placeholder
Stuart Gentle Publisher at Onrec

How to scale your recruitment agency

There’s no two ways about it - growing a recruitment company can be a painful endeavour. Aside from drowning your sorrows, there is plenty of staunch advice for those fearless souls who have taken on the incredible task of scaling up and succeeded. Our top tips:

Retention matters the most

The UK recruitment index reported that one of the biggest barriers to growth within the industry was the high rate of churn across business. Within twelve months of being hired, 24% of employees leave and as we all know, that’s an expensive cost and a huge waste of time. Put the right processes in place early on to ensure your people are happy and brought on board in the right way. Set clear objectives, make them feel appreciated and celebrate what they bring to your business.

Find people like you

If you’re set on growing a successful recruitment business, then you need to surround yourself with people who are equally ambitious and have a desire to scale as much as you do. It isn’t enough to hire them for the skills they have if they’re not interested in taking on the challenges of growing an organisation. Ambition is an incredible driver, and if the people around you understand that their ambition will get them big rewards, they’ll put in all that extra dedication and passion that is critical to scale up.

Pick the right clients

When you’re trying to build it’s difficult to ever say no to clients, but at some point you’re going to have to be picky about who you work with. The success of your agency depends on the bottom line and your ability to serve that customer. Pick a niche and stick with it so you can truly serve your customers in the right way. Saying yes to everything and anything that comes your way will harm your agency down the line. It will also create a business full of consultants who can’t focus on one thing or become specialists in their market, and as such, this drives down productivity per head and revenue. All things that are detrimental to a growing business.

Use the right technology

This does not mean you need to spend every penny on all the technology that comes your way. It does mean that you have to invest your money in the right technology that will actually give your business a better chance. Recruitment software has come a long way, from recruitment CRMsonline timesheet tools, to applicant tracking systems, the tools to make your job easier are out there. But whatever you do invest in, make sure it aligns to your exact business goals and growth plans. You don’t always need all the bells and whistles, just some of them.

Don’t get caught up

It’s easy to get caught up in the everyday running of a business and in the small tasks and problems you’re confronted with, but don’t forget to pull away from it and focus on the larger strategic objectives. Businesses can lose sight of their growth plans because they forget to take stock of the strategy and how closely aligned they are. Remember to always consult those initial plans, and remember that the best use of your skills is not often in dealing with processes or people. Hire the right teams and people to handle that, leaving you free to actually grow your recruitment agency.

In need of a little more advice? Just get in touch to speak to one of our recruitment specialists today.