Social Recruiting: Direct vs Headhunter

eSocialMedia is a founding member and co-owner of the Direct Resourcing Think Tank. Recently at an iconic bank in Canary Wharf over-looking the Olympic Stadium we discussed executive search and how companies can engage their audience throughout the recruiting process. As usual there were 15 of the biggest companies in the World represented by either their Head of Resourcing or their Head of Executive Search there were a couple of takeaways that occurred to me that I’d like to share.

Internal recruiters must get trust and respect from stakeholders

Companies that build internal recruitment teams to focus on executive search often struggle to get co-operation and buy in from senior board members and executives until the recruiters have proven that they understand their business needs and can efficiently source and place top level executives. Even if they do this they still need to be liked and respected in order for executives to stop using six figure fee head hunters who may have placed them in their own role. This is why it is important for internal recruiters to use social media tools like internal communities and chat to connect and communicate online with their stakeholders. Communicating their successes and capabilities is a critical part of getting stakeholder buy in and gaining the respect of the stakeholders, many of whom look down on the internal recruiters as junior to them or as less independent than external recruiters. Internal communities also create a channel through which stakeholders can connect with internal recruiters about requirements and ideas for improvement.

 

Many internal recruiters don’t use social media to add value

Many internal executive recruiters talk to the employees internally and ask them who they know in relation to a role, sometimes they don’t because it is a sensitive role and that is where an external head hunter again can add value and internal hiring managers can have plausible deniability if a head hunter makes an approach to a sensitive target. Often the difference between an executive candidate choosing to use an internal executive recruiter or an external head hunter is that the external head hunter can share industry knowledge and give an ‘independent’ perspective and knowledge of a sector. Miramar Executive Search has chosen to extend their activities to social media and adding value to clients and candidates through industry knowledge to executives in the energy sector. The difference between Miramar and a direct recruiter and their use of social media is that the Miramar are using it to talk a common language and talk about the topics that their target executives are interested in where direct recruiters or poorly trained executive search firms currently tend to use social media channels to tell candidates how great they are as an employer, either that or they use Linkedin to source an executive by job title and then they inmail them asking ‘Do you want a job?’

Now consider if the internal executive recruiter competing with head hunter had connected that target candidate to one of their own hot shot senior executives and they had an online conversation leading to an offline meeting or phone call; no competition. The internal guy would be able to add more value and insight than the head hunter. However in order to pull that off the internal executive recruiter needs to be close to the business and be respected and close to the existing executives. They do this by understanding their objectives and delivering on promises and setting expectations at the right level.

So if you are an external head hunter make sure you know how to monitor online conversations and have the right content and training in place to enter these conversations where you can add value and ultimately meet these guys offline face to face. Be careful not to push to meet too quickly before adding enough value online.

 If you are an internal executive recruiter then you can use the same monitoring tools to find the conversations and talent online but if you find a gem of a candidate you are best to empower your own senior executives to get involved in that conversation. It’s a conversation or online engagement that could save you £100k in head hunter fees and it also doesn’t do your corporate brand any harm at all. Remember that execs are not online talking about their personal job requirements they are online discussing or reading about the business or industry topics that matter most to them at that time.

So in short if you are an internal executive recruiter, be likeable, be accessible, be known, be knowledgeable, add value, set expectations, communicate well both online & on the phone, deliver on your promises and get yourself in good shape to compete online with external head hunters!

Please feel free to take a look at my other articles on Social Media and Recruitment by clicking here. Let me know your thoughts on this or any aspect of the topics covered on our website. You can contact me on twitter @ColmHannon or by email colm.hannon@esocialmedia.co.uk.