What is Headhunting in recruitment terms?

To answer this, you first need to understand what a Headhunter is.

A Head hunter is an individual who excels at finding individuals for senior level positions – but this is not to be mistaken with normal recruitment practices as there are some big differences, which will be looked at below.

We wanted to learn more about the Headhunting market and how the internet was either helping or hindering the processes, so contacted Executive Headhunters and spoke to their Managing Director, Phil Sharp.

“The internet has made a big difference to the headhunting market, some positive, some negative.

When the first job boards came online there was a general fear amongst traditional recruitment agencies that they would represent a major threat to their business models; the expectation was that companies would be able to find candidates directly, more cheaply.

The growth of the internet and the evolvement of social and business networking sites such as linkedin and facebook, have further raised these fears in recent years.”

Growth in the Headhunting Market

Whilst contingency recruitment agencies, those working on a “no win no fee” type basis, have seen these tools have a negative impact on their businesses, they have helped provide a real stimulus for growth in the headhunting market.

“The reason for this is fairly simple.  Companies can now get access to more candidates for their roles, more quickly than before and for less money than a recruitment agency would charge.  They are typically finding the same people themselves that the recruitment agencies were providing previously. “

Who are the candidates that a Headhunter seeks?

Candidates who are not on the open job market tend to be very wary of advertising their presence on social websites as this can lead to them being inundated with calls and emails from recruitment companies.  These people tend to be happy in their current role and doing a good job for their current employer, in short they are the highest quality.

These are the people a good headhunter will identify and attract to your business!!

Headhunting and Social Media Websites

A good headhunter will use the social and business networking sites as a networking tool and not as a candidate database and in this respect they can be very useful.

“Senior level candidates are becoming more and more aware of the negative impact their presence on social networking sites can have, with potential employers and even customers “looking them up” as part of a referencing process.

In the future, the growth of tools such as these will aid the growth in headhunting as clients will be increasingly be bombarded with volumes of poor quality candidates, with those highest quality hires coming from the pool of people who are doing a good job, are happy where they are but are receptive to a direct approach.”

In terms of sourcing candidates, the introduction of the increasing number of networking and social media websites has been of no real benefit! Each Headhunter will have their own network of contacts with whom they will keep in close contact with – the social media sites are being used for networking purposes only.

Executive Headhunters are a specialist Headhunting organisation dealing with senior level appointments throughout the UK.

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