Why Does Executive Recruiting Fail?

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Industry standards show that about 63% of retained executive searches result in hiring a desired candidate. With that track record, it is not surprising that many companies are dissatisfied with their use of executive recruiters. Why does executive level recruiting fail? There are numerous factors that have driven these results from both client and recruiter perspectives.

The top ten executive recruitment problems include:

1. Lack of clarity in defining the position needs and requirements
2. Limited involvement of the hiring manager, especially early in the search process
3. Client focus primarily on cost/price versus the quality of delivery
4. Lack of relevant recruiter experience, expertise and contact bases
5. Over reliance on researchers versus senior recruiters in the search efforts
6. Only using existing resumes from the recruiter’s database and online job board sources without significant personal networking activity
7. Large numbers of conflicts in “off limit” companies for the recruiter to source top talent
8. Use of non exclusive contingency arrangements that create marketplace confusion and do not establish a close working relationship between clients and recruiters
9. Recruiter compensation arrangements that are not success based and share risk with the client
10. Balance of recruiter’s sourcing and selling skills to deliver the best candidate for a client

The most critical executive recruitment success factors to overcome these issues include:

• Ensuring well thought through and documented position descriptions and candidate qualifications
• Carefully evaluating individual recruiter’s experience, areas of expertise, recruitment approach, and client service focus including doing reference checks
• Demanding to learn the recruiter’s sourcing and networking strategy to gain access to “hidden talent”
• Utilizing risk sharing and success based compensation arrangements to align interests
• Establishing partnership based relationships with professional recruiters to enhance their client knowledge, loyalty and ability to perform

Executive recruiting will continue to evolve along with more sophisticated buyers and client centric recruiters. Successful recruiting requires efforts from both parties in a collaborative approach. Establishing partnership based relationships with top quality, performance driven recruiting organizations is essential versus utilizing a largely cost driven, vendor management approach to work with the best recruiters in the marketplace.