Why your clients need you NOW more than ever...and the Serpeant of "C" Talent

You are hearing the same thing I am. "We are not using agencies this year", or "We are using internal resources instead of using recruiters". Most of the time when you get down to the brass tax - budgets are being cut and one of the first things to go - is the recruiting budget.


Before we shed a tear and decide to change industries or even professions - lets take a hard look at the impact this will have on your clients organization.


For a company trying to be cost conscious and remain competitive in a tight market, they will still need exceptional talent this year. Our clients and prospective organizations will have key players leave and quickly following that event will be an urgent need to replace them. Bottom line - they will have to be doing some type of recruiting activities. Maybe not to the extent that they did a year ago, but they will have the need for great talent and will .


How will they go about finding the "Exceptional Talent" that the need? More than 90% of your client companies will be using Job Boards, Employee Referrals and Company Website postings. Mainly Job Boards.

Be rest assured, there will be NO proactive searches being done in HR Organizations. First - they don't have time to do direct recruiting activities due to other duties, but most dont have a clue how to direct recruit if they did had the time.


Of the recruiting activities, the most popular will be placing ads on job boards. All the individuals who were down sized from every other organization in that industry- will be responding to the ads.

Question: How many companies down size their top people? OR... How many companies let go their "A" players who perform at the highest level and pull most of the load?

Answer: NONE of them

Oh you hear stories of a whole division being gone. Yes that may happen - once in a life time. But most organizations let go their bottom 10-15% of people in every major down sizing. They can do this in every department in an organization as well. So what does this mean?

Your clients job board ads will be answered by the individuals who were downsized - the bottom 10-15% - of the workforce. They will be trying to choose the best from the worst of the talent in the market. If they see six "C" players (Bottom 10%) individuals and then finally see a "B" player. They will hire them. They will also think their process is working fine. Unfortuantely, that hire will end up a statistic. Peter Drucker said "66% of a companies hiring decisions will prove to be mistakes within the first 12 months."Brad Smart - author of Topgrading - says 50% of all hires companies make are mishires.

If your clients continue to hire "B" and "C" players to fill critical positions - their competitiveness will be severely handicapped not only now, but also as the recession subsides and the economy starts taking off.

Conversely, if they worked with professional search consultants, their outcome could be substantially different. What professional Search consultants do - is work with the "A" players, those individuals who are hidden to Job Board Advertising because they are achieving high goals and results for a competitive company. Instead of making poor hiring decisions from choosing the best potential talent from the worst available, they would be choosing the best talent, from the best in the market. The "A" players, the top 10% in a given market.

Lets go one step further. If Dr. Brad Smart in his HR blockbuster book "Topgrading" is correct, a mishire will cost 18-24X the individuals salary. So if they on board a "C" player at 100K per year, the actual cost of that mishire will be 1,800,000 at a minimum. That includes - the cost of their salary, their training, the damage they caused and .....the opportunity cost of not having an "A" player who would have achieved the specific objectives set up initially.

This is by the way.. American Businesses most costliest problem. Mishires.

So what are we to do - as professional search consultants???

Simple - share this with your clients. Dont allow them to be bitten by the Serpeant of "C" talent and let their organization suffer. Organizations filled with "C" talent quickly lose market share, "A" players leave, goals go unmet and the future becomes bleak. You need to do whatever it takes to insure your clients do not get bitten by the serpeant of "C" players. Educate your clients on the talent market and what you will do to protect them and their entire organization.

Good luck.. Your clients business future is resting on your shoulders. Only you can save them.