• With many businesses not having had to recruit recruiters for some time and finance/procurement putting pressure on the department to keep costs low in February a major trend was clients seeking to find candidates at an initial pay grade and then having to increase the salary range available during the recruitment process to attract the right talent
• Note. This was not always upwards, some businesses bought into the commerciality aspect of the sourcing skills of the recruitment consultant over the in-house professional and downgraded the salary and role to bring in external recruiters
• Many of the businesses hiring in February were US owned companies, these businesses still operating in a candidate rich market in the States have put tremendous pressure on EMEA counterparts to hire within the salary range where possible and have often missed out on preferred candidates by being extremely aggressive during salary negotiation
• The noted trend of “paid on results” for in-house recruiters receiving specific placement bonuses for directly sourced candidates has continued in February; while it is still rare there have been stand out opportunities where clients are keen to reward almost as an external recruiter with a percentage of salary or flat bonus

In February there have been two very different drivers for clients when recruiting; relationships and delivery.

• As it becomes increasingly difficult to hire for all functions there has been an emphasis on seeking to find very strong relationship managers those who can manage expectation at line and ensure that candidates are offered who should be rather than the hiring manager holding out to see “just one more”
• Equally relationship management is becoming a critical part of the relationship with the candidate community.  As social media continues to broaden people’s exposure to potential employers and brands there is an increased emphasis on ensuring rejected as well as successful candidates walk away with appropriate feedback and still seeing a hiring company as a potential employer; the risk of the rejected candidate relaying a poor interview experience are now much higher and as such experience of managing this is in high demand

• DELIVERY – This is still a major focus, hiring managers are still extremely focused on bringing in people they feel they can entrust a hiring target to and see it delivered to time and to budget.  While many candidates are keen to talk strategy, marketing, routes to market, and about the impact of social media and their role in these areas time and again the client response is “that’s great but I just want someone who will deliver”
• Proper research and headhunting skills remain of great importance to hiring businesses.  Many see this next stage evolution of their recruiting function to improve direct access to potential senior hires as a critical cost save and engagement improvement opportunity for 2011 but (SALARY WARNING) the pay rates are not what you would get in search firms and this does put some candidates off when the role is similar and there’s little internal exposure to hiring managers

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