In the days that followed, we received a number of really good CVs from candidates directly, one of the main reasons for doing PR for ourselves and often clients too.  But we also got the usual raft of approaches from recruiters offering ‘excellent candidates’ most of whom were recently redundant from other PR businesses. 

Don’t get me wrong, when there is a shortage of good people, and many jobs, recruiters, or at least good ones, have their place.  I can see the benefit, if someone is in full time employment of having an agency helping you to secure your next role, when time is scarce.  An old mate of mine Doug Baird runs a great operation called Interim Partners (not a client, I hasten to add) that puts highly skilled director level candidates into very specific temporary roles, and they are a proper professional service provider, I can easily see the value in that bespoke niche service. 

My wife is a corporate recruiter by profession (and obviously the best judge of character I know!) but she worked mainly in the States where they invented the profession. 

In the US it was established as a proper regulated profession before it became a sales gold rush and degenerated (as it has on the whole over here) into a numbers game of cold calling and square pegs into round holes.  Even the general recruiters there operate far more professionally, and really earn their money.

But when any PR person, who is essentially a marketer is out of work, the very least they could do is try and find their own job, and write a few emails and letters to prospective employees.

Surely candidates must get that if we hire through an agency, we pay a significant (20% of salary is typical) fee, and that is a lot of money to a small business.  Effectively, candidates using agencies are putting themselves at an immediate disadvantage, and in my case ruling themselves out of a chance at any jobs we might have.

Even more baffling is graduate candidates approaching us through big name recruitment firms.  That’s just bizarre, and in my view is an immediate statement that they have zero commitment, nous and initiative.  We always use the Graduates Yorkshire service for recruiting newbies, it’s a fantastic realistically priced (£50 for an ad the last time I used it)  regional resource that deserves to have a very bright future.  It’s been the source of three first rate candidates (including our very own Rachel Pycock) and I can’t recommend it enough.

I have decided I should look recruiters calling me in another way – I suppose it is actually saving me the effort of wasting time meeting people who are too lazy/uncommercial/devoid of initiative to spend an hour or two researching the market and writing a letter to try and find a job.  

I still don’t want to get the all too common call though…

”Hi Mr Snape, it’s Abigail/Andrew Smythe from People Power, you may remember we spoke last December (NO, WE DIDN’T) and you asked me to keep you informed (NO, I DIDN’T) of any good candidates we had, well, I have an excellent newly graduated PR professional  (WHO DOESN’T HAVE THE GET UP AND GO TO SEND YOU AN EMAIL HIMSELF), I was hoping you would like to look at his CV…”