The value of the right hire

I went swimming today and the thing about it is that when you’re swimming, there’s no one to talk to, there’s no iPod to listen to. It’s just you and the water. Plenty of thinking time.

So on this morning’s workout I was reminded again of Steve’s post on how complicated the staffing industry has been. Why can’t we just go back to basics? Why can’t it just be about the best candidate for the best price?

I agree with Steve, it should be as basic as that. But the thing is, the industry feels that just providing the candidate for the best price doesn’t present much value to it. Heck, even I, as a college student working my first agency job, thought it was gonna be a piece of cake. Find this person for this job. Match ‘em up. How hard would that be? So we add on things that, as Steve’s post demonstrates, complicates things.

But anyone in the industry knows it isn’t that easy to match up a candidate with a job. We all look for things. We all have our individual recruiting practices. We all recruit based on our individual criteria. And we all know why we go to such lengths to screen candidates — it’s because we know what’s riding on our placements.

Which is, I think, all that needs to be the main message communicated to our clients. It’s not this reporting feature or that online invoicing feature that we offer. Those are just tools for convenience.

What’s riding on our placements?

No matter what we recruit for, whether it is a front desk receptionist, a PCB assembler, or a software engineer, they are individually crucial to a company’s success. The critical roles they play in a company should be value enough for a staffing service.

The receptionist you place will represent your client and will be the very first person that greets their clients when they walk through the door. Pick the wrong one and it could just break your client’s image.

The assembler you place will be holding a hot soldering iron on that costly printed circuit board. Pick the wrong one and it could cost your client thousands of dollars in damaged components.

The software engineer you place will be writing the code to what could be your client’s next cutting edge application. Ask the client how much damage a bad code can cost and see if that cost is worth the penny-pinching in hiring a mediocre staffing firm based on price.

That’s where the value of a staffing firm lies. The value of the right hire.