By Carmen Lapham, Director of Recruiting and Operations, Q4B

Throughout my recruiting career I have had the pleasure of working with some pretty incredible people, people who have coached me, mentored me, managed me, held me accountable, people who have demonstrated by example how important it is to build strong relationships and how equally important it is to make a commitment and deliver on that commitment.

In my new role as Director of Recruiting and Operations I have an opportunity to not just help find great talent for our clients but also to plan for and allocate the necessary resources so that our company, Q4B, can keep its commitment to our clients and deliver on that commitment.

By taking a job order, having the client sign a fee agreement or sign a contract for managed recruiting services we are making a commitment to that client that we will work as long and as hard as necessary to deliver qualified, interested and available candidates for the client’s positions.

I know that there are two schools of thought on this. There are those who approach the recruiting business as a numbers game. If you take enough job orders, source enough people, present enough candidates to the hiring manager, placements will happen. In other words, generate enough activity and you will be successful. And to a certain extent this approach works. The dark side of this approach is that it is a major contributing factor to how recruiting and recruiters in general are valued by our clients, just slightly better than used car salesmen. No commitment is made with this approach.

The other school of thought, the one that I was taught and continue to practice, allows the recruiter to operate with a different perspective. There is less emphasis on numbers and activity for activity’s sake and more emphasis on following a process, managing that process and partnering with the client to see that the project of hiring great talent is completed successfully and to their satisfaction.

Recruiters who subscribe to this school of thought can feel confident in conducting a thorough needs analysis, asking the necessary questions and offering the client information regarding the position, salary range, qualifications, depth of talent pool in order to make the commitment to work the assignment. If the information cannot be had, then why commit?

A good contractor would not commit to build a house without blueprints, but once the blueprints have been drawn up and agreed to, one would expect the contractor to complete the job. And that is why there is Angie’s List.

Recruiting should be the same. For those of us who see great value in the services we provide and would want our clients to see that same value, making a commitment and delivering on that commitment is the only way to operate.

For the others, you can continue to play the numbers game, continue to take job orders and have some success by not fully committing to your client. But remember some day there may be an Angie’s List for our profession.

Maybe I will call it Carmen’s List!