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Having been in the executive search industry for 10 years, we have been wondering that what kind of relationship we have built up with our clients, or what is the ideal relationship we should have built up with our clients? To discuss
this issue in greater depth, we must first know how our clients consider us.
Generally,
we can divide our clients into 2 categories, as follows: The first
type of clients consider us as one of their ¡°suppliers¡±. As long as the logistics, or supply chain management concept,
are acceptable, companies will classify all their raw materials, commodity or
services providers as suppliers. By
providing recruiting services and appropriate candidates with the required core
competencies, search firms are also classified as a supplier.
The standard processes are then followed for the assessment, selection
and potential future cooperation of a supplier.
This way of
standardizing every working process is usually adopted by big companies.
The result is that unfavorable terms and conditions are usually imposed
on the supplier. ¡°You want to be a supplier of a big company like us?
Sure! But please cut your
proposed price by 20%; you¡¯ll have to compete with the other 3 companies
and/or suppliers, and any risks will be taken fully on your side...¡±.
In short, the idea of better and more timely ¡°services¡± are ignored,
or disregarded. What about
the other type of clients? They
treat us as ¡°partners¡±. As one
of our clients, who is also from the services industry tells us, ¡°we don¡¯t
work FOR our clients, but work WITH our clients¡±.
They treat us in the same way. This
kind of relationship is on the basis that the supplier and customer are equal,
they treat each other with respect and as business partners.
The partnership lies in that each party gives and takes, bears the risks
and benefits from the resultant relationship: a real win-win model. One may
argue that why the partnership is a win-win model?
The ¡°supplier¡± model is much better, from the client¡¯s viewpoint.
Let me explain from our search experience.
To introduce
the right candidates to our client, we must have in-depth understanding about
our client, what products do they make, what kind of company they are, i.e.,
WOFE or JV, who is the hiring manager, what¡¯s his/her style, the company¡¯s
culture, etc. To get to know such
confidential information, we need our client to trust us, to spend time and
energy with us. We can then
understand their needs and place the right person for them.
So the client ¡°invests¡± in us, and they will therefore get the
expected pay back in the successful recruitment of the right style of people
with the required core competencies. If this
situation cannot be established, as the case in most ¡°supplier¡± model, we
can only ¡°guess¡± what kind of people our client wants and the time and cost
pressure stop us from investing much resources in our search.
For this client, it¡¯s more like filling in a position rather than
finding a good candidate. The
result is that this method only appears to be cost effective. The hidden costs on time spent, high turn over rate,
appointee training, etc. are much higher than expected.
This can be explained by the saying: ¡°no pays no gains¡±.
The more fundamental reason lies in that the specialty of human resources
is ignored; human beings are considered the same as materials. On balance, a partnership is an ideal relationship, to us and to our clients.
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