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Do you like talking to people? Do you like working in a fast-paced environment with different challenges and rewards each day? Want to make a big difference in someone’s life? In a company’s success?

Become a recruiter!

The career prospects are bright for recruiters – finding the talent needed to support the business community will be a tall order for the foreseeable future, as demand outweighs supply in most industries and jobs. That is especially true in technology sectors. Recruiting can offer you a dynamic career with great potential.

Many companies don’t have the time to take away from their daily duties to source or recruit for their internal needs, so they count on staffing agencies so they can focus on their primary goals, their business. Some outsource all of their hiring needs, others supplement their own internal recruiters, especially for hard to fill positions.

Everyone needs help finding employees!

Now the big question: Should you work for a business and be an internal recruiter or a staffing agency as an external recruiter? What’s the difference? Is one better than the other?

All good questions! The answers? It depends…

I know, that seems like a cop out but it’s true. It depends on who you are – your personality, career goals, skills, and what you like to do. In many ways, internal and external recruiting do similar jobs with similar activities and responsibilities. But staffing firms offer those opportunities at a different, often higher and better level.

A Focus on Recruiting

Internal recruiters are often part of HR and have HR responsibilities as well, especially in smaller departments/companies. In corporate, hiring freezes or being at full staffing during certain seasons greatly reduces your role and means you will likely be asked to do other activities. At a staffing firm, you are focused on recruiting, as are your coworkers.

You learn from each other. You’re surrounded by other recruiters – peers and more experienced people. This exponentially increases your ability to learn, to be mentored, and to more quickly advance your knowledge about recruiting and the industries you work in.

A More Robust Experience

Do you like hiring for the same positions over and over or do you prefer a changing, challenging environment where you’re tasked with filling multiple roles?

Internal recruiters are recruiting for one company only, theirs. External recruiters work on behalf of multiple clients, across different industries. Recruiting for technology professionals encompasses nearly every business sector. You could have clients that include a global financial institution, a healthcare provider, and a leading software company. Recruiting for multiple companies provides opportunities to work with a diverse group of people, clients and candidates alike. It broadens your expertise and experience. If you’re up for a challenge and would like to become a truly well-rounded recruiter, then join the Staffing side.

An Active Daily Work Life

And by active, I mean active! Open positions in technology are a significant issue and it’s only expected to grow. Businesses need people and they expect quality results quickly. Recruiting is fast-paced and your days are rarely ever the same. On a daily basis you’re interacting with people from various backgrounds and experience, helping a diverse group of clients, and generally searching for a broader list of positions. Those corporate hiring freezes I mentioned earlier? They don’t happen at a staffing firm. It’s hard to get bored recruiting in our world!

The Opportunity for Advancement

A staffing firm needs staffing professionals, and many more of them than most individual companies where recruiting is a department, not the main business. The opportunities for promotion and advancement are much more numerous at a staffing firm. Between new clients and growth at existing ones, most firms have expanding needs. Smart firms promote from within first when possible; I know we do! This means it is often easier to advance as a recruiter and move into more senior, higher paying roles, in a staffing firm than in an internal role.

The Benefits of Recruiting for a Staffing Firm

Working in the staffing industry is exciting and rewarding. It’s more emotional than you might expect to work with someone to find a job. Helping someone to change their life, sometimes profoundly, is incredibly rewarding. It can be equally rewarding to help your clients, the people who, sometimes desperately, need to build their workforce. Helping them to succeed means they can provide better services or products to us all, thereby creating stronger and more successful communities.

I think that staffing firms provide recruiters with more opportunity to have these successes and experience these feelings, to learn, and grow, and advance. It’s absolutely worth thinking about these things as you contemplate your own career decisions.

 

Think you might be interested in exploring opportunities at ATR? Contact me!

 

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