Is HR Really Blocking New Hire Processes?
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In the UK pretty much all SMB IT hiring is done via a recruitment agency and recruitment agencies will filter our non-graduates for a huge number of IT positions. Whether this is at the request of their clients or not, I don't know, but it is a fact.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
In the UK pretty much all SMB IT hiring is done via a recruitment agency and recruitment agencies will filter our non-graduates for a huge number of IT positions. Whether this is at the request of their clients or not, I don't know, but it is a fact.
Ah, now that is interesting. In the US it is extremely rare (AFAIK) for SMBs to use agencies. The agencies are exclusive to the large business and enterprise space and I've worked with nearly all and none filter by degrees that I have ever dealt with. And I've dealt with everyone of any size in the US.
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So SMBs in the UK actually find the agencies to be good in bringing in candidates? The agencies are widely seen as one of the failures of IT in the US.
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Well, I've tried recently to cut them out and have advertised on Monster.com instead, but haven't been very successful so I've now brought some in and they've been ok at finding candidates.
By ok, I mean marginally better than doing it myself!
We've had some good success using Monster.com for non-IT roles though, including recruiting my boss the Finance Director, so we've saved tens of thousands of dollars over the last couple of years alone as a result of not paying any agency fees.
So how do US SMBs recruit?
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@Carnival-Boy said:
Well, I've tried recently to cut them out and have advertised on Monster.com instead, but haven't been very successful so I've now brought some in and they've been ok at finding candidates.
By ok, I mean marginally better than doing it myself!
We've had some good success using Monster.com for non-IT roles though, including recruiting my boss the Finance Director, so we've saved tens of thousands of dollars over the last couple of years alone as a result of not paying any agency fees.
So how do US SMBs recruit?
From my experience through word-of-mouth. The person doing the hiring mentions it to someone they are acquainted with who knows someone who is "good with computers".
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@Carnival-Boy said:
So how do US SMBs recruit?
Poorly.
Lots of word of mouth. Monster, of course, but very little of that. Direct application mostly.
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@coliver said:
The person doing the hiring mentions it to someone they are acquainted with who knows someone who is "good with computers".
I've had a bit of that but it is normally a waste of time. I have to explain to my acquaintance that just because their son lays cable for the phone company it doesn't mean they'd be a good fit for managing Microsoft servers. "Good with computers" is a very big field.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Direct application mostly.
Not sure what you mean by that?
Meaning the company has a way to apply to the job on their website and people put in their resumes directly to the company. The old fashioned way.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@coliver said:
The person doing the hiring mentions it to someone they are acquainted with who knows someone who is "good with computers".
I've had a bit of that but it is normally a waste of time. I have to explain to my acquaintance that just because their son lays cable for the phone company it doesn't mean they'd be a good fit for managing Microsoft servers. "Good with computers" is a very big field.
You'd be surprised how often people get hired like this here.
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@coliver said:
You'd be surprised how often people get hired like this here.
In the smallest companies this is just about the only process that is used. Or hoping that someone stops by and asks for a job.
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I'm after a generalist and they're quite difficult to recruit for (in my experience). I'm not sure how many SMBs run internal IT departments any more, but I haven't had great experiences with outsourcing so still prefer to do as much as possible in-house. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned like that?
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@Carnival-Boy said:
I'm after a generalist and they're quite difficult to recruit for (in my experience). I'm not sure how many SMBs run internal IT departments any more, but I haven't had great experiences with outsourcing so still prefer to do as much as possible in-house. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned like that?
If you are doing in house, is that what I would call direct? Meaning, you take applications and look through them?
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When I say in-house I'm talking about employing someone at all, whereas a lot of SMBs would just employ an MSP or IT company to take care of all their IT needs. So I'm thinking a lot of SMBs simply don't recruit IT staff because they don't actually employ any, or many, IT staff.
In terms of direct recruiting, I would include posting an advert on Monster in that category. People then apply directly to us via the Monster add. We also place the advert on our website, but no-one can find it. It's not like we're a famous company that everyone is desperate to work for!
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@Carnival-Boy - Do you not tend to get swarmed with sales calls from recruiters who want you to sign up with them?
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I never answer my phone, so that's not a problem.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
I never answer my phone, so that's not a problem.
That's my strategy with the phone.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
When I say in-house I'm talking about employing someone at all, whereas a lot of SMBs would just employ an MSP or IT company to take care of all their IT needs. So I'm thinking a lot of SMBs simply don't recruit IT staff because they don't actually employ any, or many, IT staff.
Oh, I see. Here in the US SMBs rarely outsource their main IT staff. They should, I feel, because that's how you fix so many things like hiring problems, but in the US they don't. They just have their nephew do it.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
In terms of direct recruiting, I would include posting an advert on Monster in that category. People then apply directly to us via the Monster add. We also place the advert on our website, but no-one can find it. It's not like we're a famous company that everyone is desperate to work for!
This is an issue in the US. It seems to be part of the culture of SMBs that they all feel that they are famous and that everyone should be so excited to work for "Bob's Taco Hut and Hardware Store" and don't want to hire anyone that isn't thrilled at fulfilling their IT destiny there.
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Oh there is some of that in the UK as well. Just not as rampant. We're a more down to earth bunch.
