One of the first questions I get asked at every meeting with Clients and Candidates is: “How’s the market”.
2015 has been an exceptionally busy year. It’s been the first time in a long time that we have seen consistent demand across all white-collar industry sectors for experienced Recruitment Consultants.
We cannot find enough experienced Consultants to meet our client’s demands.
If you haven’t been doing well and billing good numbers in this environment then you’re doing something wrong.
I often refer to recruiting Recruiters as being like the “canary in the coalmine”. We are often the first to hear from a number of sources (our clients) when a particular industry sector is quiet. Our clients tell us very quickly when their industry is softening and there is little or no demand for their services. That has certainly not been the case in 2015.
We have made a number of placements this year into Banking and Construction. They had both been reasonably dormant sectors for a few years but have definitely picked up again this year. There continues to be a very heavy demand for experienced Recruiters in IT and in the Digital / Marketing industries.
The bottom line is, in 2015 we were able to place experienced Consultants with a demonstrable track record of billing in excess of a three time multiple of their salary package into any industry sector.
I am a firm believer that most Agencies are still running very lean and the demand for Consultants is coming from growth as a result of greater demand from clients.
One of the biggest problems facing the Recruitment industry for 2016 and beyond is that everyone is “fishing from the same pond” in terms of trying to attract experienced Consultants.
Very few agencies are prepared to bring in green Consultants and train them up which is severely restricting their growth. We are seeing a lot of recycling of average Consultants due to the lack of training and mentoring of newbies by small to mid sized Agencies.
We are looking forward to continued growth and demand from our clients in 2016. How has your year been? I’d love to know your thoughts on the year and how we can address the talent shortage in the Recruitment industry.
