Most corporate recruiting departments struggle to fully support the recruiting needs of their organizations. This is not to say that there aren’t strong recruiting functions or recruiters on the corporate side, but corporate recruiting does struggle with an image issue that is at least somewhat deserved. A couple weeks ago I published an article that stirred up conversation between corporate and third party recruiters, so I thought I’d follow up with a more detailed understanding of the corporate recruiter’s role. This perspective should be beneficial for some agency recruiters to understand why their corporate recruiting counterparts sometimes struggle to fill openings, and also suggests what corporate recruiting leaders should be fixing.
In closing, don’t interpret any of this article to say corporate recruiters don’t work hard. Most of the ones I know do truly work hard, but they don’t have the recruiting skill set, motivation, and focus (see points above) to truly be successful to the degree their organizations need them to be.
In full accountability, a good part of these challenges are created by the recruiting function (or at least recruiting leadership) itself. We’ve not been able to provide enough on the value proposition side to say “leave us alone” when it comes to HR distractions. We’ve also not been able to create appropriate compensation structures to attract and retain the best recruiters in the market. I’m not completely sold that recruiting should be rolled into HR at all.