Hiring is hard. Building a team is hard. In fact, nobody said it was easy.
But here’s the thing: so many companies think it is.
Finding talent is a skillset and one that not everybody has. Figuring out what works is more than just checking boxes on experience. It’s the art of blending skills, intuition, and understanding a company environment in order to produce a successful individual.
Putting these pieces together into a professional creates what makes a successful recruiter. And it doesn’t come overnight.
Let’s say you decide to build your own house. You bought the piece of property and ready to create your dream home. Could you build it all by yourself? In theory, yah. It might take you years and years and probably not turn out super well, but sure, you can throw up four walls and a roof and have something to show for it. But like most, you would choose to partner with professionals that have experience in construction. Your house will go up much faster, last longer, and provide you with a much better outcome than you could accomplish alone. Would you agree?
Same concept goes for building your team. Yes, you could hire your entire staff by yourself. Maybe you have an internal recruiter and you tell them to fill every opening you have. They conduct every interview, sift through every resume, and try to lock down as many new hires as possible. But realistically, the bandwidth needed to do that, plus the learning curve of understanding every position at the company will make that feat near to impossible.
Staffing is a service, like anything else. It is a tool to utilize when you are looking for external expertise in an area that you could use assistance and advice in. Recruiters are well-versed in the industry, have their ears to the ground about hiring trends, and above all else, know how to scout the appropriate, qualified talent that you’re scratching your head about how to obtain.
Sure, you can tackle some hires independently, but when it comes to scaling a team or creating a department from scratch, being able to lean on a team with that specific expertise is going to make your company that much more successful long term.
The Takeaway
As a hiring manager, you should establish the mindset of utilizing resources and developing relationships with the right people to help you expand.
Whether you have an internal recruiter or not, it’s important that you partner with an external resource to support hiring. You don’t have to be a large corporation either. Smaller, rapid-growth companies can hugely benefit from a recruiting partner, leaning on them for advice and consulting as well.
Consider creating an exclusive relationship with a staffing firm. Having them be your “go-to” is going to prove more valuable than you realize and you will gain more support and at the end of the day, more candidate from them in return.
