Why do recruitment agencies tell you so little?

We work in a frustrating industry, because businesses are so readily identifiable. And because there is no point in being in business if we cannot make money out of it. Here is the issue, there are two situations where we as an agency can tell you very little. First of all, the client may be working confidentially. If you phone up and ask about the franchise and the location, and we answer then we have told you which business we are talking about. End of confidentiality. So if we are recruiting for the Lada and Zastava dealer in Stevenage, there is likely to be only one. (Okay, I know the franchises disappeared a long time ago, but I didn't want to embarrass any of my current clients). Even if I say they are in the Home Counties, north of London, you are probably going to guess that it is between one of three dealers. Which is how rumours start.  So we have to be careful, and we have to respect the wishes of our client, especially in these days of GDPR. And then we have the call out of the blue. Someone we don’t know asks ”Can you tell me what franchise and where it's located please?” Bluntly, no. But let me explain why. I know you find it difficult to believe, but agencies short of jobs will phone up to find out who the recruiting client is. Even more difficult to believe is that candidates will phone up and then apply directly, having told us they are not interested. It has even happened to us with candidates we trust, so there's a very good chance that people who have no loyalty to us will bypass us. This is our lifeblood, it is what we do. We try and put good people in front of good employers. And we try and respect our clients’ and candidates’ confidentiality completely. So we're not being awkward, but we often need more of a conversation with you than just give up the information immediately. In any case, it is often better to have somebody represent you professionally into an employer rather than be one amongst hundreds of applications. But we are here to help. Want to subscribe to this blog? click here.