market pick up
It’s that time of year again – the run-in to Christmas and the rush to close the year out.
Just filled a senior level product management position that took 9 months from start to finish. Just closed another deal that started 3 weeks ago. I’m seeing a lot more of the latter cycles now than I was 3 months ago. Usually, you attribute this to a rebound in the economy with companies realizing that to hit the numbers, they need to re-plug some of the holes they dug by releasing people earlier this year.
What I’m seeing more of are companies expanding or replacing and looking to get people on board before the Christmas season so they can get a feel for the company, the people they’ll be working with and technology they’re going to be involved in – they can then hit 2010 running.
Already, the days of huge volumes of quality candidate availability are leaving us. The majority of candidates released earlier this year have either now found new positions or have been through the interview rounds with the companies out there and so far, have not been selected.
2010 will continue to be a battle to attract those passive A players. While in-house talent acquisition teams will be able to find candidates, their coverage will be limited as they spend their time working on one client to sell to prospective candidates. Recruiters on the other hand work across a far broader range, giving us access to a much wider net of prospective candidates – let your prospects know this!
Also, have conversations with clients about Q1 headcount planning. With a new year comes new quotas, reviews and employee ‘changes of heart’ – new year and all that. This leads to open positions early in the year, denting the run rate requird for target achievement. Every month you have a $1.5m quota position open, you run the risk of having a $125k deficit in the required target. Encourage clients to plan ahead with your help, as soon as they pull the trigger, you’re already there with a pipeline of candidates. Clients in Technology hiring sales people will subsequently need to add technical pre-sales, project managers and marketeers. Make sure your cross-selling to those reference points to generate more positions with the same client. When you have placed 5 people in different teams for a client, the relationship should continue to improve exponentially, providing you with a run-rate of business for 2010.
Great info above! I’d love your insight on the job market now, as we enter 2nd Q.
thanks for the note Brooke. The market is gaining more momentum as we speak. Companies need recruiters even more as candidate availability (in a number of markets) is dwindling and we’re needed to find the great ones as internal HR functions dont seem to focus on direct headhunting and THIS is where we earn our money.
While as a business, we do advertise from time to time, over 90% of our placements are made by direct approach. We identify candidates online, find out there loccation and call them directly to present the opportunity. Interestingly, clients using us are doing so with their tougher searches, which they allocate specific recruitment budgets for. For example, they may be planning to hire 25 sales people this year and 3 product managers. Sales people are typically easier to identify, but more importantly, usually ALWAYS open to discussing new opportunities, so internal HR functions can deal with that. Product Managers are more engrained in the back end of the business and skill sets are very specific from the client perspective – this is where we are picking up more business, by asking ‘which positions typical take the longest to fill – and why?’ This is where we, as recruiters can add immediate value. We target individuals at companies competing directly with our clients and take it from there.
I think we should be bullish on the recruitment industry at the moment, but I also think you have to go where the money is. The energy, smart grid and ‘green’ industries are in dire need of talent at the moment and virtually all of them are hiring! Hope this helps.