Working with a Recruiter: What Have You Done for Me Lately?

Working with a recruiter or staffing firm can be a useful tool in your job search toolkit, whether your ultimate goal is temporary work or a full-time position. As with most things related to your job search, developing positive relationships is often the key to success.

To truly leverage all that a recruiter can do for you, make sure you’ve picked the right one. Every firm has a focus and specialty, whether it’s general or niche-oriented. Those in the financial sector should seek out a finance-focused recruiter. The same goes for those in IT, Healthcare, Engineering, Creative, etc. The more involved the recruiter is within your industry, the more likely they’ll have appropriate opportunities for you.

Once you’ve got the right recruiter, it’s time to start building the relationship. Like any relationship, trust and honesty are very important, and it goes both ways. If your recruiter trusts you and feels that you are being honest with them, they will work very hard to help you land the right position. If you trust them and feel that they are being honest with you, you’ll take their advice and follow their lead on pursuing positions.

Sometimes job-seekers focus too much on the short-term, not realizing that a positive relationship with a recruiter in your industry might be the key to a great job down the road, months or even years from now. Make the effort to maintain the connection with your recruiting partner because you never know what they’ll have for you in the future, or when you’ll want to call on them again.

It is also important to understand what a recruiter or staffing firm can (and can’t) do for you. Recruiters in your industry are great people to know, they have excellent connections and strong relationships with their clients. They know what companies are really looking for in candidates, and often hear about positions before they become public.

Recruiters can guide you towards great opportunities and present you in the best possible light for a particular company. But it’s also important to understand that no matter how good they are, all recruiters have limitations. They cannot create positions or force a company to hire you, and have little to no influence with a company that is not their client. Companies do trust and listen to their recruiter’s advice, but the client is the one who is hiring and they make the final decisions.

A strong relationship with individual recruiters or staffing firms focused on your industry will become even more valuable as you grow in your career. Today they could help you land your next job, tomorrow they may fill an opening on your team, and a few years from now they just might call you with that dream job you’ve always wanted.

This article may be reprinted when the copyright and author bio are included. ©2011 Kristen Harris, Portfolio Creative, LLC.