Welcome to the Recruitment People podcast, the place where employers and candidates unite to uncover the art of successful recruitment. Hi, I'm Kelly Charity, a recruiter and agency owner with over two decades of recruitment experience. In this podcast series, I'm going to dive deep into the heart of hiring and job seeking, sharing actionable insights, expert advice, and of course, a little bit of fun along the way. Whether you're looking to sharpen your hiring practices or navigate your career path, we've got you covered. So let's get started and unlock the secrets to recruitment success together. Hello and welcome to the Recruitment People Podcast. Today we're discussing why using multiple recruiters might be failing your company. Now, I'm your host, Adam Bell, and again, joining us in the studio is recruitment expert and owner of the Recruitment People, Kelly Charity, who will help us understand the drawbacks of this common practice and why maybe a focused approach might be far more effective. Kelly, welcome to the studio. Nice to see you again. Fantastic. Okay, so let's start by explaining why some companies choose to work with multiple, recruiters, because you can sort of understand maybe that the idea is, well, you know, the more we have working on our companies, our vacancy, the better, but not necessarily the case. No, it's not. It's not. I mean, the problem with working with multiple recruiters is that it tends to be a race to introduce a candidate first, which is obviously compromising quality for speed. Okay, because if you're working with the same candidates as multiple agencies would be, the way it works is if you, it's only Your referral if you get it in first. Absolutely. So most recruiters terms say first introduction is the person that gets paid for that candidate. So when you work with multiple recruiters, it's a race to get a resume in front of you first. That doesn't mean to say that the resume is the best resume. It's just getting resumes in front of you. I've heard a lot of employees, sorry, employers say, our recruiters just, you know, send resumes and hope one sticks. Well, this is the reason why. This is paving the platform for that to happen, isn't it? You're not, you wouldn't be, if it's the race and that's the only way you're going to pretend, well, one of the best ways to be able to ensure you get the fee, you're not going to be doing your pre screening to the level it should be done, are you? Can't do it. I mean, you may have a candidate on your database that is pre screened. Pre screened, pre interviewed, which is great. Yeah. But again, that candidate on your own database might be with another recruiter. So you basically, as a, as an employer, not allowing the recruiter the opportunity To go through the entire process, take their time, speak to lots of different people, to find the best quality candidate for the role, because what you're saying is, well, I'm working with other recruiters, so whoever gets there first is going to be the winner. I can see, so it really just becomes a race. Compromising quality for, for speed. And, unfortunately, It's just not the way to work. I don't believe it's the way to work. So we don't work in that way. I can understand it. I mean, you were telling me about an example, uh, before we came on air here today tell me about that example where you had a, a client and he gave it to. 14 recruiters, 14 agencies. Talk me through that. So we, we work with a client on, a couple of exclusive roles, but there was a particular role that they wanted us to work on. And so out of the blue emailed us with 13 other recruiters. In the same email. Okay, so you could all see that you all had it. We could all see each other and said, Oh, Hey everybody. You know, here's the role description. Bring me your best. So one out of 14 is gonna win or get paid. So there's the question. So, you know, we've got clients we're engaged with, you know, we're partnering with them, we're really working tightly with them. So to be emailed with 13 other recruiters was a little bit smart a little. So I thought, Oh, I'm just, I'm going to leave this. I've got other more engaged clients. I'll just sit on this role and. I'm not going to race to beat 14 others Where again, you're all just potentially going to be throwing resumes because that's what they've set up to do. And even in that instance, I mean, you imagine the amount of time, if 13 recruiters sent them three candidates each, I mean, they're going to be overloaded with resumes. So they're not. It's not efficient. It's not. They're not getting the benefit of what a recruiter can do. By doing this. They're paying a fee for throwing, having resumes thrown at them. So anyway, I didn't do anything with the role. I didn't respond. I left it for about two weeks and then I called him and said, Hey, How are you getting on with your recruitment? And he said, Oh, nobody's, I haven't heard from anybody. Wow. And so we had a conversation about, you probably had a little wry smile as well. Yeah. Well, I wonder why. And so try to explain that. You know, you're asking all of these people to work when there's no value in the service. You don't, you're not valuing the work and effort that they're putting in. So therefore, why would they all fight against each other to hope they get paid at the end of doing their work? And so, yeah, nobody had worked the role, which was very, very interesting. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Did you then get a little bit more info and have a crack at finding him someone? What did he want to do from there? I talked to him about why he should only work with one recruiter, but he still didn't quite get it. it. Look, it's commonplace out there. I mean, I think, you know, as a society, we've been brought up to cast the net as wide as you can. Use, you competitive, you know, we live in a competitive world, a competitive business environment that surely if I'm using more, so I understand why we're even talking about this topic. We're trying to overcome a cultural norm. Absolutely. And I think, you know, you'd find that, there's many other industries that are similar like this. I mean, real estate is one that comes to mind, where, I know that they love to work exclusively. Most only will do that and then if you're not wanting to do that you might get a few who are desperate maybe for a listing. Yes. They'll take it on and but you've got to have multiple open homes. It's the same thing. Yeah. It becomes desperation. Yeah. You know, it's desperate for us. How do two agents have a open home on the same property? Do they do it back to, you know, who? Absolutely. It is like saying to five real estates, each of you go and sell my house and whoever sells my house first finds the first buyer. Yeah. We're all pulling from the same pool of people. That's right. But you have to allow you, particularly now in our industry, you have to allow for us to go through the process because we're speaking with the candidates. We're vetting them. We're making sure they're right for the role. If you don't allow us that time, because you want resumes as fast as you can get them, because there's all these other recruiters working on the role, we don't have time to go through the full process. So then you're compromising the quality. You're probably going to have less retention rates because they've just thrown a resume. They don't know that they're the right culture fit. You can make that decision as the employer. But as the employer, do you want to be making the decision that the recruiter should have already made on your behalf going through that process? So you're not paying, well you are, you're still going to end up paying, but you're not getting the full job done by the recruiter by doing that because it is a race to get Candidates in front of you. That's right. That's not ideal. And look, this really then brings me to, I guess, the other end of the scale where partnering with one particular recruit and getting a long term relationship with them is at the opposite end of the scale here. Cause if we look at that example, that 14 now who's going to bother spending time building a really firm relationship where you understand everything about them, when you know, he's just going to throw it to. All right. Let's even just say five recruiters. Whereas talk me through the benefits of, you know, partnering with one agency long term, I mean, if you're partnering with one recruiter, that recruiter is going to understand your business, your culture, your planning, your business plan for the future. Understand where I suppose, who, who's going to fit into your organization and really. Partner with you. So when they place the first person, they get it right. Now they know who you like. Then they get onto the second placement. They now know who's going to work with that person because they recruited that person, starting to know everybody, you know, and taking that time. I mean, time and again, you know, employers will say, Oh, here's the job description. off you go. It doesn't work like that. You know, that tends to be the throw a resume and hope it sticks approach. We don't work in that way because we're not here to throw resumes at you. We're here to find you the right candidate. And we can't do that unless we're afforded the time and the opportunity to do so. But it's about understanding the entire business and the culture. to get that fit right. When you lay down those two concepts of what we've just talked about there, you actually understand the term resume throw, don't you? So on one hand, you know, you'll have clients out there who are saying, I want to get as many people working on this as possible because in my mind, that's the best way to find the right person. But geez, I hate recruiters who just throw resumes at you and don't care about whether they're the right person, but that is what's setting it, The opposite is true when you partner with someone, they can't throw a resume at you because they know it's not going to stick. They know you, they want to find you the right person. Yeah. And you're getting more, you know, as an employer, you're getting more value for money because we're actually being paid to do the full job. Recruitment process, because we have to find the right candidate. We have to find the, you know, the right culture fit. We have to find the right match and you're only going to get one or two resumes because you're allowing us and affording us the opportunity and the time to find the right people when you use in, the, let's throw the net out and see who we get. Well, firstly, you're not efficient because now you're going to get. A plethora of resumes, or if you're unlucky like the other employer, you get zero. You get no , you're gonna get a plethora of resumes. Now you have to go through all of that recruitment process yourself. Recruitment fees are not cheap. Your recruiters should be working really hard to make sure the people they put in front of you are the right people not putting resumes in front of you. Look, this, there's a difference. This reminds me of a. An episode we did a, a while back and it's all starting to link together here, Kelly. You only give your, your employers one resume because you find the right person. Now let's talk about the guy with 14. What have you worked with you? You knew his business, you knew him backwards. He gave you the time to spend on it. Here's the one. And I remember you saying. Yes. I'm not going to show you the runner up. I can if you like. If you want to, if you want to spend some extra time that you don't need to. If you find that the first one's not right, then, which I'll be very surprised if you do. In fact, you won't. But if you do, here is the runner up. However, can you imagine that where he didn't, he gave it to you and here's your one resume. Yeah. And I'm telling you it's the right, because I know you, I know your business and I know this person will work. Yes. And, and that's where it comes in terms of feeling, I suppose, valued. If you know, if you've got the time in the relationship with the client, they value what you're doing. So you, they're allowing you the time to take, to go through the proper process. If you're just searching for a resume that matches the brief quickly. You're not doing it thoroughly. You're just looking at a piece of paper and saying, Oh, they're a business development manager. You want a business development manager in logistics. Here you go. Match made, right? Well, no, it doesn't quite work like that, but you've got a resume in front of them, but they don't value what you're doing and they don't value the process. So you're not valuing the sort of the relationship by throwing a resume at them because it's about speed. You're doing yourself a disservice. Absolutely. And then our retention rate is low. There's, you know, high turnover and they go, well, what, you're not giving us the right match. We haven't had time. So it's really difficult relationship to navigate when you have that kind of relationship with your client. Let me play devil's advocate. Then we've talked about the extreme example of 14. Yeah. Okay. 14. What if there's some employers here now thinking, okay, I'm getting what you're saying here. It makes sense. Why wouldn't I use maybe two at a maximum three agencies? Surely I can still get the value you're talking about with that. It's the same. We're all pulling from the same pool of people. It doesn't matter whether it's 14 or two, does it? It doesn't matter whether it's one, two or three, two or three. Um, you're still pulling from the same pool of people. So what it means is that you're asking me to put my time and effort into all of these candidates and go through the process And at the end of it, the other recruiters presented three candidates. I've presented three candidates, made the best person win. Well, that's fine. But now I'm not going to get paid for my work. So why would I go through that process? It's about like a real estate agent. I want to be paid to do the job that I can do and do very well. And I want to give you the right candidate that I'm a hundred percent sure. Not two or three that I'm going to get in real quick in case the other recruiters got it. Whether it's 1, 2, 3, 4, or 14. Correct. Makes sense. Yeah. Makes sense. Fantastic. And Sorry, just to add there, the other thing with, you know, working with, say, for example, two recruiters, is that, you're working with the same pool of people. I'm going through this process and spend a lot of time, and then I go through an interview with candidate A, and Johnny tells me, I'm not working with any other recruiters. John is working with another recruiter and then Johnny gets sent to the same client twice. So not only is the employer then got a problem on their hands, because they're now got two recruiters arguing over a candidate. And then what it comes down to, like we spoke about just now is that the candidate that presented the recruiter that presented the candidate first is the one that gets the candidate. And so they get paid and the other recruiter doesn't. So even though we're allowed the opportunity because there's less recruiters working on it, only one of us Is going to get paid for the amount of effort we put in. And I can see that, and to sort of expand on maybe that example, I could see where, you know, potentially where you'll have one agency, well, the two that find the right, that same candidate, he is the right candidate. Now you go through and do all of your pre screening, All of your things to make sure that you know he's the right candidate and you spend a week and a half doing that. Agency B finds this one, says his resume looks pretty good, flicks it over, it arrives half an hour before, and they're the resume throw, you've done everything. Now, they've got the resume throw lucky this time. Lucky them. Which does happen because that's how those recruiters work. You throw enough, one's going to stick occasionally. Great. But you've done all the hard work, but you're, again, you're not having a crack and just, yeah, hope this sticks, I can see how that, that can play out as well. It's pretty frustrating. And that's why the relationship with the client is so crucial. To say, you know, we need to be paid for the work that we do. So we don't want to be up against other recruitment companies. It's just, and let's be clear here. You're happy not to be paid if you don't find the right candidate. If you're given the opportunity, go through the process and don't find someone that's okay. You just don't want to. Be, you know, up against others where you do all the work, you do, you are a good chance or do find the right can, but you're still not going to get paid for it because they've chosen to. And I think in most cases now, if not all, you only work exclusively with clients. Is that right? Yep. Yep. I can see why it makes sense. Yeah. I mean, we had a client we've worked with for many years and, They came back to us recently. They were using multiple recruiters at the time that we went in to work with them. And very quickly, probably within the first six, seven months, we did work this way, several years ago when we set up the business and we were fighting against other recruiters because at the time we needed the work. So it's almost, it becomes a desperation situation. Like I talked about with a, with a. Correct. A real estate agent who's desperate for listings. Yeah. You just take it because you can. There's nothing else. And there's nothing else. But very quickly they realised that we were going through the full process regardless and the candidates we were giving them. Were of a higher quality. Yeah, of a higher quality retention rate was turning around. So they then started to use us exclusively anyway. So we kind of proved ourselves, but it was a national client and, they used us recently again, for four roles. They literally had one, candidate presented in each state, and that one candidate was offered the job. Wow. That's fantastic. Yeah. That's fantastic. That's the relationship because we know who they need. We're not fighting to the race to the bottom or fighting to throw resumes. You know, we're there to do the job. We do the job. We present the resume. We know who they need. They're going to get hired. Look, I've really enjoyed this episode. There is so much in what we're talking about here. And I think as we unpacked there, we're challenging our cultural way of thinking that the more working for you is the better, but there are cases that definitely is, is going to work against you. And this definitely is. So look, thanks Kelly for shedding light. pitfalls of using multiple agencies and recruiters. However, more so showing the benefits of using one. So look, if you're listening to this out there and, and this is sort of put a light bulbs gone on, give Kelly and a team a call and, and give using an exclusive agency a go, what have you got to lose it? You'll see that, this, Is the way to go and that you will get far better, better results using this streamlined approach. So look, we hope this discussion helps you rethink your recruitment strategies. And look, tune in next time to the next episode of the recruitment people podcast. Again, what is your, website Kelly? www. therecruitmentpeople. com. au. So plenty of information there, more podcast episodes. Please give us a like a share, whatever platform you're on. There's all sorts of ways you can do it. You can rate us, it depends what platform you're on as to what you do, but we do appreciate your support and look forward to you joining us next time on the recruitment people podcast. Thanks again, Kelly. Thank you, Adam.