I was having an interesting conversation with a recruiter in Dallas last week about including HR instead trying to avoid it like the plague when working a deal.
His view was that his success is based on including HR and not trying to work around them. He feels that the recruiters who avoid HR end up having to include them anyways so why not reach out right from the beginning.
His opinion was that when HR realizes there is a recruiter who is clearly doing everything they can do in order to avoid them, it sets the stage for a play doomed to failure whereas when the recruiter starts off by involving HR in the process, things work out for the better.
I think most recruiters would disagree with the above.
On to the next, last Friday Dave Staats wrote a post here on the Fordyce website about Splits. It’s something I know about because many years ago I had a little side business with a call center that supported 65 recruiting firms in the semiconductor industry that did splits. Dave says:
“but I swear…If I had all the time back that I have spent TALKING about making splits with people and trying to make splits with people I probably could have done twice as many regular deals. I actually do one now and then but it just seems like way more prince-less frog-kissing than should be done. ”
Dave is right. You spend lots of time working for half a fee. Having said that, there are ways to look at doing splits and developing splits partners that will not waste time.
I remember a friend named Gary Fowler saying to me that he views his splits partners as a client and as a result, I remember he shared almost every good candidate he recruited with his splits partners. As a result, he did generate a significant amount of money doing splits BUT, he will be the first to say that there was a whole pile of time wasted and since then, his splits percentages have come way down by choice.
The problem in a lot of splits relationships is that expectations are rarely ever managed properly. By this I mean that if you have a splits partner that sends you a resume with no deep understanding of what makes the candidate tick, it means you need to find out and you should not have to find out. It’s not your candidate.
Splits relationships work when you have a small group of recruiters in your industry that are successful that can close candidates (real important) and know that time wasted is time lost. And very important, if you pride yourself on being a recruiter, don’t come to work in the morning excited about working some other firms order for half a fee. You won’t get ahead.
The other thing you can consider is if you are already part of a small group of recruiters doing splits in the same industry, it will make sense to hire a researcher to collectively support your needs. It’s a real small price to pay for the results you will get.
Are you going to the Fordyce Forum?
