Recruitment & Corporate Success ForumThe highlights of a roundtable discussion hosted by Executives Online

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02 Contents

03 Our Experts

04 Recruitment & Corporate Success

06 Recruitment’s Role & Performance

08 Where Things Go Wrong

10 Flaws in the Process

12 Getting it Right

16 New Opportunities & Threats

18 Conclusion

Contents

Our Experts

Gill AitchisonChief Executive Marketing and Advertising ResearchIpsos MORI

Gordon SteeleFormer Sales and MarketingDirector, The Post Office

Samir PatelManaging Director, Ruskinn Group

Norrie JohnstonManaging Director,Executives Online

Tom HadleyDirector of External Relations,REC

Ewan McConnellGeneral Manager, British Energy Direct

Duncan SedgwickChief Executive, Energy Retail Association

Chaired by Evan DavisBroadcaster

Geraldine WardDirector, Nicholson McBride

Peter HeathManaging Director, EasyFairs UK

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This line of questioning was prompted bysome of our recent research. It suggeststhat companies are broadly apatheticabout recruitment. It takes them severalmonths to find the people they need andeven then, they struggle to find seniormanagers with the right mix of skills and experience. Yet despite theseshortcomings many aren’t activelychanging the way they recruit. It’s almost as if they have accepted that the recruitment status quo just can’t be bettered. The consensus seemed to be that, unlike just about every otherbusiness process you can name,recruitment simply cannot be refined or improved. Companies can acceleratetheir production lines, hone their CRMprocesses, make tiny percentage pointimprovements to their quality regime butthey can’t get any better at finding thepeople they need, when they need them.

If this is the case, then what about majorrecruitment trends and issues such asglobalisation and the online revolution?Should companies passively watch theseroll in - or is it worth trying to anticipateor even harness them?

To explore this we asked a group ofbusiness leaders and industry experts,who know a thing or two aboutrecruitment, to speak candidly abouttheir own experiences. They have workedwith established big brand names andspearheaded high tech start-ups. Theyhave faced many corporate challenges -from staging buyouts and expanding into Europe to merging companies andbuilding entrepreneurship into massiveorganisations.

We asked them whether, in their vast andvaried experience, recruitment has helpedor hindered their plans. Are companiesmanaging recruitment effectively and isthe recruitment industry geared up toactually meet their needs?

This Report charts the discussions and, as I’ll hope you agree, provides a thoughtprovoking examination of the rights andwrongs of recruitment today.

Norrie JohnstonManaging DirectorExecutives Online

Recruitment & Corporate SuccessDoes how we manage recruitment matter? Can it have animpact on corporate success? If so what needs to changeto make recruitment work better?

Are companies managing recruitmenteffectively and is the recruitment industrygeared up to actually meet their needs?

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For companies looking to expandquickly, recruitment is vital. Companiesthat have major growth strategies needto factor into their plans the time andexpense that will be involved in findingeach and every senior manager.

Take a small business with a workforce of five, planning to double the businessyear-on-year for the next five years. Its managing director will spend a hugepercentage of his or her time finding,interviewing, assessing, screening,appointing and settling in the 155additional employees that will beneeded if those growth plans aredelivered. This is not allowing for thetraining costs and upheaval if there is a mismatch between recruits and roles,and disruption to the team - during acritical time of high growth - if thoserecruited don’t fit.

“I can’t foresee in the next five years that I will stop recruiting. If I carry onrecruiting I can carry on growing andthat’s exactly what I’m interested indoing.” Peter Heath

Looking to the service sector - the fastestgrowing part of the UK economy - thedependency on people becomes evengreater. For many companies in consulting, accountancy, marketingservices and so forth their people are their business and their brand. They have the added dilemma of not just finding competent people, who knowthe industry and can do the job. Theyalso need people who fit the businessand will be ambassadors for the brand.

“We are a service organisation. So people are the absolute lifeblood of the company. In many ways, they arethe primary asset. Almost the greatestconstraint on growth is the load ofbrainpower and suitable people tolubricate the wheels to make the nextphase happen. Recruitment seems achore; it is very labour intensive but it is a major investment and strategic driver to making the business happeneffectively and sustaining the competitiveadvantage.” Ewan McConnell

People aren’t just vital in expandingbusinesses and people-orientated sectors. Senior managers have thepotential to make the biggest differencewhen times are tough and a businessneeds turning around or when thatcritical project needs putting back ontrack. Being able to recruit and retaingood people during such times is just as important.

“Recruitment should not be a process or a chore but a source of competitiveadvantage. You are competing for ascarce resource, for good people.However, I don’t think manyorganisations think of it that way. “Gordon Steele

Despite its importance, recruitmentremains a highly unpredictable function.Executives Online’s ‘Executive Talent 2006’report suggests it typically takes threeto six months for companies to find thesenior managers they need, and longerif the role is a highly specialist one.

“Six months is cited as a long time torecruit, but I think it would be great if itonly took that long. In my experience itcan often take a year to get the rightperson for a top role.” Gill Aitchison

What’s more, even with all of this timetaken, a third of staff typically leave any new job with in the first six months.

Samir Patel’s company is a recentmanagement buyout. It suppliesspecialist laboratory equipment tohospitals and currently employs eightpeople but will expand to 15 peoplevery shortly.

“The three to six months it takes to hiresomeone is a reasonable price to pay ifyou find the right person at the end… but it becomes ridiculous if they leaveafter three months.”

Companies appear to have accepted that the supply of good people isunpredictable. If the supply of energywere this unreliable, there would begeneral uproar within the commercialcommunity. Recruitment - rather likenational energy policy - would be highon the news agenda, and demandswould be made for a national strategy.

“It drives me mad; three to six months is just time businesses don’t have. I agree that’s how long recruitmenttakes but it’s just not good enough.When I have identified the need, I wantthat person now. I don’t want them insix months time; what’s my businessgoing to be like in six months time?”Gordon Steele

Recruitment’s Role & Performance

“The three to six months it takes to hiresomeone is a reasonable price to pay ifyou find the right person at the end…but it becomes ridiculous if they leaveafter three months.”

Every company has to recruit - it’s a factof life - but is recruitment actually that important?

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Where Things Go Wrong

Trouble at the TopA crucial part of the problem is thatorganisations at the top don’t appear to appreciate the importance of people.Recruitment is seen as purely a functionof the HR department, and HR itself is too often not privy to the widerbusiness strategy. This leaves the humanresource team ill-equipped to anticipatethe company’s people needs.

“One of the problems very often is that businesses don’t allow the HR guys to understand what is going on.They don’t actually integrate HR. No HR person is on the board, theydon’t attend operational meetings.” Duncan Sedgwick

The 2005 HR Performance IndicatorSurvey by HR consultancy, DLA, seems to bear this out. Its figure for HRrepresentation at board level across UKcompanies is just 60%.

“HR is about people and businesses arerun by people so HR must be integral.”Duncan Sedgwick

This lack of HR representation at Boardlevel equally means directors are leftuneducated about the HR function andits many tasks including recruitment.For instance, while the Board has anunderstanding of how key areas such as finance, IT and marketing work - fewthink about what recruitment involvesor think about it early enough.

“CEOs normally have a good grasp of finance and every other discipline,but how good are they at understanding the HR function? They want it doneimmediately and can’t see why they have to wait for a good result. It’s back to HR not being seen as strategic.”Geraldine Ward

This lack of awareness of recruitment as a strategic tool and a determinant of corporate success also means thatcompanies allow their own internalbureaucracies to inhibit recruitmentsuccess.

“All too often recruitment becomes alaborious bureaucratic process mired inlegislation and policy.” Gordon Steele

A lack of appreciation of therecruitment process at the top oforganisations also means senior decisionmakers just aren’t ready to move quicklyenough when they’re recruiting.

“Good people are in hot demand. If you go out looking for a good seniormanager, it’s no good getting to theshort-list stage before you ask yourboard members if they have any datesfree in their diaries for interviews. Great senior managers won’t sit aroundwaiting for the Board to find time tointerview them. Boards need to be readyto move incredibly quickly.” Norrie Johnston

There are a number of factors contributing towards this time delay -perhaps the most pernicious of these is the attitude of the Board.

Down the LineAt senior line manager level there is alsoa tendency to not take ownership of therecruitment process. Line managers aretoo quick to pass the task to HR.

“Recruitment only hits the radar whenthere is an acute pain. If the pain isn’tthat huge, we pass it down.” Peter Heath

The end result is a dangerous disconnectbetween the two. This is borne out inthe Executive Talent 2006 study whereHR managers seem to have a rosier viewof recruitment than their line managers.Line managers are almost three times aslikely to be worried about the difficultyin retaining senior managers.

If recruitment is to truly support abusiness, the relationships between HR and line managers need to deepen. Line managers need to be engaged inthe recruitment process.

“Unless the heads of our business unitstake full responsibility for recruitment,even at quite junior levels, we cannot be

sure that the people coming into thebusiness have the right culture, fit andskill base.” Gill Aitchison

Line managers need to share theirbusiness concerns and needs with HR so that the priorities are agreed.

“Sometimes I feel I need an interpreter to act between me and myHR department. The HR department is managing the process and I can’tcommunicate my energy, enthusiasmand need.” Gordon Steele

Equally, HR needs to share its expertise,insights and knowledge with theinternal management team.

“There is a danger that at selection, keybehaviours to look for, interviewingskills and the best approach to take arenot well communicated internally. HRmay need to work harder to transfersome of those skills and work in a moreintegrated way with people throughouttheir business. It’s about working intandem with the business andsupporting it.” Geraldine Ward

“If you transfer people to do a stintworking in HR, it gives them a muchclearer two-way understanding andhelps to integrate HR better into thebusiness.” Gill Aitchison

“Recruitment is not a third-party fairy godmother that deals with people for us. It’s a line issue working in partnership with HR specialists. You can’t divorce yourself from yourown responsibility to grow and developyour business.” Ewan McConnell

“HR is about people and businesses arerun by people so HR must be integral.”

“Recruitment onlyhits the radar whenthere is an acutepain. If the painisn’t that huge, we pass it down.”

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For instance, research by the Universityof Michigan on the ‘Validity and Utilityof Alternative Predictors of JobPerformance’ shows that your chancesof making an informed choice based on interview with CV are only 2% better than selecting at random. Yet asignificant proportion of recruitment is still done this way.

“You might as well flip a coin. Theproblems with this approach is you havea lack of consistency because differentpeople interview in different ways, it’svery subjective and there’s a real risk ofthe halo effect - the candidate looksalright so everything they say soundsalright.” Geraldine Ward

The recruitment brief is another sourceof failure. There is far too much focuson cultural fit and credentials and notenough examination of the actual jobrequired to be done.

“When we take a brief we ask clients tofocus on the job deliverables, the criticaltasks which the candidate will need todo. We say ‘forget the five page jobdescription; what’s this person got toachieve for you?’ ” Norrie Johnston

The problem appears to be thatorganisations don’t quite know whatthey need the person for. This isfrequently the case when they arerecruiting for an existing role. Whensomeone is leaving, there is a tendencyto go into automatic pilot and simplyreplace like with like - without re-evaluating the post, whether the scopeof the role should be changed orwhether the type of person employedbefore was any good.

Flaws in the Process

“The problem appears to be thatorganisations don’t quite know whatthey need the person for.”

In addition to the delays, some feel that the actual techniquesdeployed within the recruitment process - such as the highdependency on interviews and CVs - are also building failureinto the recruitment process.

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“If you don’t spend enough time writingout the spec and you’re not absolutelyclear what it is you are looking for, then it is extremely difficult for anyrecruiter to find the right person.”Duncan Sedgwick

An obsession with cultural fit alsonarrows the candidate choice. Whenstudied for the Executive Talent 2006Report, 50% of senior managers saidfinding people with the right cultural fitwas vital, making it more important thanfinding people with the right skills andexperience. This focus on fit radicallynarrows the number of candidatesconsidered - further reducing the chanceof recruitment success - and can resultin core competencies being sacrificed.

Geraldine Ward sees the actual interview process as flawed andadvocates assessment centres andcompetency–based interviewing.

“You start with recruitment andcompetencies, so you work out what it takes to be good in this organisation.What skills do you need?What behaviours do you need? What experience do you need? That becomes a theme and a streamthat goes right through appraisal and development.”

A preoccupation with cultural fit couldalso lead to companies falling foul ofthe legislators.

“You have to be very careful with culturalfit, especially in the present climatebecause you can get sued. What doescultural fit mean?” Tom Hadley

MeasurementA further issue appears to be lack of measurement. Every aspect ofcorporate life is closely assessed today.The heavy involvement of procurementmeans that ROI measures are applied to marketing, sales, IT and so forth.However, recruitment is not subject to close measurement and this lack of rigour could be an issue - enablingpoor practices to go unquestioned and the status quo to remain.

In Executives Online’s research, when assessing whether their seniorrecruitment has been a success, only 27% of companies said theymeasure the quality of candidate hired and almost 10% have no formal measurement at all.

“You will monitor costs for the 500people in the call centre and know what staff turnover is. But once youstart stepping up a level to managementpositions, it tends to be a more generalsense of losing a couple of people. I would be able to recite quite easily theturnover rates in call centres, but not atsenior levels.” Duncan Sedgwick

“You can find figures for the averagecost of recruiting someone, but that’sjust an average. There are also hiddencosts of getting it wrong.” Geraldine Ward

There appear to be few establishedprotocols in place to measure the manyhidden costs of recruitment failure -such as loss of morale in the rest of theteam, delays to the business strategy,the cost of managing or retraining thebad recruit.

“Getting recruitment wrong at thesenior level is often seen in the cost of losing and replacing junior people in their team who may leave as a result.Sadly, by the time you discover that thereason they have left is as a reaction to a bad recruitment over them, it is too late.” Gill Aitchison

“In my experience, there’s never been ametric where I have looked at the costof recruitment over an period of time,or measured the success of recruitment.”Gordon Steele

The lack of measurement in companies,combined with a lack of boardroominterest in ‘people’ issues mean that the bottom-line impact of recruitmentdoesn’t get analysed - as such there islimited appetite to change things.

“Few measure whether recruitment works.”

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where IT specialist recruiters are alreadyacting as partners - anticipating needsand strategically supporting businesses. This needs to be emulated more widely.

“Within the IT sector they say ‘you aresetting up a new IT system; let me tellyou now that will be tough to recruitfor.’ ” Tom Hadley

Like the HR function, recruitmentagencies need to be allowed to workmore closely with companies, so thatthey are in a position to proactivelysupport their plans. If this approachextends to other parts of the recruitmentindustry, the sector will move away frombeing a matter of who can be first witha CV on the desk and become more of a real value-added service.

“You expect your own HR team tounderstand your business culture andpeople, but I think it’s also down tothem to have a close relationship withtwo or three recruitment companiesthat also really understand the business.That way you don’t have to wait untilthere is a vacancy.“ Gill Aitchison

This shift in roles will require a shift inclient mind-set.

“Clients say on the one hand theywant a greater choice of top-levelcandidates, but they then try to squeezethe margin out. If they keep doing this,how will recruitment companies be ableto afford to innovate? How will they beable to offer a wider choice and a betterservice? They can’t have it both ways.”Norrie Johnston

Play for KeepsOrganisations also need to look at their personnel planning and retentionstrategies. The CIPD Annual Survey 2005showed that 60-70% of companiessuccession plan on an ad hoc basis, or not at all. Given the difficultyorgansiations have replacing people, this needs to be remedied, and staffretention needs to become a priority.

“Say you’re in the pharmaceuticalindustry and you have a highlyspecialised piece of equipment. The dayit breaks down, your business breaksdown. Would you wait for it to breakdown? No, you would plan for it andyou would start developing ways to fillthat gap. That’s a role that strategic HRshould be playing. It’s a case of planningfor the business and working out whatit will take to keep people, motivatethem and develop them in the rightway.” Geraldine Ward

“It’s a recruit, retain, develop process -and it must never stop.” Peter Heath

Getting it RightThere are a number of potential ways in which recruitmentcould be improved - either by reducing staff churn, increasing acompany’s appeal, increasing the choice of talent or acceleratingthe process.

Change RelationshipsCurrently unfilled senior vacancies are at an all time high. In such a ‘seller’smarket’ recruitment needs to be viewedas much more of a two-way street.

“It is sometimes astonishing thatemployers don’t recognise thatindividuals also have a choice.” Duncan Sedgwick

Companies need to open themselves upto potential employees - let them get aproper insight into the organisation - and if expensive and disruptive employeechurn is to be avoided, they must bebrutally frank about the task ahead.

“I would never recruit anyone, even at a very junior level, without letting themcome in and talk to anyone they want.Candidates should spend at least a day if not more, touring around andchatting with a whole range of people.” Duncan Sedgwick

“When you get to the shortlist, try tobring in the candidates two or threetimes and give them as much exposureas possible to the organisation so theysee it warts and all. You can’t deceivethem; you have to let them know whatit is really like so they can make aninformed choice.” Ewan McConnell

AgenciesThe dynamics of the relationshipbetween agencies and clients also needto change. Recruitment agencies need tobe allowed to work more proactivelywith the industries they serve. The ITsector is a good example of an area

“You can’t deceive them; you have tolet them know what it is really like sothey can make an informed choice.”

“It’s a case of planning for the businessand working out what it will take tokeep people, motivate them and developthem in the right way.”

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Build the BrandThe challenge of attracting the rightpeople fast enough also means employersmust take a fresh look at what they haveto offer potential employees.

“We spend so much time on ourcustomer brand, but in a tight market,you have to start thinking about theemployer brand.“ Geraldine Ward

Smaller companies, competing fortalent, are instinctively aware of this.

“People come to us because we arecommunicating to the market that we’rea good place to work.“ Peter Heath

However, many larger companies are also working hard to promote theiremployer brand.

“You have to develop people, providecareer structure and try to ensurepeople have a positive view of yourcompany.” Gill Aitchison

The decision to use training and staffdevelopment as a crucial plank in -recruitment strategy creates another recruitment problem - poaching. Even so, career development is still seen as a ‘must have’.

“My people get continual callsfrom head-hunters because theyknow we offer great training andhave good people… it places evenmore importance on us ensuringthat we have a great environment to work in.” Gill Aitchison

“The utopian ideal of everyone trainingand developing their people is nevergoing to happen. We have decided tofight on the attracting ground ratherthan head hunting or poaching.” Peter Heath

Staff and the media can also play a partin the attraction process, by acting as‘brand ambassadors.’

“Bringing HR into the everyday lives ofthe individual employees is a way ofperpetuating the whole process ofretention. You need to develop a culturewhere if everybody respects and reallyunderstands the value of having anothergood person like them workingalongside them, then everybody is goingto win. You also do something simplelike putting a bounty on referringfriends.” Peter Heath

“Ultimately it’s all about what peoplesay about your company. Do your ownemployees advocate working for you?Do you get good things written aboutyou in the press?” Gill Aitchison

Be FlexibleIn a bid to tackle the recruitmentchallenge, other options such as interimmanagers, project managers andsecondments are proving to be attractivealternatives for both companies and forthe growing band of senior managersover 50 who may have found themselves‘recruited out’ of organisations.

“There are quite a lot of people with theskills, who choose to work in a flexibleenvironment. That is something that isdeveloping in the UK and across the restof Europe.” Tom Hadley

The interim management sector wasworth £450 million in 2005 up 15% on2004. Its rising popularity is becauseinterims address, head-on, thelimitations of permanent recruitment.

“With an interim manager you do getthem next week.” Tom Hadley

“Interims do have a very definite role toplay, and I have used them when I wantto kick-start something new quickly orif I think I have a big vacancy withoutsomeone to develop into it. Why have avoid for six months while you arerecruiting?” Ewan McConnell

In addition to being sourced in days,and available immediately, interims canbe selected to deliver a key project andare often over qualified for the task in hand.

“If you can create the right relationship,you get far more out of an interim thanyou do out of some existing employeesbecause of the greater skill level.“Gordon Steele

Whereas a permanent employee maytake months to find and then takeseveral more months to ease into anorganisation and start making adifference, an interim can make theirpresence felt extremely fast. “With our interim service we can go

from client brief, to a perfect candidatein place and delivering within a week.”Norrie Johnston

“If you really want someone to get stuck in to make things happen quickly,I would go for the interim…If an interimhasn’t hit the ground running and isn’tmaking a difference within a week, theyare the wrong one. And if they do notwork out, you can swap them againincredibly quickly.” Duncan Sedgwick

Interims are being used to plug theaforementioned six month gap - whilstthe permanent recruit is found - andindeed to help with the recruitmentprocess itself.

“I have often said to an interim thattheir job is to find their replacement.“Gordon Steele

They are also being deployed to helpwith that all-important task of ‘peopledevelopment’ for organisations whodon’t want to have to look outside theircompany to fill a role.

“You may well have the 55-year oldinterim with 30 years’ experience who is helping the 30-year old internal toget up a very steep learning curve…someone who might be really good, but he just hasn’t had the experience.”Duncan Sedgwick

Despite these benefits, Norrie Johnstonbelieves organisations such as theInterim Management Association shouldbe doing more to promote the benefitsof interim management to companies.

“Interims are a real solution to apressing recruitment problem, but toofew companies in the UK know whatthey offer or how to use them. Giventhe way recruitment delays can inhibit a business from moving forwards, that’s bad news for UK plc too.”

In addition to interims, someorganisations are looking to theirsuppliers - particularly those in theservice sector - to help them plugtemporary gaps. Such secondmentstypically involve the supplier secondinga member of staff to their client’sorganisation.

Such an arrangement obviously providesfor a closer bind between theorganisations, which is good for thesupplier. However, rather like supplychain management - where retailershave rewarded key suppliers with evercloser working relationships, but inreturn have demanded that those‘chosen’ suppliers deliver to anticipatedorder - that deepening of links hascome at a price. In essence the supplieris taking on some of their client’s peoplemanagement problems.

“Quite often our clients are also askingus to allocate people from our teamsinto their own companies, for exampleto cover gaps arising from maternityleave. It is good experience for thoseinvolved, on both sides, though italso adds to our resource pressures.”Gill Aitchison

“You have to develop people, providecareer structure and try to ensurepeople have a positive view of yourcompany.”

“If you can create the right relationship,you get far more out of an interim than you do out of some existingemployees because of the greater skill level.”

“Interims are a real solution to apressing recruitment problem, but toofew companies in the UK know whatthey offer or how to use them.”

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GlobalisationFew will have missed the headlines -whether it’s plumbers coming to the UKfrom Eastern Europe or call centres beingoperated out of India - globalisation isimpacting on the availability of labour.True, it is expanding the available talentpool that companies can draw on, but it’snot having as profound an impact onsenior recruitment as the headlineswould have you believe.

“One of the options is internationalrecruitment, and a lot of companies aredoing that in the European labourmarket. That brings its own difficulties.”Tom Hadley

UK talent mobility lags behind the restof Europe. For instance every other EUcitizen speaks a second language -except in the UK where 70% only speakone language.

Logic would suggest this leaves UKemployers with an advantage - a UK workforce which is less likely tomove overseas - plus access to newoverseas talent.

“If you compare us to the US wherepeople move around according to need,there isn’t that same mentality here.”Tom Hadley

However, there are barriers inhibitingthe flow of talent into the UK.

“When you identify people in otherparts of the world and want to bringthem across, it’s much less of an issuenow within the enlarged EU, but to getsomeone from Australia or South Africacauses issues with legislation and workpermits.” Gill Aitchison

The announcement by the Commissionon the European Services Directive isseen by some industry insiders as afurther step backwards.

“Despite all the talk about competitivenessacross Europe, what’s happened is thatthe protectionism of France and Germanyhas won the day.” Tom Hadley

Online Revolution Online recruitment advertising is now at£150 million a year and it is even havinga marked affect on senior recruitment.The speed and breadth of candidatesthat the Web offers are attracting many corporates.

In the UK there are around 500 jobboards and candidates are beingextremely savvy and proactive, signingup to them as both active and passivejobseekers. So their potential reach ishuge.” Norrie Johnston

The ease of registering on the web ischanging the whole dynamic ofcandidate availability.

“Headhunters have traditionally saidthat the best candidates are not looking.That’s no longer true because of theonline market.” Norrie Johnston

“We actually placed one advert for a PRperson online and we had 500-600 hitsinside two days… We were surprised bythe bandwidth we caught.” Samir Patel

Not all companies are convinced bythe online revolution.

“When recruiting over the webinstinctively I worry about quality notquantity. We have around fourrecruitment web-sites dedicated to ourindustry but I have had minimal successin recruiting candidates through thesesites.” Gill Aitchison

Executives Online’s recent researchsuggests that while job boards orcompany web sites are being deployedby 34% of companies, they lag someway behind candidates in terms of theirunderstanding and use of the Web.

“Most companies are pretty black andwhite about it - they see the web assimply equalling job boards, a lowvalue-add service which deluges themwith CVs that they then struggle tohandle. Whereas we are a traditionalrecruitment company which happens to use the web to attract candidates and clients. That’s a business modelwhich will flourish moving forwards.”Norrie Johnston

The need for the human touch inrecruitment is unlikely to go away.

“The web might increase the reach but at the end of the day there has tobe that human selection process, whichis what Executives Online is doing. You can use the web in a smart way, but ultimately that personal interactionhas to be there.” Geraldine Ward

“The web has changed the way a lot of people work, for sure, but I think thetwo recruitment models work together.”Tom Hadley New Opportunities & Threats

Globalisation plus the web are the two major trends whichcould impact on the recruitment process moving forwards.

“If you compare us to the USwhere people move aroundaccording to need, there isn’t that same mentality here.”

“In the UK there are around 500 jobboards and candidates are beingextremely savvy and proactive, signingup to them as both active and passivejobseekers.”

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All too often HR is sidelined and theboard does not give it the priority it merits. There needs to be a far closer relationship between HR andmanagement and it must be seen as a two-way street where employees have as much choice as employers who therefore need to build their brandand promote their organisation as anattractive place to work. Appointmentsneed to be accelerated and greaterflexibility is required all round, frommaking greater use of the Web, toimproving talent mobility across Europe.A sea-change is called for, whererecruitment shifts from being a chore to an integral part of an organisation’sstrategy to boost competitive advantage.

About Executives OnlineExecutives Online offers a fast-track,executive resourcing service and is theUK’s fastest growing interim provider. Drawing on its 10,000-strong network of senior management talent - spanningall job functions and industry sectors -Executives Online quickly provides senior and board-level executives for interim assignments, projects,change programmes or permanentrecruitment. Executives Online’s clientsinclude Plcs, SMEs, government andpublic sector bodies, not for profitorganisations, venture capital andprivate equity firms.

ConclusionRecruitment is vital given that people are one of a company’s primary assets, but the recruitmentprocess is not a smooth one and there is room for improvement at every stage in the procedure.

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