At any dinner table conversation, admitting that you are from the recruitment industry evokes the same reactions as coming from banking or the taxation department.

In many ways the reputation is deserved, because traditionally recruitment firms have charged high fees for providing an indifferent service, with very little first- hand understanding of the client’s actual needs.

Furthermore, once you get past the glossy brochure’s soft-sell, and the potted aspidistra in the foyer, you find you are not dealing with the senior consultant after all, but the young graduate, fresh out of B.A. (Comms).

They still charge the same high fees and still offer the same old, so-called “replacement guarantee”. This is one of the oldest tricks in the traditional recruiters’ shopping bag. The idea being: if you pay your fee promptly (say, in 7 days) they undertake to find a “suitable” replacement if the first candidate leaves within say, three months.

However, consider the realities. They have got your money and they are not going to repay it; you have lost a candidate and they have lost interest! A perfect recipe for disharmony between supplier and client.

For many years clients have used recruiters with some reluctance, but with very little option, knowing that behind the somke and mirrors there was very little first-hand knowledge of the client’s particular industry.

For some years I have felt that there is a need to challenge or “deregulate” the recruitment industry - to tilt the scales back in favour of the client. To spread the risk more evenly between client and recruiter, so the latter takes greater ownership of the risk - rather than the traditional “take the money and run” attitude.

Many is the time I have said to a printing proprietor: “Try this candidate. I’m convinced they’ll work out. Put him/her on, at no charge, and only pay something if you feel he/she is worthwhile!”

Other creative responses have included halving the normal fee for either first-time job seekers or those in the more mature-age bracket. Or, as often happens, agreeing with the client to spread the payments over several months - and giving the client the power to cease payments, at any time, if the candidate is not working out.

Coming from the printing industry as I do - going back in the printing game in Sydney, to 1903 - I have had to adopt a more helpful and flexible approach. I believe the main qualities that clients’ seek in a recruiter, include:

• Fee flexibility (i.e. scope for the client to negotiate terms favourable to them).

• A comprehensive knowledge of the printing industry, and all its idiosyncrasies.

• The ability to offer constructive advice and offer alternative selection strategies to clients (i.e. not just automatically demand a large, client-paid advertisement – JDA uses other, more cost-effective options).

• The preparedness to offer guidance and career advice to candidates, bearing in mind they are our industry’s greatest future resource.

Finally, and I firmly believe that any recruiter worth his salt, should be prepared to do this: do not charge the client any fee for at least 30 days, to allow a reasonable period for the candidate to settle in. If it is not working out, the recruiter should waive the fee!

Most recruiters won’t agree to that, as it puts their fee at risk. That, however, is the whole point.

If and when you next need a recruiter, don’t accept his “terms” passively. Assert your bargaining power by tipping some of the risk onto them. Furthermore, ask them a few searching questions, such as their membership of printing trade associations?. It is a tough, competitive world out there. The printing industry has had to adjust and adapt to changing realities. I believe that traditional recruiters should climb down out of their ivory towers and join the human race.