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Episode 6
394 Plays1 year ago
Episode 6
It's essential to stay up to date and know what is happening within the industry, find out all the news with Ross & Adele in this episode.
Question of the Week:What are the signs a rookie recruiter is going to make it during the probation period?
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Transcript
Introduction of Hosts
00:00:07
Speaker
Welcome to Recruitment News Australia. In case you don't know who we are, firstly, my name's Ross Clennet. I started my recruitment career in 1989 as a permanent accounting recruiter in London. I work for four different agencies across a 14 year period. I started my training and coaching business in 2004. I've been publishing a weekly newsletter and blog since 2007.
00:00:37
Speaker
And my name's Adele Lust. I've been working 26 years in the recruitment sector for a range of small private and larger publicly listed recruitment agencies. I've worked as a GM and managed recruitment businesses before starting my own company three years ago involved in creating a pathways program, including training for new recruiters coming into our industry.
Leadership Changes in Recruitment
00:01:07
Speaker
This is the news for the week beginning the 24th of April, 2023. Hayes ANZ employees were advised just prior to Easter that ANZ managing director Nick Delagianis will be retiring and leaving the business at the end of the current financial year. Delagianis started with Hayes as a consultant in 1993, steadily progressing through the ranks before being appointed ANZ managing director in 2012 after incumbent MD Nigel Heap.
00:01:35
Speaker
returned to the UK to take charge of the faltering UK and Island Division of Hayes. Matt Dickerson, recently appointed Managing Director of Hayes APAC, will concurrently be the new ANZ MD. Dickerson, recently relocated from London, had previously spent nearly six years based in Sydney, as initially the Regional Operations Director, then COO, APAC, within the Hayes Talent Solutions business.
Financial Performance Reports
00:02:05
Speaker
In a trading statement for the quarter ending 31 March 2023, Page Group announced that group gross profit declined by 2.4% on a constant currency basis. Growth in the group's largest region, EMEA, was offset by declines across all the group's other major regions. The earner headcount reduced by 4.4% in Q1 2023,
00:02:31
Speaker
compared to the headcount at the end of December 2022. Gross profit per Fiona in Q1 2023 declined 8% compared to the corresponding period a year ago. Page Group Australia recorded a 1% increase in gross profit on the corresponding period in 2022.
00:02:54
Speaker
Hayes reported global net fees increased by 5% on a like-for-like basis in its fiscal third quarter ended 31 March 2023. Germany was the standout performer growing 23%. Net fees in the ANZ region fell by 8%, with Hayes Australian net fees decreasing by 9% and Hayes New Zealand net fees rising by 3%.
00:03:19
Speaker
At the ANZ Specialism level, Hayes's three largest specialisms all reported net fee declines. Construction and property was down 4%, technology 6%, and accountancy and finance declined 3%. The Hayes ANZ consultant headcount decreased by 2% to 1,088 by the end of the quarter.
00:03:45
Speaker
with global consultant headcount also declining 2% in the quarter.
Rise of Temporary Staffing Platforms
00:03:52
Speaker
Ignite reported a 16% fall in their March 2023 quarter gross profit compared to March 2022. Contractor numbers dropped from 701 at the end of March 2022 to 597 as of 31 March 2023.
00:04:13
Speaker
Global revenue for temporary staffing platforms rose 58% year over year to 21 billion US dollars in 2022. According to staffing industry analysts, temporary staffing platform update report released at the beginning of this month. SIA's report noted 76% of the global temporary staffing platform market is derived from professional staffing segments. And that's dominated by the US healthcare sector.
00:04:42
Speaker
The report notes that traditional staffing firms offering staffing platforms represented 62% of the staffing platform market in 2022. Temporary staffing platforms are becoming more popular by represented nearly 4% of the overall global temporary staffing market in 2022 compared to less than 1% prior to 2020.
Challenges in Assessing Rookie Recruiters
00:05:16
Speaker
Question of the week is, what are the signs a rookie recruiter isn't going to make it during the probation period? Well, I would say Adil to start with.
00:05:30
Speaker
The challenge is that most leaders have worked very hard to find a good rookie, to bring them in, and they're always looking for the reasons that they will succeed. There's this kind of sunk cost fallacy that, oh, well, I've invested a month or two or three and I haven't quite made it. I'll give them another month or two or three. And in my experience,
00:05:55
Speaker
where most leaders lose the most money in their business is this period between month 6 and month 12 for a rookie recruiter who really hasn't shown they're going to make it by month 6, but the leader doesn't want to pull the trigger and get rid of them. Then in month 10, 11, or 12,
00:06:15
Speaker
the rookie clearly isn't going to make it and they either leave or they get fired. And that is a very expensive five or six month period when the decision should have been made definitely by the end of six months, but most likely by the end of month three or four. And it's interesting because I sometimes see the other side of that where I think that rookies are often assessed really harshly. I see some agency owners
00:06:43
Speaker
really forgetting what it was like at the start of their own careers and forgetting how tough it can be. And it's a very different market, as we know, has evolved over time. So I'm often seeing agency owners who are saying, I just don't think the person's going to make it very early in the piece, very much within that first three months, but really assessing people against, I guess, things that were not relevant in today's market, I suppose, things that that may have been relevant to them 20 years ago. So
00:07:13
Speaker
I see the other side of that point around, you know, making the assessment too quickly as well. Yeah, what are the number one behaviours do you think for those activities? What would you be looking for?
Effective Evaluation Strategies for Rookie Recruiters
00:07:28
Speaker
Well, I prefer to keep it pretty clean. And in my world and in my experience, the leaders should focus on four things.
00:07:38
Speaker
and communicate these expectations to the person. Firstly, behaviour. Secondly, skills. Thirdly, activities. And finally results. In that order, because it's in that order, it's easiest to assess. So it's easiest to assess behaviour, whereas results is the thing that's a lag indicator. It may take, depending upon what market you're in,
00:08:03
Speaker
a month or two for someone to generate their first placement. And my experience is too many owners or leaders are looking just at the results and not at the other things, which I think are probably more important for someone in their first two or three months.
00:08:22
Speaker
Well, certainly with behaviour, to me, the number one's achievement drive or results orientation. Obviously, agency recruitment is a results-oriented business. It's easy from a metrics or measure point of view to indicate number of placements, fee income, et cetera. So the person has to care about results.
00:08:42
Speaker
If someone is happy just to do a day's work and they're indifferent to whether they place candidates, fill jobs, whether they're indifferent to whether a job goes credit or not, to me that is a big red flashing light. The best recruiters love making placements and they hurt when they don't fill a job.
00:09:05
Speaker
And so I'm looking for science that the person is achievement oriented or results oriented. And the other one is coachability. I mean, this is a business where activity, it's fast activity. It's a fast paced job. People have to learn quickly. And if people just can't learn what they need to learn quickly, if they don't take feedback and improve in a short space of time, then it's highly unlikely they're going to make it.
00:09:36
Speaker
Yeah, I agree with those. Definitely, Ross. And I think it's really important again, though, to make sure that we are assessing people in a fair manner with data.
Data-Driven Evaluation and Feedback
00:09:47
Speaker
I suppose too often we are seeing situations of people just, you know, running on that gut feeling. I really just don't think this person's going to work out or conversely, like you said, at the start of the conversation, you know, I really want them to work out. So I'm going to hold on a bit longer.
00:10:01
Speaker
And it comes down to the way they feel around things. And we really need to move away from that and into data validation of looking at what is it that you're expecting? What exact behaviors are you expecting? What skills are you expecting the person to demonstrate? What activities should they be doing on a daily and weekly basis? Letting the person know that's what the expectation is, is obviously really important as well.
00:10:26
Speaker
giving them an idea of what kind of behaviours and activities they're expected to demonstrate in what period of time, giving them feedback around it if they're not on track, holding them accountable certainly, but using that data to actually assess whether they are meeting those milestones appropriately and not just going on. We feel like they're going to work out or we feel like they're not going to work out. I think it's really important we start to get a lot more scientific about this process.
00:10:54
Speaker
I agree because that is also fair.
00:10:58
Speaker
Like the perception of fairness is very important. And as you rightly point out, the rookie needs to know this area and this area are the ones causing me concern. And this activity or this outcome is what you need to produce or deliver within the next, whatever the timeframe is and see if the person needs more training or support
00:11:27
Speaker
So you can't hang them out to dry. Absolutely agree with that. But I think to your point, far too many leaders, they don't do enough training with a rookie. They just leave them be. And then they make a judgment of, oh, I overheard that call, and I really didn't do it well, and I really don't have a good feeling about that person. And that's just, well, firstly, it's completely unfair to the candidate
00:11:56
Speaker
But also, it's like you're setting someone up to fail. Unless you're being clear about your expectations, providing the resources to help someone meet and exceed those expectations and then giving them feedback, then, you know, it's a very tough job to begin with and people are more likely to fail than not if you're not providing those foundation resources. Yep.
00:12:23
Speaker
Well, no surprise, the two trainers are giving you advice to do training with your rookies, of course.
Podcast Subscription Reminder
00:12:29
Speaker
But hopefully we've given you some other general good advice there on making sure you're assessing people well in that probation period. That's a wrap. Don't forget to subscribe to the podcast wherever you get your podcasts from, Google, Apple, Spotify, or on our website.
00:16:58
Speaker
demonstrating what period of time, giving them feedback around it if they're not on track, holding them accountable certainly, but using that data to actually assess whether they are meeting those milestones appropriately and not just going on. We feel like they're going to work out or we feel like they're not going to work out. I think it's really important we start to get a lot more scientific about this process.
00:18:48
Speaker
Yep, well no surprise the two trainers are giving you advice to do training with your rookies of course.
00:18:54
Speaker
But hopefully we've given you some other general good advice there on making sure you're assessing people well in that probation period.