Recuitment Agents now outsourcing resourcers?

[JonRB]

Those of us who are freelancers are used to fielding calls from agents on a regular basis enquiring about our availability. The bigger agents use 'resourcers' which are kind of like junior agents who do a lot of the donkey work and they're even worse as they generally don't have a clue.

I've just had the pits though. A large recruitment firm whose name is something like "persons who pertain to computing devices" have obviously outsourced this lowly job to a call centre in India.
I've just had a lady who can barely speak English, obviously reading from a script, tell me that they are updating their database and can I answer some questions. Bearing in mind that your average resourcer usually has to be told to go away and read my CV rather than expecting me to do their job for them, I could see where this was going and interrupted and said I was far too busy and hung up.

I realise that agencies need to keep their databases up-to-date, but what is the point of having a well-stocked database if you have alienated a proportion of your potential candidates to the extent that they won’t use you in future?

[Zad]

Just when you thought recruitment agencies couldnt get any worse

[flyingjase]

Zad said:

Just when you thought recruitment agencies couldnt get any worse

Thanks for that constructive comment Zad.

As we all know there tends to be a trend towards outsourcing to India. It possibly has its place in the 'behind the scenes' stuff, but in the client facing roles I vehemently disagree with its application. I've had first hand experience of Dell's 'customer service' (contradiction in terms) which is based in India.

Interestingly I had a third party company try and sell me such a resourcing service quite recently. They offered to resource my roles for £5 per hour. Ummmmm..... It took me all of 0 seconds to send them on their way.

I can see why people would be attracted to the cost, but anyone with one modicum of common sense would know that resourcing (a business critical role) & India just don't mix. It's a shame that a large company like CP tarnishes the whole industry. It seems apparent that the decision makers at CP are no where near the coal face.

[JonRB]

flyingjase said:

It's a shame that a large company like CP tarnishes the whole industry.

I don't recall mentioning CP.

But, yes, it's pretty short-sighted with regards to customer-facing things. Of course, given their pro-IR35 stance in the past, I'd be unlikely to use CP anyway, but this episode means I definitely wouldn't use them now.

>> Edited by JonRB on Tuesday 9th May 22:27

[edc]

I've received spam from such companies too and I don't even run a recruitment agency - talk about them doing a bit of research! They're selling a research type service and they can't do any themselves.

[FourWheelDrift]

edc said:

I've received spam from such companies too and I don't even run a recruitment agency - talk about them doing a bit of research! They're selling a research type service and they can't do any themselves.

I've recieved this today, they probably spam anyone who's ever run an advert with their name on it.

Outsource to India said:

Like Calls Centres, IT, BPO’s now UK Recruiters can outsource elements of their work load to India. Every minute a Recruiter wastes searching a Job Board Database, formatting a CV, screening tons of useless advertising response can now be outsourced for £5.00 an hour. By outsourcing these low level resourcing functions you will be able to focus your time and energy on true revenue generating activities. • Job Board CV Database Searching (Monster, Totaljobs etc) • Advertising response management (Screening CV’s) • CV Formatting / Process / Inputing • Email marketing We are already working with over 350 UK Recruitment companies, helping them resource on over 2500 vacancies and helping our clients make hundreds of placements per month. Free trial’s for a limited time!!! To find out why so many UK Recruiters are already using OS2i request a free trial and see the results for yourself. Regards Stuart Day Sales Manager

The bit in bold worried me if it's true (which it probably isn't).

[JonRB]

Hmm. I notice they don't list "pissing off potential candidates and losing shedloads of potential revenue" in their advert.

Edit: I'd go further and say that "screening CVs" is wholly unsuitable for being outsourced. That's one of the main jobs of a agent - matching skills to requirements. By way of example, I had one recruiter refuse to put my CV forward to his agent because it didn't show evidence of experience with "Microsoft Visual DevStudio and C++", despite me having 10 years experience with "Visual C++" (which is C++ under Visual DevStudio ). Something a decent agent would immediately know. QED.


>> Edited by JonRB on Friday 12th May 12:38