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SELECTING AN EXECUTIVE RECRUITER
Choosing a search consultant should be a two step process: developing a strong, open communications linkage with the search Consultant and speaking with references who can give you a valid, independent evaluation of his or her skills and effectiveness. Omitting the references is perilous. A decision based only upon personal impressions is like buying jewelry from a street vendor , without consulting an appraiser first -- what glitters initially may prove to be of little value! The ideal way to evaluate a recruiter is to ask the people with whom he or she has worked.
Many search consultants are quite glib and can portray the executive search process as virtually risk free when, in fact, what recruiters do is both difficult and hard to assess. If executive recruiting were more visible and less dependent upon the nuances of confidential conversations with candidates, an easy gauge of a recruiter's mettle could be devised.
Because no direct measurement tool exists, a tricky selection decision confronts the buyer of executive search services. As a first step, you should attempt to evaluate the search consultant's interpersonal skills through a personal meeting. Without references, however, this can reduce your decision to a personal assessment of an invisible process. Incorporating the evaluation and referencing recommendations which follow should take some of the risk out of the recruiter selection process.
CRITICAL RECRUITING SKILLS
Several skills and abilities are correlated with highly effective recruiters. The primary skills every search consultant needs to have well developed are: building rapport; listening; interviewing; intuition; persuasion; negotiation and diplomacy. Each is critical to different stages of the recruitment process. Being aware of these is important during your evaluation,
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