Five years ago, I watched a programme—something like Tomorrow’s World. It showcased incredible innovations that could transform the way we live in the future. It had taken into account all sorts of new possibilities from AI. But one presentation in particular caught my attention: the potential use...
More and more of the recruitment business owners and leaders in my network are experiencing a growing phenomenon. What is it? Their clients (the end-hirers) are insisting that they work under their terms of business for suppliers, rather than the ones issued by the agency. And that is to be...
It’s happened again! Business leaders I know have been sleepwalking into the holiday season and feeling the hit on their P&L- even to the extent of converting profits into losses in the last 2 months. It’s NOT inevitable. Certainly, I know it can be difficult to get a decision from a client...
Does anyone remember Filofax? They were often bulging personal organiser “systems” that took the business world by storm in the 1980’s. Executives ‘importance’ (or their sense of their importance?) was symbolised by the size of their Filofax, and big display stands of the various accessory pages...
You don’t only see a doctor when you are 100% well, do you? And the same applies to a business coach. It’s an interesting fact that, in recruitment at least, some owner/managers regard a NED or board advisor as their last luxury, a sign that their business has “arrived”. Now, while it’s...
In Spring last year, I started working with a client who ran a small business (25 staff) placing tech infrastructure and UX specialists. They’d done pretty well during the job-rich year of 2022, and the owner was ambitious for 2023. In fact, he wanted to increase net profit by 50%. His cost...
A business I work with has 45000 candidate records on his CRM. This was a mature business. At the same time, his team were spending 20% of net fee income (yes, 20%) on job boards and CV download services. That was having a big impact on net profit. He was a bit flummoxed. “Do we need to write...
Lots of recruiters I know are struggling to build new business at the moment. In some cases, they have a team who have no experience of BD and can’t have a conversation with a client unless it’s about a specific job or candidate. In others, they find that market outreach has changed and banging...
There are 3 main things your commission scheme must deliver on: It must motivate the right behaviours for your business, in your market sector(s), in the prevailing market conditions. It must be attractive enough for recruiters to actively work to gain commission. It must be affordable to your...
If you are going to succeed in changed market conditions, you really need to review your sales technique. I’ve been listening to recruiters in multiple different sectors, and I keep hearing them repeat self-defeating phrases. Here are 3 phrases you should remove from your tool kit without delay....
Awards! What are they good for? Quite a lot, actually… I regularly help clients with writing successful award submissions, and as a recent award winner myself (pics below!), here is how they solve certain challenges and my top tips when it comes to approaching awards 👇 💥 Two of the biggest and...
Have you noticed how, when you deal with a call centre now (your bank, for example, or energy provider), you don’t have complete faith in the call agent? Or do they actually give you the wrong information, confidently? https://giphy.com/gifs/buzzfeed-v1SvfAG7sHJpS You may be thinking it was always...
Yep, they have been around for a while. And they do all sorts of marvellous things, allowing recruiters to work from various locations and at times that suit clients/candidates/themselves. If you think I’m going to write about the importance of “switching off” from your phone, think again. This...
OK, I’m calling it… Sport is NOT business, and business is NOT sport. In common with many, I have spent hours at conferences listening to elite athletes talk about the secrets of their success. And I’ve listened to a fair few audiobooks and podcasts as well. The recruiter and...
One question I encounter, more often than any other is, “how do I start a successful temporary recruitment business?” This question appears to defeat even the most experienced recruiters but they do get the message and understand the value of temporary recruitment. A temporary or contract business...
Award-winning ‘recruitment industry lifer’, NED and Strategic Coach, Alison Humphries is imparting her knowledge from a 30-year recruitment career into her brand new book, ‘Seven Habits of Successful Recruitment Leaders’. With experience ranging from leading multi-million-pound business sales to...
Have you discovered a big price increase to list on job boards? Are your adverts not getting the same or better results than they did in 2019? If so, this blog is a must-read for you! Before you spend another penny on job boards or job distribution, have a look at what exactly your staff are...
New recruitment business owners often make this mistake - in fact, more often than not. Maybe they don’t consider it important. Or maybe it gives them a nice, warm feeling when they show it to their friends and family. But it’s the number one wasted marketing opportunity. What is it? They name...
I have 2 words for you…. Account. Development. I have observed a “generation” of recruiters entirely focused on filling jobs. Their tools are speed and technology. I have no issue with both of these, which are sufficient for closing deals and hitting numbers - in the short term. However, just a...
I have several recruiter clients who work with sexy, high-growth start-ups. Both the recruitment business owner and their teams enjoy their interactions with a forward-thinking CEO. As well as their involvement with an early-stage business with a clear growth agenda, an innovative product and...
A couple of months ago, I started to work with a new client. This business owner was recruiting in a buoyant sector but his sales revenue had dipped a little over the last two years, due to difficulties retaining staff. However, this wasn’t the most concerning revelation! His net profit had...
Fostering good habits within your business builds an infrastructure that makes virtuous behaviour more automatic. The result? More success in realising your organisation's goals, while bolstering the opportunity to take on more challenging goals. Take a read of the infographic below to discover...
Regular readers will know already that I broke my arm and foot while on holiday. Consequently, I am relying on taxis to get me to the clients near me so that I can still visit in person. I use a traditional private hire firm because I need reliability; they’ve never let me down. Until now. As it...
One of my clients, Matthew, rolled his eyes at our last meeting. “Clients have become such tarts! They’ll engage with anyone these days who promises them a CV.” Matthew was frustrated. Despite bringing on and billing 46 new clients this year, his business still felt “hand to mouth” with no...
Everyone who knows me also knows that I am a dedicated champion of L&D. It’s central to performance. I took a postgraduate diploma in L&D. I have since used my knowledge to build and deliver countless bespoke, in-house learning programmes. I understand the science of learning. I’ve won...
In Part One of this two-part series, I wrote about the distinction between sales success and profitability. Managing costs is the obvious place to start. In Part Two, I want to focus on the areas that very few recruitment business leaders have a grasp of… Efficiencies If you run a perm recruitment...
Fostering good habits within your business builds an infrastructure that makes virtuous behaviour more automatic. The result? More success in realising your organisation's goals, while bolstering the opportunity to take on more challenging goals. Take a read of the infographic below to discover...
Most recruiters I know are enjoying a period where demand from clients is the highest they have ever known. Sensibly, many have taken the opportunity to revisit things with clients, explaining their role and responsibility in managing recruitment to a successful outcome. And many are asking for...
In Part One of this series, I attempted to give some broad definitions of when sales-led owners of recruitment businesses should seek to develop a back-office infrastructure. We looked first at finance and compliance, and the factors that “move the dial” on whether you should hire support staff....
Several clients have asked me recently, particularly the owners of high-growth recruitment businesses, to explain when they should start hiring their own back-office personnel. They are feeling significant pressure on their own time (I know, I expect a lot from my clients!) and yet are wary of...
Unless you have been living under a rock, you know there is a surplus of vacancies over candidates willing to move. Consequently, there is noticeable pay inflation going on - including in the recruitment sector. But while some recruiters are ghosted by candidates, or they accept extraordinarily...
During the lockdowns over the last 2 years, it was often said that people became either “a hunk, a chunk or a drunk”*, depending on how they responded to circumstances. For certain, in my own circle, I cannot think of one person who was unaffected by the circumstances, often physically. Now diets...
Every day my inbox is chockful of new bits of “news” for recruiters – cataclysmic labour shortages, unhappy employees, “revenge resignations”, the skills/jobs mismatch, the rising costs of running a business... the list goes on. One recruitment business owner, of 5 years, told me yesterday that he...
I read a story about the late Prince Phillip recently, it described how he had stopped the practice of a bottle of Scotch being placed by the Queen’s bed every night and removed, unopened, the next morning. It turns out that a doctor had once told Queen Victoria that a “snifter” at night might...
The pandemic has made it absolutely clear that we are not “all in the same boat”. More accurately, all recruitment businesses have been through the same storm - but our ships are different. Many recruitment businesses I know had their best ever year in 2020, and have continued that growth in 2021....
I interviewed with a client last week to recruit internal staff for her recruitment business. I listened to four interviewees talk us through their successes. Every one of them, unsurprisingly, glossed over their biography as if the whole thing had been planned in detail from the day they joined...
I think most business owners will agree they are doing all they can to assist recruitment sales right now. Add candidate reluctance to move into the mix of employer uncertainty and IR35 changes and you have the perfect storm for many recruiters. So, they have invested in tools. Better marketing,...
Most of the recruiters I know tell me that engaging great candidates is really hard. Despite increased candidate availability in some sectors, most are extremely reluctant to move and risk their employment rights. At the same time, many are dealing with a deluge of unsuitable candidates. Why?...
One of the biggest fetishes in business is especially worshipped in the recruitment industry. A “never give up” mindset, the determination to “power through”, a value system that celebrates “grit” and dogged repetition. Some recruiters I know argue that this is more important than ever. I don’t...
In my last blog, I discussed whether a genuine specialist can make a move to a new recruitment market. The answer is a conditional “yes” – as the key to a specialist making the move relies on successful adaptation. And successful adaptation boils down to one thing – how you sell your proposition....
A few years back, I was in the position of explaining to a substantial recruitment workforce why their contracts had to change to a new recruitment market. Some staff were clearly suspicious of the changes. Some of the staff were finding the legal language a little hard to understand. I explained...
In my last blog, I began to outline what you need to do to maximise your chances of success when entering a new market. Here is part two – you can get a refresher on part one here, or continue reading to for the final four points… This is a guide only, please seek professional help when entering a...
In one of my recent blogs, I referred to the VUCA environment (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity) in which most recruitment businesses now find themselves. In this world, agility is key. That may mean: Rapidly changing your proposition or product Finding new geographies Entering...
To adapt Jane Austen, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a recruitment leader must never, ever be a micromanager. Every time the phrase comes up, recruiters tend to shake their heads sagely and concur that micromanagement is a bad thing. But in the present situation particularly, perhaps...
Getting a shareholders’ agreement is a must for recruitment business owners. Sadly, lockdown pressures have laid bare the dysfunctionalities of lots of relationships, in partnerships with “pre-existing conditions” that weren’t apparent in good times. In some cases, partners responses to the...
Lockdown has presented recruitment businesses with an opportunity to reassess their staff skills, knowledge and training. I know many business owners who have realised that busyness often camouflages a lack of skills among staff. James, who owns a healthcare agency told me “I discovered that many...
A few weeks ago, I was helping a client with their cash flow forecast prior to a CBILS application. One of the changes he’d made to his budget pulled me up short. He had completely deleted his marketing spend. His thinking went like this: I built this business without marketing, other than e-shots...
A really interesting aspect of the current crisis is how, even in the recruitment industry, it has affected businesses so differently. Some are actually better off and experiencing increased demand. Some specialise in markets which are so candidate oriented, including international remote workers,...
The other weekend I got stuck behind someone who I’ll call “NOT a frequent flyer” or NAFF, for short. He wasn’t any older than me, was wearing an expensive-looking suit, and it was quite clear that he didn’t do airports very often. At check in, he took half an hour to find his boarding pass and...
I met a new client this week who has did really well during the recession. And his business is doing well now – just not as well as some of his competitors. We looked at his management accounts and then at his Key Performance Indicators. Get this – he had set minimum standards for each of his...
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