What’s The Difference Between An In-House Recruiter And An Agency Recruiter?
Recruitment has many faces. It is HR, people management, talent attraction, and employer branding rolled into one. It’s also a job grounded in relationship building. How you build those relationships is determined somewhat by whether you are an in-house recruiter or an agency recruiter. But what’s the difference between the two, and what does it mean to people engaging with recruiters?
It’s worth reiterating that, as recruiters sit at the juncture between job seeker and employer, they fit their service and adapt their approach around what best suits the industry they work in. Recruiters are, by nature, people-focussed, and have to be able to attract talent, negotiate fees, close deals and manage to onboard while balancing the desires and needs of both employers and employees. It’s an intense role, suited for only the most resilient of human resources.
However, there most definitely can be a “square peg, round hole” approach to recruitment if the recruiter doesn’t fit the business culture, demands of the vacancy, and attitude of the workers in the role: even the language used to discuss certain career paths requires specialist knowledge and can seriously alienate stakeholders in the relationship if the recruiter has no grasp of the field.
Employers and employees want to know they’re being looked after by someone who truly understands their industry, the pressures of the role, and the expectations of the work.
It then follows that if business owners are looking for staff or talent is looking for a new opportunity, that they start reaching out to recruiters in the market. This, then, is where the differences in the recruiter approach come to bear, and there are many considerations to take when deciding which path to walk.
Do you as an employer stay in-house? Or do you engage a third-party recruitment agency?
Do you, as an employee, go straight to the company you want to work with and engage with their in-house recruiters? Or do you approach an agency?
What are the benefits and pitfalls of each approach?
Let's consider an example - a small marketing company wants to hire a new MarTech specialist. What’s the best approach for the client and for the candidate?
Client
Recruiting pain points for clients are numerous, but, with the right recruitment approach, easily mitigated by strategizing your approach to hiring.
Cost and time are the two most important factors in recruitment strategy setting - studies show that hiring an employee can cost as much as $4,000 per employee, and take up to 40 days to fully onboard your new employee. This cost takes into account the entire ecosystem of hiring - training, recruitment software, third-party hiring, and unproductivity as staff are pulled away from tasks to onboard new team members.
However, ROI should not be your capital concern when recruiting - the quality of hire is. That quality and the time you spend finding it is the real ROI.
Benefits of pitfalls of hiring with in-house recruiters?
Your in-house recruiter will be a brand-savant, fully immersed, and engaged with your teams, your marketing, your culture, and your DNA. Therefore they’re perfectly placed to dip into the talent market and find the perfect MarTech employee through employer branded marketing.
However, for smaller companies that don’t require constant hiring or turnover management, the cost of hiring someone full-time can be an unattractive proposition.
Benefits and pitfalls and agency recruiters?
The inherent flexibility of agencies, plus their wide network of candidates, is ideal for companies that need a wide array of staff, rapidly.
However, agencies can be prohibitively expensive in the first instance, for some companies on a budget and when recruiters are unproven.
Candidates
A good recruiter within MarTech needs to be acutely aware of the SaaS platforms and tech that sits at the heart of MarTech; they need to understand what pay bandings are to be expected at different levels of seniority; they are expected to know who the main players are in the market, and who the competition is; they’re trusted to handle the candidate journey as if it was their own career they were looking after.
Benefits of pitfalls of approaching in-house recruiters?
An in-house recruiter is the voice of the company, and their role will cover HR, onboarding, and salary negotiation in one.
A real downfall is that this process can be ponderous at times - with a lot on in-house recruiter’s plates, you may find service not as quick as agency representation.
Benefits and pitfalls of approaching agency recruiters?
Agency recruiters tend to work on multiple job postings with many employers - the chances of you snaring an interesting job are increased, as is the speed of service.
There are only so many hours in the day, and you may find recruiters are pulled in different directions day to day - therefore careful planning of the application and recruiter handling is urged.
No matter which side of the recruitment fence you are on, in-house and agency recruiting have something to offer. It’s about analyzing what you need, first, before choosing a path.
