Everyday I learn of a new recruitment agency forming, and every day I hear about how there aren’t enough jobs for recruiters to work. I read an interesting article recently written by an internal recruitment manager, frustrated at the state of the market, and the time she had spent sifting through a combination of both irrelevant, and the all too common unsolicited CV’s for a position she was trying to fill. As an ex-recruiter, I know only too well that common phrase when you finally reach the “gatekeeper”, “Sorry, we have a PSL and have no need to go outside this. I will keep your details on file though.” Will you? Will you keep my details, or will the follow-up email I am about to send you simply end up in the deleted items folder, alongside a hundred others sent by recruiters all desperate to work the carrot dangling from the clients stick!

My boss once told me to give myself as many chances as possible, that way at least one would work out! If someone said they had no jobs or used a PSL, send them a few good CV’s to prove our worth and move onto the next. This was not an approach I would ever consider adopting. Recruitment in the modern day is built around relationships, but the problem is, and I would sit and ask myself, how can a relationship be formed if we haven’t even had the opportunity to do so.
Going back to the fed-up internal recruitment manager, sat fending off incoming recruiter calls and speculative emails, she was protesting for a change in the way the market was run, a change in the approach adopted by recruiters. “What if everything could be done on OUR terms, through a single channel, and no pestering phone calls for updates”, and so BringUsTogether was the revolution born from the protesting words of those who know best.

BringUsTogether is a simple concept. By bringing together employers and recruiters in a friendly online environment, agencies can work with clients they would not normally have access to, and develop brand new relationships, while at the same time boosting placement revenue. This service in theory eliminates the need for cold calling and speculative emails – the key reason for the bad name us recruiters have acquired over time! Recruiters can sign up for free, and once the B.U.T team has verified the agency, they will be provided with a unique log in code, where live vacancies can be viewed. It is then the responsibility of the recruiter to pick the positions they feel they can work best, as any poor quality CV’s or poor communication will be marked down in the employer’s feedback. Why waste time cold calling, when you can log on, view roles to work, and get recruiting straight away (the job you were hired to do!).
BringUsTogether does not only bring about benefits for recruiters, who by this stage have developed new working relationships, and hopefully made successful placements which have scored you some more points on the board. Employers are winners too. No more fending off recruiters, no more time wasted dealing with cold callers, and a single channel where they can publish their vacancy, and sit back and wait for recruiters to make a request.

It is no longer a case of being up against the agency with thirteen offices worldwide, which simply churns out CV’s like free newspapers. No matter how big or small you are, whether you are a recruiter working from home, or working on the 20th floor of a multi-storey in central London, everybody has the chance to submit their best candidates for the role, and a real chance of scoring the prize of not only the fee at the end, but the relationship with a new client.