Acquiring competent employees has never been easy, especially for the highly-skilled and unique professionals such as executives. An executive headhunter is an exceptional recruiter, working independently for different organizations to find employees for various high-level positions and roles.
The headhunter recruiting process is relatively complex, unlike recruiting by HR representatives. The headhunting process involves various steps the specialist performs to deliver impressive results. The executive headhunting profession is broad, but this blog will make it quite understandable for every company or individual seeking to hire one.
Let’s learn what does a headhunter do:
Executive Role
Before reaching out to potential candidates and recruiting them, headhunters will critically analyze the role under discussion. The analysis helps them understand what skills they will be looking for concerning the organization’s condition and needs.
It also enables the headhunters to evaluate the contract period for the role they are seeking to recruit, how the job should be undertaken, and any other information that appears helpful in the organization. After entirely understanding the role at hand, headhunters proceed to search for potential candidates for the job.
Searching for potential candidates
With all the essential details at hand, a headhunter is fully prepared to search for candidates best suited for the role. The searching process entails analyzing various referrals from fellow headhunters, evaluating their special contact lists, and digging through social media platforms.
Additionally, they can engage their past successful candidates and attend special networking events for the industry they are working for. As challenging as it may appear, headhunters can identify exceptional employees easier than in-house recruiters.
Scrutinizing the selected candidates
After generating the potential candidates, a headhunter will scrutinize them and come up with the best number as required by the organization. Most organizations usually need one or two employees due to the fragility of the special job positions.
A headhunter uses their experience and qualification for the job to narrow down the candidates to the most suited one. Leadership development is often one of the main criteria, among other qualifications. They will then engage the selected candidates and schedule interviews.
Interviewing candidates
When an organization is seeking to fill unique job positions, a headhunter is the best for recruiting and undertaking interviews. Interviews with a headhunter aren’t similar to ordinary ones since the specialist focuses on specific subjects and asks questions to determine the best candidate.
The qualified candidate(s) will be hired successfully, and all terms and conditions regarding their contract will be stated straightforwardly.
What should an organization look for in a headhunter?
Like their job, hiring the best headhunter requires critical examination for the entire organization’s success. A qualified headhunter should possess top-notch recruitment skills for filling executive job positions. An organization can quickly evaluate a headhunter’s ability to recruit by examining the performance of their past recruitments for different companies.
Another factor an organization should consider when hiring headhunters is their experience in the specific industry. The economy hosts many industries undertaking different roles. It’s pretty challenging to find a head hunter qualified for all sectors.
Therefore, you should ensure your selection has majored in your organization’s industry. For instance, you shouldn’t hire a headhunter who has majored in real estate for the food industry. Lastly, a successful headhunter should have extraordinary communication skills. Good communication effortlessly attracts skilled personnel for your organization, especially executive positions.
A headhunter without extraordinary communication skills is no different from an in-house recruiter. In this case, good communication skills mean evaluating the potential candidates’ communication while responding promptly to emails and following up on the organization even after successful recruitment.
What differentiates headhunters from in-house recruiters?
You’re probably not alone if you’ve been confusing headhunters with ordinary recruiters. The two, however, lie under the same category of recruitment. Headhunters are significantly different from in-house recruiters depending on specialization.
In-house recruiters work for a specific organization to hire regular employees and fill open positions with qualified and available candidates seeking employment. On the other hand, headhunters work independently to recruit the most qualified and needed employees for an organization.
Typically, all headhunters are excellent recruiters, but not all recruiters are headhunters. Therefore, headhunters usually earn higher than in-house recruiters.
How much do headhunters cost?
The annual salary of the recruited candidate usually determines the payment of headhunters. Most Canadian industries offer specialists between 15% and 25% of the employee’s yearly salary. Other factors for determining the fee include the complexity of getting the perfect employee and recruitment policies regarding headhunting for various industries.
Hopefully, you now understand what headhunters do for the organizations they are working for. Although quite complex, headhunters are the best channel for filling unique job positions in an organization. To get the best hunters, an organization or individual can search various networking sites, get involved in business trend news, or ask for referrals within their network.
