, the best bosses being found in Mexico, USA and Canada, and the worst in Sweden, Italy and Turkey.
The survey rated employers on four key attributes - communication, leadership, team spirit and delegation skills; areas which UK employers did not excel in, but fared reasonably.
In general employees felt that their managers were good at delegating effectively, but weak on the other three qualities.
Respondents in the science and pharmaceutical sector gave their bosses the third highest rating, after business services and local government which is another surprise given the current crisis in the science recruitment sector.
The study was conducted on around 70,000 people across 28 countries worldwide in order to give a decent spread. Of the 70,000 approximately 6000 were UK based.
The survey also found that:.
The UK's teachers are happier with their jobs than any other UK industry sector, and place their bosses in the top three nationally.
63% of UK teachers were happy or very happy, and bosses in teaching scored an average of 6.8 out of a possible 10.
UK workers employed in transport and distribution are the least happy (25%).
In research conducted in October 2006, this industry also reported high levels of discrimination.
44% claimed they had experienced discrimination when applying for a job, positioning it among the bottom three industry sectors, while 35% said they experienced discrimination whilst working within the last five years.
Wales has the happiest workforce (60%) with Scotland (58%) and London (57%) following closely behind.
Northerners are the least content at work, with 24% claiming they're unhappy in their current role.
The under-20 age group were kindest to their bosses, awarding them an average score of 6.8.
Those aged between 45-54 proved tougher, awarding their bosses an average score of 6.1.
A staggering 43% of employees claimed their boss does not reward them for a job well done.
Among those who do show praise and recognition, there was surprisingly little difference between men and women.
58% of women show their gratitude to their employees compared to 56% of men.
The findings also revealed that apart from the 55+ age group, which showed a slight preference for a male boss, people in general do not mind whether the boss is male or female, 78% saying that it made no difference.
A spokeswoman for the survey had this to say: "The survey has revealed both good and bad news for the UK.
"While we may be one of the unhappiest workforces in Europe, we still have confidence in our bosses, believing they are doing an acceptable job.

Scientific employers are the latest in a long line of top level managers to criticise the services of scientific recruitment agencies in a report generated by the Association for Consultancy and Engineering (ACE).
Scientific employers levelled a number of criticisms at scientific recruitment agencies and the services they offer, in a report by the Association for Consultancy and Engineering (ACE). The report highlights high fees (in some cases as much as 20% of the successful candidates first year salary) and poaching staff (known in the industry as headhunting) as common complaints and believes that recruitment agencies could be doing more to fill some current vacancies thought to around 20, 000.
Quality issues have dogged recruitment agencies on all sectors since recruitment services began to be offered. The problems lie with discrepancies in the objectives of recruitment consultants and recruiting managers. Firstly, a recruitment consultant may only need a small number of placements monthly to meet their target, hence, when there are an abundance of vacancies they can cherry pick the easiest to fill, without concern for the rest. Meanwhile, a recruiting manager must focus on trying to fill 'all' of their vacancies and hence are often left short by a recruitment consultant happy with filling only a couple of positions.
Most scientific employers, when questioned, said that they would be happy to do without the services of recruitment agencies if they could afford the time to manage the recruitment process. The recruitment industry has, in the past 15 years or so, become very reliant on the use of recruitment professionals. Although many companies would prefer to handle the recruitment of new staff in-house, the means to do so are limited. The majority of good candidates are already registered with one, or in some cases many, recruitment agencies and there are very few websites that allow for direct recruitment. The human resources manager of one such company said "we feel like we're backed into a corner. We've made efforts to bring our recruitment process in-house but inevitably we've ended up having to use the services of recruitment professionals because we couldn't attract enough suitable candidates directly. It's a shame because we're willing to try and take it on ourselves but the recruitment agencies have such a hold over the whole of the recruitment market".
The next issues stems from the turnover of recruitment consultants, which is high. Very few recruitment consultants stay on the same position for any length of time. This coupled with high bonuses available means their motivation to make placements make overtake any desire to build long term client relationships.
Many of the engineering recruitment agencies surveyed felt that recruitment consultants would ratchet up salaries falsely to increase their own fees. The issue of poaching is a serious problem.
This is the scenario where a recruitment consultant takes staff from a client they are also trying to find people for. In some cases, they end up 'recycling' the same people and indeed the same vacancies, for example, poaching someone and making a fee, then approaching the manager who has lost his member of staff to gain the new vacancy, before anyone else knows about it.