By Hank Levine
Corporate recruiting departments have been working with staffing agencies since the first employment agency in the United States, Engineering Agency, was founded in 1893. Although working with staffing agencies is expensive, until recently there have been few other ways for companies to supplement their internal recruiting capabilities.
A single corporate recruiter may handle up to 60 simultaneous job openings. It simply is not possible to conduct quality searches for this many positions. Many corporate recruiters also have human resources responsibilities, which make it even more difficult to find the time to recruit for so many openings. Therefore, companies turn to staffing agencies to ensure critical openings get filled.
In the last three or four years, progressive companies have discovered a better alternative: Working with an offshore recruiting partner can increase recruiting productivity by 30 to 50 percent while lowering staffing agency costs by up to 80 percent.
Sound too good to be true? While these types of results are certainly possible, they are not always achieved. The quality of many offshore recruiting firms is inconsistent and some firms are less than totally reputable. So selecting the right partner is critical.
The Concept
Many of the tasks involved with recruiting mid to fairly senior ($50,000 to $130,000) information technology, finance, and accounting professionals are not done face-to-face. Recruiters often identify candidates through Internet-based sourcing and then communicate with the candidate using the phone and e-mail. These "back-office" activities can be performed equally effectively from a lower cost center—offshore. The majority of offshore recruiting firms are located in India, but some offshore recruiting firms can be found in other Asian, Eastern European and Latin American countries.
Offshore Recruiting Services
Offshore recruiting firms provide a range of services. Full lifecycle recruiting allows corporate recruiting departments to outsource recruiting functions that do not require in-person interactions.
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