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“Understanding the functioning of Manpower

Consultancies in Odisha”

Ashutosh Nanda, Dr.RKS Mangesh Dash

Department of Human Resources & Personal Management, Centurion University of Technological and Management (CUTM)

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ABSTRACT

The objective of this research paper is to understand and identify the effective ways through

which the Manpower consultancies strategize their recruitment process to ensure right hire for any

given position by the Organisation.

The concept of outsourcing has evolved in early eighties and has been a great success since

then. Outsourcing system allows companies to contract for services that are not within the scope of

their expertise. They would rather focus their time, money and energy on their core competencies

instead of trying to gain understanding of areas that are somebody else's expertise. The companies

initially began with delegating their non-core functions to the external organizations that were

specialized in providing a particular service, function or product. In outsourcing, the external

organization would take on the management of the outsourced function in exchange of service

charges. One of the most looked for function that is potentially outsourced is the Recruitment &

Selection and the Training & Development. Most organizations are opting to outsource because

outsourcing in Recruitment enables organizations to access intellectual capital in the external market,

focus on a larger resource base and gain access to all the possibilities in reaching out to a better

talent for a given role.

When sourcing profiles for any open role, the hunt needs to be made from all the possible

sources either in-house or by external sources. The internal source only offers limited opportunities

to look for profile however, the external sources opens multiple opportunities to a wide range of

profiles not limiting to any particular area.

The recruitment industry is gearing up for these area of opportunity by developing strategic

alliances and process alignment to ensure access to the best candidates. External recruitment

agencies are growing in number. This research article greatly focuses on this objective. The attempt

to research and express that choosing such an external manpower agency would help organization

recruiting the suitable candidates. When this function is outsourced, the option & opportunities to

explore to a larger manpower pool increases. Resulting which the businesses has a better access to

the right skilled talents. Although it involves a cost, but it is every worth that having a wrong hire

which may invite to future problems. While the agencies fetch/ hunt for the most appropriate profile(s)

for any given role, the hiring Manager would concentrate on other important functions, like profiles

assessment & selection decision, which still rests with the organization.

Outsourcing the manpower services is an effective approach to gain farther visibility and help

Organization source talent which may not otherwise have any access to. Even the organizations not

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using the services of a recruitment agency, I would like to suggest that recruitment agencies started

gaining an important position among organizations and those people looking for career opportunity.

The core objective of this paper is to investigate effective ways of maximizing the role of recruitment

agencies in Odisha.

For our research work, Bhubaneswar is chosen as the location of this study. This qualitative study

involved 12 informants from four categories; i.e. 4 informants from each category including the

recruitment agency owner, the recruiter, employers/ HR , and job applicants.

Key Words: Recruitment, Organization, Selection, Human Resource, Talent Acquisition. Recruitment

Consultants, Manpower staffing.

INTRODUCTION:

Recruitment, simply is not just filling an open role with an available candidate but rather

taking every possible measure to identify the right fit who is aligned with the Organisation vision &

Management’s objective. Every open position is an opportunity to identify and encourage an

individual with a fitting competency, experience & expertise to apply for the role. On broader level,

recruitment is not only the process of identifying the right resource but rather marketing about the

open position and encouraging potential applicants to apply for the role at the respective channels.

A position at an organisation is open for multiple reasons either new position added, backfill

of a role, business expansion, business restructuring, temporary fill, etc. Irrespective of the reason,

the open position is required to be filled with the most suitable rather a better candidate from a

larger pool. There may be at times only one position open and in other occasion multiple open

positions needs to be backfilled.

The start of the problem occurs when in spite of looking for all the possible internal methods

of sourcing, getting the right talent becomes a tough job & consequently the position is either

closed by a referral candidate or with someone who is not just the right fit. Backfilling happens with

a compromise as the position needs to be closed asap so that any potential (future) problem is

avoided. This particular action ceases the opportunity for a company to get the right fit & also

blocks the road for a most suitable resource to apply for the open role.

That leads us to a main question: what is the utility of recruitment agencies? This is a double

problematic, where on the one hand, I try to explain what recruitment consultants bring in the

process, and on the other hand, they are simply not considered a part of the hiring process.

This study will start with a theoretical part, where we will observe what the literature says

about each approach separately, but also about the relationship between a consultant, employer,

recruiter and a candidate. The second part will be empirical, where we will explore through a

qualitative research how consultants view their own utility in the recruitment process, but also what

job seekers find attractive in this employment strategy, whether the open position as are

appropriately filled for the employers or the recruiters are given all the required areas of

understanding to perform their roles & responsibilities..

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For this exploratory study, an in-depth interview was used as the data collection method,

followed by recording of their responses. The following were the study outcomes:

1) The focus of recruitment agencies should be on the recruitment of both fresher’s and

experienced candidates.

2) Constant training and innovation.

3) Increasing headcount of the agency.

4) Conducting industry mapping for finding out the best fit clients and candidates.

5) Recruitment of the right candidates.

6) Screening candidates with good working attitudes.

7) Ceasing the collection of recruitment fees from the candidates and provision of better

consultation ensuring its effectiveness.

In conclusion, more in-depth future research is needed with respect to recruitment agencies to gain

valuable outcome that would in turn contribute to the field of study.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Of all the outsourcing models that went successful, Manpower Outsourcing has been a great

success for the organisations as it opened new avenues to seek better talents from a wider talent

pool. Understanding a great future & potential, in this 21st century, most consultancies had shifted

their recruitment method attention from traditional sourcing to online recruitment. Job postings on

the websites; utilising social media for job posting, online newspaper classified advertisement; etc.

they adapted all the possible effective strategy to reach/ invite talents across industries. Thus, this

following study was conducted to find ways to maximize the roles of recruitment agency in staffing

activities and identify any possible challenges being faced by them.

Recruitment Agencies: Introduction and Fundamentals

In this article, our objective is to introduce the context of recruitment, and to understand

what it means to outsource the recruitment process by the organisation. It is an essential first part

that will help understand the following ones, more centred on the two parties for which this research

focuses on: the recruitment consultant and the job seeker.

With an understanding on the challenges & opportunities of the recruitment consultants, the

following study will make the common thread through our argument in this thesis. Our

understanding is based on multi-fold dimensions/ approaches:

The first approach will be consultant-oriented, basically the business head of the

consultancies and we will try to understand what they bring, and what makes them

better (or worse) than in-house employers.

The second approach, job owner (HR department), will rather focus on who uses

recruitment agencies (depending on the age, the industry and the management

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level), and should make us understand what are the different areas they seek

assistance

The third area is to check with the recruiter of the consultancy firm to understand

the different factors governing around a hiring process (end to end)

The fourth & the last perspective is to check with the job seeker, candidate himself/

herself to identify the information/ opportunities he/she is being appraised with for

an open role.

This chapter will follow a simple path; we will start by briefly introducing what the general term of

recruitment is, including important distinctions to make. Then, we will explain what the literature

tells about Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) to manpower consultants, and why it is so

commonly used these days. Finally, we will discuss the role of recruitment agencies, with a more

detailed part on executive search firms, as they represent an essential issue in this study.

1. Introduction to Recruitment

Simply defined, “Recruitment includes those practices and activities carried on by the

organisation with the primary purpose of identifying and attracting potential employees” (Barber,

1998, p. 5). This author (1998) makes a clear distinction between recruitment and selection: two

different phases, but she does not omit the fact that one may or may not influence the other.

Recruitment would come first, and consists in finding and attracting potential candidates. The

selection follows with picking the right fit among these potential candidates. However, Lundby and

Jolton (2010) explains that recruitment would be more important as it comes first, and therefore a

very successful selection process can be ruined by a poor recruitment in the first place. Depending

on the phase, the leverage is not on the same side. Indeed, when trying to attract candidates, the

organisation remains in a weaker position, having the obligation to find qualified individuals with the

limited resources. On the other hand, the organisation gets leverage back when selecting its new

hire, because they usually have more than one choice (specially looking for a wider pool).

Obviously, the candidate still has the possibility to reject the offer, but everyone acknowledges that

once the potential candidate has been through all the levels of recruitment process, the likelihood

to refuse an offer is smaller.

2. Recruitment agencies

Recruitment agencies are the manpower consultants who assist organisations in sourcing the

most suitable profile from the available wider talent pool. They are the registered associates who

work on behalf of employers and look for the best fit from the market. Their role is to find the best

candidates for the job and present them to the employer. They don’t usually make the final hiring

decision, and once a candidate is hired, they get a payment from the employer. A recruitment agency

acts as an intermediary between an organisation that is looking to employ someone and an

individual who is looking for a job. A recruitment agent’s main function is to source the most suitable

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person for a job vacancy that they have been asked to fill. Recruitment agencies usually provide

extensive and advisory services to the organization. Recruitment agencies get paid by the employer

for every candidate they put forward who successfully gets a job with the employer. Some agencies

get paid on a fixed-basis, and some agencies get paid a fee based on candidate’s starting salary.

(Recruitment Process through Manpower consultancies)

3. Why do employers use Recruitment Agencies?

Individuals with virtually any amount of experience in human resources will likely readily

agree that the process of recruiting and hiring new staff can be somewhat costly to the company.

These costs will be both direct(advertising) and indirect (resource and time allocation) and may have

short-term (training requirements) and long-term implications(turnover/bad hires).

In many instances, the recruiting /hiring responsibilities are assigned to a sole employee, or

perhaps to a small in-house team, on an as-need basis within the other duties of a comprehensive

human resources role. Such a scenario can often lead to hastily devised recruitment plans and

perhaps hiring decisions made under time pressures, which can ultimately result in poor returns on

investment for the organization. If this has a familiar tone for employers and hiring managers, then

it is actually an ideal case for considering to utilize the expertise of an agency providing staffing

services of their recruiters. Recruiting people takes a huge amount of time, and for many firms it is

real struggle to find enough time to do it well, Recruitment is also very much a numbers game: an

employer often has to look at a lot of applications before he finds the right person for the role. That

might sound a bit horrible and impersonal, and it is, but it’s also how it is.

RECRUITMENT AGENCY GET LISTS OF

VACCANCIES FROM EMPLOYERS WITH JD & PERSON SPECIFICATION

RESOURCE REQUISITION ASSIGNED TO A

SPECIALISED RECRUITER

ADVERTISING PLACEMENT ON

INTERNET JOB BOARDS WITH DETAILED JD &

SOURCING STRATEGIES

SOURCING OF PROFILES THROUGH JOB PORTALS

,REFERENCE CHECK

REACHING AND TARGETING RIGHT

RESUME

CONTACTING THE CANDIDATES &

OFFERING THE VALUE PROPOSITION

TELEPHONIC INTERVIEW BY ISOURCE

FORWARDING THE RESUME TO THE CLIENT

ORGANIZATION SELECT/SHORTLIST

PREFERRED CANDIDATE & ITERVIEW SCHEDULE

FEEDBACK BACK FROM CLIENT AND SELECTED CANDIDATE FOR F2F

ROUND

FOLLOW UP WITH CANDIDATE FOR JOING

FORMALITY

JOING DETAILS,COMPENSATIO

N STRUCTURE AND OTHER REGULATION

RELATED INFORMATION REQUIRED

PREPARE INVOICE

FOLLW-UP WITH CLIENT FOR THE FINAL

PAYMENT

AFTER THE FINAL PAYMENT,SEND

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT MAIL TO THE CLIENT

CLOSE THE PROCESS

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Recruitment agencies fill a specific need. Employers need the right people to apply for their jobs, but

often that don’t have the time to go and find these people themselves. They use recruitment

agencies to this for them, so that the employer can spend more of their time interviewing applicants.

Agencies are a major and important part of recruiting for the computing midsized industries. You

will probably find at least one of your first three jobs in the industry through a recruitment agency.

Recruitment agencies offer several cost-reducing or cost- saving measures over in- house efforts,

including:

I. Minimizing advertising costs

Recruiters already maintain pools of pre-identified potential.

Ready access to a target audience narrows the span/scope of advertising.

II. Reduction of recruitment time:

Targeted search efforts can identify top candidates in a shorter time span.

Opening can be filled faster and help maintain desired productivity levels.

III. Reduction of interviewing time:

In-house staff only dedicates time to assessing the most viable candidates.

Saves time lost to interviewing several potentially less-qualified applicants.

IV. Coordination of pre-employment screening:

Includes background checks, reference checks, and specific skills testing

Ultimately plays a role in making better, more confident hiring decisions.

V. Strengthening of retention rates:

Hiring well-vetted staff will likely improve retention/reduce turnover rates.

Minimizes high /unwanted costs of termination and repeated recruitment.

VI. Reduction of overtime hours / costs:

Agencies can act quickly to meet seasonal or unexpected staffing demands.

Allows revenue streams to continue; lessens fatigue/ strain on existing staff.

VII. Give a best fit candidate with replacement guarantee.

VIII. Less stressful hiring.

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3.1. Criteria to consider when choosing a recruitment agency

The main criteria that employers need to consider when choosing recruitment services from

recruitment agency are well presented in Table I below.

Table: I Criteria to Consider When Choosing a Recruitment Agency

Criteria Issues

Agency and its Reputation

Types of workers provided Planning

and Lead time

How long has it been in business? Are location, references from

clients available?

What occupation and KSAO levels? How many available?

Does agency help clients to plan staffing levels and needs?

How quickly can workers be provided?

Services Provided Issues

Recruitment

Selection Training

Wages and Benefits Orientation

Supervision

Temp-to-Perm

Client Satisfaction

What methods are used? How targeted and truthful is the

recruitment process?

What selection techniques are used to assess KSAOs?

What types of training, if any, provided before workers are

placed with client?

How are wages determined? What benefits are provided?

How does the agency prepare workers for assignment with

client? Does agency have an employee handbook for its

workers?

How does agency supervise its workers on site of client?

Does agency provide on-site manager?

Does agency allow clients to hire its temporary workers as

permanent employees?

How does agency attempt to gauge client satisfaction with

services, workers, costs?

Worker Effectiveness Issues

Punctuality and Attendance

Job Performance Retention

Does the agency monitor these? What is their record with

previous clients?

Is it evaluated? How are the results used?

How long do workers remain on an assignment voluntarily?

How are workers discharged by the agency?

Cost Issues

Markup For Special Services What is the base wage charged to client (often it is 50% to cover

benefits, overhead, profit margin)?

What services cost extra beyond the markup (e.g., temp-to-

perm)? What are those costs?

(Source: Heneman, H. G., & Judge, T. A. (2006). Staffing Organization (5th ed.). Middleton, WI: Mendota House, Inc., p.121)

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4. Recruitment agencies & consultants may provide the following services:

o Executive search (head hunting potential high calibre candidates)

o Permanent staffing, temporary staffing, campus recruitment

o Training, consulting (background verification, recruitment process outsourcing,

advice suggestion for right career

o Participation in the selection process

o Conducting specialist recruitment

o Advertisement design and placement

o Assistance with the preparation of selection documentation

o Handle initial enquiries and acknowledge applications

o Short list applications and conduct first round interviews

o Conduct verbal reference checks and skill tests

o Present short listed applicants for further consideration

o Organise interviews with the short listed applicants

o Assist with negotiations and advise unsuccessful applicants of the outcome.

5. Sectors recruitment agencies deal with in backfilling for any open role:

o Manufacturing

o Logistics

o Banking & Financial Services

o Insurance

o Consumer Durable

o Construction

o IT

o ITES

o Media & Entertainment

o Pharmaceutical

o Steel Industry

o Telecom

o Shipping & Logistics

o Aviation

6. Recruitment process through different recruitment agencies for midsized companies in

Odisha:

Agencies get lists of vacancies from employers, and then they place adverts on internet job

boards, and sometimes in other places too. They are also always on the lookout for new CVs

being uploaded to the internet job boards.

Some agencies will take the CV that you give them and send the employer an edited version.

(This, by the way, is the main reason why many internet job boards only accept CVs in

Microsoft Word format). The agency may simply put your CV into their branded template,

and some may remove your personal details to prevent the employer trying to approach you

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directly to avoid paying the agency. (There is often no love lost between employers and

agencies!)

No reputable agency will change the contents of your CV without permission.

A shortlist of applicants is drawn up by the agency who select individuals from the pool of

their database.

The organization selects their preferred individuals from the CV selection and asks the

agency to arrange and coordinate an interview.

Final selection status shared with candidates.

Follow-up meeting

Closure, along with offer letter and compensation structure and regulation related to

employment.

RECRUITMENT CYCLE

(Image source: https://www.michaelpage.lu/en/about-us/recruitment-process)

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Process of recruitment through recruitment agencies:

(Image Source: http://www.5elementshr.com/services/executive-search-firm.html)

According to the researcher, if the organisation will follow the above process step-by-step then role

of recruitment agencies will be maximised.

2.6) ROLES OF RECRUITMENT AGENCY IN RECRUITMENT AND SELECTION PROCESS:

Recruitment agencies aim for a “win-win” situation between candidate and company. It is

their role to ensure they provide companies with an impressive short list of candidates who meet the

criteria for the job. A good recruitment consultant will give feedback on your interview technique

and resume layout. Typically, data are collected by a search agent from the host organization to

ascertain requirements. A job specification & candidate specification are drawn up to measure the

candidates against. Agencies must first obtain “sufficient information” from the employer in order

to “select a suitable work seeker”, and include. the name of the employer and the nature of its

activities; the date on which the recruit is required, and the duration of the work (temp or perm); the

position, its location, hours of work, and known health and safety risks; the experience, training,

qualifications and any authorization that the employer considers necessary; the minimum pay and

benefits that the employer would offer, their frequency, and the notice period involved. Agencies

should confirm the identity of the recruit and that the person meets the employer’s criteria and that

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it is willing to work in the position concerned. Agencies must inform the employer any information

that indicates the individual might be unsuitable. Agencies will have this duty for perm recruits at

least for a period of three months. Agencies will pass copies of any qualifications and two references

to the employer.

Good recruitment agencies will have an excellent understanding of their local markets and become

major players within the sector. According to Pretty (2008), agencies can also give the candidates an

accurate understanding of what salary they are expecting, according to the experiences and area

that they wish to work in. However, the most basic service offered by recruitment agency is to match

the skills and qualifications to the most suitable vacancies that arise. The usual process is that the

candidates will send in their curriculum vitae to the agency, which will identify possible roles for the

candidates and then contact them for approval before putting them forward for each vacancy. The

agency will then coordinate the interview process and provide feedback from the clients (employers)

about the outcome of each interview.

The recruitment services offered by an agency are free for candidates to register. Reputable

recruitment agencies will take time in understanding the requirements and ensure that types of

positions that the candidates are interested in. Recruiters often have contacts with a large number

of clients who choose not to advertise their vacancies publicity, widening the pool of vacancies to

job seekers. As most agencies have huge database of job applicants who are looking for jobs, they

generally help employers to save their times and costs to speed up the recruitment and selection

process. The recruitment consultants will not simply send the unqualified candidates for short-listing

as it is not beneficial to them. Unqualified ones for sure will be rejected by the employers.

ROLE OF RECRUITERS IN RECRUITMENT AGENCIES:

o Source profiles from different Portals for Resume Search, Job Posting, Referencing and

Headhunting.

o Pre-Screen the Resumes and Send relevant profiles to client for their perusal for candidate's

interview.

o Direct sourcing activities

o Dealing with candidates, Clients

o Coordinating Interviews, Follow -up

o Understanding the requirement, develop the job description

o Preparing Hunting text, JD & Company profile after receiving the opening.

o Have to coordinate with accounts department

o Understanding requirement of the client and customise the search accordingly.

o Identifying the potential candidates through various sources like job portals, Head Hunting ,

Networking sites, Reference etc. to fill the vacancies and stimulating them to apply for the

jobs.

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o Ensure that resume appropriately reflects candidate experience and meets requirement.

o Match the profile of the candidate on technical and behavioral grounds.

o Conduct preliminary tests and Initial HR rounds for the candidates.

o Conducts initial interviews by phone to determine interest, Communication, experience and

skill level.

o Ensure candidate is available and ready to take up the position.

o Negotiates salaries with candidates and close the position.

o Build resume sources (networks). Focus on targeting the passive job seeker.

o Follow up till the candidate joins and maintain a good relation.

o Preparation of offer letters and salary negotiations.

o Follow up with interviewers on commencement formalities.

o To build and maintain database of junior/ Middle/ Senior level Professionals.

An Effective Recruitment cycle

IDENTIFICATION

&

UNDERSTANDING

SOURCING

SCREENING

INITIAL INTERVIEW

FINAL INTERVIEW

FEEDBACK

SHORT LISTING

VERIFICATION

OFFER

JOINING FORMALITY

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RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:

The type of research design that was used for this study was qualitative research approach.

By using this approach, it allows the researcher to explore more on employers and job applicants’

perception towards the recruitment agency. This research was conducted in Odisha at

Bhubaneswar. This is because the majority of recruitment agencies and well-established

organizations are located here.

This qualitative study involved 12 informants from three categories; i.e. 3 informants from each

category including the recruitment agency owner, the recruiter, employers/ HR , and job applicants.

The informants for this study were selected using purposive sampling method.

The research instrument used by the researcher was a set of printed or written questions with a

choice of answers, devised for the purpose of study (commonly termed as questionnaire) to be

answered by the informants. In this study, there were closed-ended schedule questions, which

focused on the effective ways to maximize the role of recruitment agency. The usage of closed-

ended questions had encouraged the informants to be more specific, and it take less time, it can be

easily analysed and can be accessed through statistical interpretation, suited for analysis and

moreover, the response rate is higher in case of closed-end questionnaire.

After data collection, the researcher started to analyse, and interpret all the collected data. After the

researcher discovered the categories and patterns in the data, there were explanations for these

data and the linkages among them. Objective of study has been used as a guideline for data analysis

and interpretations.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION:

To support the research work, I’d approached almost 8 manpower consultancies & 12

organisations at Bhubaneswar. The organisations approached had a mix model of hiring, few were

very active in hiring through placement consultants and others some utilised consultancy for filling

in specific position. For the research work, I considered 3 consultancies & 3 organisations to help us

for our research work. Overall I observed there has been a major gap; the candidates are not getting

suitable job as per their skillsets, the placement agencies are not getting proper business and the

Hiring Managers are not getting right manpower. Although there is a great opportunity but nothing

is getting addressed to the satisfaction level.

The questionnaire for data collection was designed in a way that it captured the required

information for the research study. Broadly, it captured the personal details, information about the

business & the team. This was made with the intention to study & review all the connected factors

involved in recruitment.

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Summary of Informants background:

SL. NO

GENDER

AGE

EDUCATIONAL

LEVEL

CURRENT POSITION

CATEGORY

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Male

Male

Female

Female

Male

Female

Male

Male

Female

Male

Female

Female

39

31

29

42

38

45

35

48

36

31

28

30

B. Tech.

MBA

B.Com

MBA

MBA

M Sc., MBA

MBA

PGDBM

B. Tech, MBA

BSc.

MBA

B. Tech, PGDBM

Marketing Manager

Operations Executive

Asst. Manager Accounts

Senior Consultant

Sr. Consultant

Business Head

Recruitment Lead

HR Head

Asst. Manager - HR

Recruitment Consultant

Business Consultant

Executive Recruiter

Job seeker

Job seeker

Job seeker

Agency owner

Agency owner

Agency owner

HR Manager

HR Manager

HR Manager

Recruiter

Recruiter

Recruiter

For the research work, the gender neutrality was considered. The responded were equally

divided irrespective of the genders (6 Male & 6 Females). All the respondents were more or less

experienced (with min. 5 years of experience) & had a good understanding about their

responsibilities & the opinions connected to the research work.

The primary challenge that the consultancies faced in reaching out to the companies &

getting recognised. The consultancies still believed in the old methods of approaching business. i.e.

cold calling & website promotion but did not leverage digital marketing to the full advantage.

Moreover, they have very limited or no resource for marketing & client engagement. It is only the

Head of the consultancy who maintains the relationship & addresses the escalation (if any).

Consultancies are not maintaining proper hierarchy in their internal team. Consultancy owners want

to manage with minimum resource so they hire limited employees and give them multiple job

responsibilities not matching their profile. Some consultant firms in their own internal team don't

hire exact persons for exact positions to fulfil client's requirements. For ex: They hire a tele-caller but

put them engage to source candidates and close the positions too. The recruiters/Client Sourcing

Managers are not properly trained for which they are not following proper methods to source CVs

and get Clients.

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Due to inappropriate practices of some consultancies, the candidates lose their beliefs on

recruitment firms. There are even some recruiters who send candidates to their clients without

sharing them proper information regarding their job profile. But most of the Candidates are happy

with the behaviour of the consultancy firms and the service and opportunity provided by them.

However, the consultancies need to improve in their quality of training as per the candidates’

responses.

Whereas coming to recruiters, they are not happy with their salary structure and incentives. They are

not getting proper infrastructure support from their Organisation and not even getting proper

support from their immediate seniors due to lack of knowledge.

Recruiters are not satisfied with their clients even. They are not getting proper feedback of their

candidates from the clients. In general, they are not getting proper cooperation from the client side.

4.2. Discussion on ways to maximize the roles of recruitment agency:

Recruitment agencies need to improve their recruitment practices in order to compete with

other agencies. Effectiveness of recruitment agencies always has become satisfaction factors for

most of the employers and job applicants. Agency users will only look for professional people to work

for them. There are many ways for agencies to improve their recruitment firms.

According to Recruitment agency Informant category, they had changed their recruitment practices

and focus on not only to the fresh graduates, but also recruiting more post graduates or experienced

candidates as older people are more mature, and they are able to perform better in the job. The

agency operator believed that constant training and innovation are very important. “To get good,

reliable candidates is a challenge…” Although Informant this category has no problem getting any

fresh graduates because there are lots in the market, but getting specific people with specific skills

are very tough task . Informants from this category responded, “HR or recruitment is still a people’s

business.

Recruitment consultants are the important people in the recruitment firms. They should have the

communication and social skills to deal with people, especially to their clients and candidates.

Recruitment consultants meet people every day. They have to fulfil requirements from employers

and candidates to help them to find a job as well as to help the employer to fill in their position. No

matter how good the technologies are, agency still need to provide training for their people, if not,

they will never success in the business. In order to maximize the agency’s effectiveness and to satisfy

the clients and the job applicants in recruitment and selection process, Informants suggested that

more people should be hired. “In order to maximize our agency service, we would prefer to increase

the headcount…” They should always look for good consultants, the more consultants they have,

the more people that they could help to deal with people then there will be higher chances for people

to find them a good job, and also for company to find suitable employees.

Informants from Employers’ (clients) mentioned that different period of time actually require

different skills set to keep on innovating and upgrading the agency services to fulfil market

requirement. For an example given in notes, “Last time computer was not popular, not everyone got

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a computer, that’s why people need data entry clerk, but today no more data entry clerk…” From

here, the researcher understand that Informants from employer has to keep track on what is the next

demand in the job market, then only they can continue to survive.

“A company is successful because of people…”Informants from this category believed that, if she/he

pays such amount of money to hire, she/he maybe get back more valuable in return. So, to keep

hiring people is a long term investment for her. From here, she is able to discover the talented people

and retained them. Usually Informants from employers category marked that agency will first do

industry mapping and then they carefully selecting their clients and candidates. Doing survey and

study about the company are equally important for Informant before agency made any decision

whether to serve them or not. This is how they should practice their business management. For

candidates, they will do the evaluation and judgment on the particular person by matching

qualification, skills, age and experiences and will see his/ her characters and also the company’s

culture. The reason why employers used their services is because they have allocated sources and

people to help them to solve their recruitment problem and there are many advantages to them too.

Sometimes, the agency keeps sending unqualified candidates and forcing employers to recruit them

and just want to get their recruitment commission but they were not professional enough. In deriving

to the solution, Informant was hoping that the agencies should improve their services in the

organization. “They have to start supply the right candidates for the company and should charge

reasonably....” from the feedback given by informant from employer category.

Informant from candidates category always ensure effective candidates’ arrangement for the

interview session with the employer, they encouraged and welcomed more people who are looking

for job should come and register with agency. Informant from this category marked most of the

clients and applicants felt comfortable with the agency services provided, that is why they have the

confidence with them. In addition, qualification of consultants also very important because they

represent the firms, “They are the ambassador of the company…” replied by Informant and they

have to know what the candidates’ interest and what they want. From the perspective of job

applicant, Informant strongly suggested that the job agency should not collect any amount of

money from the candidates. If they really want to help the candidates to get a job, Informant thinks

the agency should collect the recruitment fees from the company. Better consultation with the

candidates should be implemented. The consultants should discover more about the candidates’

strength, applicants will appreciate what the agencies have done for them, then they will go back to

the agency in order to build in better relationship.

5. CONCLUSION:

17

This exploratory research study began by questioning the value added by recruitment

consultants, acting as intermediaries, with a strong focus on their relationship with job seekers. On

the one hand, I tried to understand what recruitment consultants could bring to the recruitment

process, and on the other hand, how job seekers and executives were measuring consultants’

efficiency & effectiveness. The literature found on this topic showed several different aspects, mainly

positive. Namely, a successful consultant was able to widen the network and include a job seeker to

a search process that this individual would have never found alone. Job seekers would then see these

consultants as a great source of advice, whether it is regarding their career options, or even within

the recruitment process, bringing tips about how to approach the client and the role they applied

for.

During the qualitative study completed through interviewing some consultants as well as job seekers

and executives, I realised that the perspective each had on the other could differ on some points. The

main one would concern expectations job seekers have while looking for new opportunities.

Precisely, the importance of compensation and other benefits is not positioned at the same level,

job seekers admitting that this attribute was not the first one they were looking at. The opinion

would also be different depending on the management level and the industry, what the scope of the

study did not allow general conclusions on this topic.

I did found out that consultants play a real intermediate role, breaking the recruitment into more

steps, and therefore allowing more selection and more filtering, ensuring more accurate recruitment

and a higher level of quality. Consultants find people that employers would not, which very likely the

main reason why their business is successful. On a candidate perspective, having a strong profile

gives us a certain assurance to be contacted for the right opportunity. Recruitment remains a

business where the client pays, and therefore efforts are carried on top candidates. That results in a

significant amount of job seekers being left out by recruiters only because they were not part of the

top five percent for this particular role.

This industry is also considerably impacted by the rise of technology and social media. I only devoted

a few paragraphs on this topic, because the objective was not to explore it more, but it definitely an

aspect to consider for further research. The question would therefore be to understand how involved

technology should be with recruitment.

The general limits that can be considered for this entire study is the infinite number of

interpretations. As Josselson (2013) states: “we as researchers are the authors of our interpretations”

(p. 2). This statement goes for everyone; it is extremely complicated to express a general theory, as

every story, every application, every role is unique, and experiences in the recruitment sector will

never be twice the same.

Through the data gathered & the findings from the questionnaire, it can be concluded that

there are many effective ways to maximize the recruitment agencies’ roles as suggested by the

informants of this study.

The recruitment agencies should focus on recruiting both fresh and experienced

candidates; provide constant training and innovation;

18

increase the agency headcount; conduct industry mapping and carefully search for

the clients and candidates;

recruiting the right candidates; reduce the recruitment fees, screen the good

candidates with good working attitudes;

stop collecting recruitment fees from candidates; provide better consultation by

helping the candidates identifying their strengths and weaknesses.

This study outcome is expected to help agency owners in Odisha market, specially

Bhubaneswar as it could be used to evaluate the effectiveness and individual performances of

recruitment consultants in recruitment process. From this study, it could provide support to increase

the potential of recruitment agencies and recruitment consultants in order to increase the

recruitment trends for midsized companies in Odisha. Besides, the outcome of this study can be used

to identify the strength and weaknesses of recruitment agencies from the perspectives of agency

users. The feedback received from employers and job applicants will maximize the performances of

agencies in the future.

Overall, the effectiveness of the firms in terms of operations and management is an important

element in recruitment agencies. Besides, the professionalism of recruitment consultants can deliver

quality recruitment services, thus lead to customer satisfaction. Therefore, more research about

recruitment agencies should be conducted and make the reliable outcome thus contributing to the

human resource field.

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Alexandra Rufini (2008),Choosing recruitment channels to fill high job positions,

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Lars Behrenz (2001), ‘Who gets the job and why? An explorative study of employers’

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Henning Weiner (2008), A study of Recruitment Process Trends in Sweden -Which factors

shape businesses recruitment behavior?, Wiley’s Online Library.

Taylor, m. Susan; Bergmann, Thomas j. (1987), “Organizational recruitment activities and

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