Engaging head hunters for recruitment

There are advantages of engaging headhunters to help you find the right candidate. For example, they help screen through the candidates for you. But there are also the downside part too.

You should not assume headhunters know and understand the job requirements and the qualities you are seeking for in the candidate. It would help if you list down in details the job requirements, qualifications and the type of candidates you are looking for. A consultant from the headhunting firm will contact you and provide you a list of potential candidates with their resumes. It is common that you receive multiple resumes for the same candidate from the different head hunting firms. As as side note, it is from here interestingly you see how each company "re-package" the candidate to make them look marketable.

To save, I would normally look through the resumes and ask the consultant questions about the candidate rather than during the interview. While I would normally discount some of the sales pitch provided by the consultants, I would be extra careful if questions asked are avoided or not answered directly for fear that this would make the applicant less marketable. This brings the credibility of the consultant to be quesitoned. In any case, in a small labour market like Singapore, for an executive/managerial/professional position it is really not difficult to find out about the working background of a person.