There are a few types of recruiters to be aware of when looking for a recruiter: head hunters, contingency/ retained search, contract recruiters, placement agencies, and staffing firms. In addition, there are recruiters that specialize in specific industries and categories. These different options can make finding a recruiter difficult if you don’t know which type is best for your needs. If you’re not sure how to find which type is right for you, keep reading. It will help ensure that you get matched with a recruiter who has experience working with people like yourself and who can get you what you need.
A headhunter is an executive recruiter who specializes in recruiting candidates for top-level jobs at other companies. A headhunter might specialize in a particular industry or specific positions, but regardless of what they’re looking for, there are a few things you can expect from most headhunters: lots of calls and emails, unsolicited resumes, and multiple requests for interviews.
Despite their reputation, headhunters play an important role in today’s competitive job market. If you’re prepared to deal with them (and get past their difficult process), you might find that hiring someone else to do your job search could be worthwhile—if not required! Most headhunters will tell you that when it comes time to make hires, managers almost always require outside help.
In your first job, chances are a recruiter from human resources or corporate will help you land your dream gig. This type of recruiter typically works for large corporations and is responsible for finding talent within their own company. If your resume aligns with what they’re looking for, they’ll reach out to discuss moving forward and schedule an interview. Some larger companies also utilize third-party recruiters to fill positions—if so, one of these recruitment agencies will be responsible for getting in touch with you about available jobs.
If you’re looking for a job and hoping to score a salary increase, executive recruiters are your best bet. These are high-level people who specialize in snagging some of the most sought-after talents at big companies—such as CFOs, CTOs, presidents, and CEO-level candidates. Because they deal with top executives on a regular basis, these types of recruiters usually have very close connections with key decision-makers at top companies.
Because of their network and reputation, executive recruiters don’t charge new recruits (aka YOU) anything when they get you hired; instead, they earn their money from candidate fees paid by employers. Want an in? Ask around your office or LinkedIn to see if anyone knows someone who has recently switched jobs: Then reach out directly or via referral through the recruiter’s office. Most professionals are willing to help their colleagues find jobs.
These are your colleagues, co-workers, and friends. These people know your professional strengths, weaknesses, and personal life and they can easily choose not to offer you a job if they want to hire someone else. Since internal recruiters work closely with other employees, there may be communication issues that hinder successful communication between you and them.
But on a positive note, internal recruiters can help make sure all departments (for example human resources) are communicating effectively when hiring for a position within their company. There’s no need to stop using these types of recruiting professionals when looking for a job, keep an eye out for potential opportunities at your current workplace by networking with internal talent scouts! Just be careful with how much information you share.
In a role like an account executive, staffing agency recruiters are often incentivized to bring on new clients. As such, they’re focused on quickly and easily finding candidates for a job opening, which may make them less likely to spend time recruiting when they don’t think they’ll be able to fill it. If your resume doesn’t fit their client’s requirements exactly or if there aren’t other similar jobs posted yet, expect a quick no thanks.
For these reasons, staffing agency recruiters may not work well with engineers and other highly technical candidates—but if you can find one who does specialize in your area or company size, keep them! They’re one of the most common types of hiring managers out there.
An in-house recruiter is a recruiter who has been hired by an organization to focus solely on filling jobs at that organization. If a business has more than one location, an in-house recruiter will likely specialize in a particular function such as finance or IT. The nice thing about working with an in-house recruiter is that they already have relationships with key people within your company and are more likely to be able to speed up your recruiting process by leveraging their network inside your business. This can make finding someone quickly possible when you need it most—say, for replacement hires when someone suddenly leaves, for example.
For example, if an attorney is leaving his firm to start her own practice, it’s a safe bet that she’ll need an administrative assistant and associate attorneys. Because she will be recruiting these people herself, she’s likely not to want to hire a recruiter who is going to take over that part of her business. At least, not at first. Instead, she’ll probably work with a legal recruiter to find new talent as well as build out her marketing materials and website. A good legal recruiter can also help new firms make sure they are following all of their state’s licensing requirements. As your business grows you may eventually outgrow working with a legal search firm—but at least for those early years, having one on your side can help ease some stress while keeping costs down. And those are good things!
You’ll be spending a lot of time with management recruiters, as they are usually involved at every step along your recruitment process. They’re focused on identifying and recruiting candidates for middle- to upper-level roles, so they generally work within departments rather than across an entire organization. But don’t think that makes them unimportant;
management jobs are some of the most crucial ones to fill because managers must possess qualities such as leadership and problem solving that can help keep an organization going strong. As you start interviewing, make sure to ask about these types of characteristics during conversations—and who better to learn them from than a recruiter? When looking at job descriptions, look out for words like impeccable judgment or strategic thinking. If you come across those words while reading through job listings, then reach out immediately! Management recruiters will often respond quickly when they find potential hires.
If you’re looking for a job, it’s likely that at some point, you’ll be contacted by a contingency recruiter. These types of recruiters typically get paid only if they successfully fill an open position with a candidate who accepts an offer. As such, they often work on behalf of hiring managers and employers to reach out to potential candidates.
Contingency recruiting is ideal in situations where finding top talent may be challenging (for example, because of location or industry), or when time is limited (because there’s a vacant position to fill immediately). Contingency recruiters are good fits for companies that need someone quickly or have complex requirements due to their culture.
While you might wonder why other agencies aren’t contacting you about a particular opening, remember: even though contingency recruiters are hardworking and want your business, they probably don’t want yours as much as other types of agencies do! Agency fees can range from 15%–30% and sometimes more—money many companies would rather save than spend on getting help filling one role in particular.
Some agencies are retained, meaning that they work for only one client. This can make them very efficient at finding top talent because there is no other client or project that takes priority. It also means, however, that they will be looking out for your best interests rather than trying to place as many candidates as possible. Their goal is a long-term business with you, so you’ll have someone working on your side rather than in favor of a candidate. While these agencies tend to be pricier and may not do quite as much marketing on their own (because they already have enough business), they can take some stress off of your shoulders by handling all of your recruitment needs internally.
If an athlete or coach asks for a referral to a particular person in HR, send them to a sports recruiter. These professionals are often former college athletes who know what it takes to get recruited and play at higher levels, as well as they understand how influential relationships can be. They also tend to understand athletic budgets, which makes them perfect candidates for hiring athletes. Sports recruiter skills translate well into other areas of talent acquisition including student recruitment and development.
Military recruiting is a specialized field. Military jobs can be tough to fill because they require specific experience and often don’t pay well enough to attract candidates who aren’t otherwise interested in serving. That’s where military recruiters come in. Most people think military recruiter and imagine a bunch of men and women dressed up like Marines or Army soldiers — scary, right? The truth is, while they’re one type of recruiter out there, they’re often not that type at all!
Instead, many military recruiters act more like salespeople (even if it doesn’t feel like it). Some are very tactical, going after top candidates with specific credentials or by working through specific channels. Others focus on filling quotas or proactively reaching out to people whom they think would be great candidates.
Information technology recruitment is an important component to hiring top talent. With a wide variety of responsibilities, IT recruiting takes time and effort. When dealing with an IT recruiter, it’s important to know that they should be talking with you more about your skills than anything else. To start, ask about their qualifications for taking on such a role and look for someone who has experience working with similar companies to yours as well as candidates from various backgrounds and skillsets.
A specialist recruiter who is dedicated to finding IT candidates. While they may recruit in many positions, they tend to focus on very specific ones such as Networking, Project Management, Business Intelligence, or Information Security professionals. If you know that you want a job in IT and are looking for help, get your resume into an IT recruiter’s hands. An expert can quickly narrow down where your skills are best suited and will present opportunities accordingly—and they’ll likely understand both how much money different roles can make.
This is an example of a highly specialized recruiter. You may not deal with pharmaceutical companies on a day-to-day basis but if you work for any company that has to comply with FDA guidelines, such as a pharmaceutical company, medical device company, or food manufacturer, it’s likely that at some point you will have to work closely with these types of professionals. They may specialize in certain roles (e.g., clinical research associates), or they may specialize based on geography (e.g., Boston). The pharma professional typically works closely with hiring managers within their own company and they are usually very good at what they do: filling jobs very quickly!
Typically, these recruiters handle candidates who are already out of a job. These people might not be looking for a job at all, but an outplacement recruiter will help them find new employment just to make sure they’re employable by other companies as well.
If you’ve lost your job and need some assistance before going out on your own, seek out an outplacement recruiter to get started. These are rarer than some of their counterparts because they don’t have immediate pay-off time like other recruiters do; working with candidates who aren’t currently employed can be risky, since there’s no guarantee that they’ll take another position if one is offered to them.