COVID-19: Essential business lessons for recruitment leaders
Everything a recruitment leader needs to future-proof your business post-pandemic.
Everything a recruitment leader needs to future-proof your business post-pandemic.
We've curated lessons from over 22 hour-long webinars and 30+ podcasts on topics that are crucial for any recruitment business leader.
Start exploring the top advice and guidance from our experts and members who've been through similar crises in the past. In this guide, you will find:
The state of the labour market (featuring REC's latest jobs market data)
Top questions asked by fellow recruitment leaders
Strategic guidance on managing your business and people
Advice on preparing for a recovery
For a full timeline of government announcements on COVID-19 and for the latest legal guidance, head to our COVID-19 hub.
How to navigate: Use the blue buttons below to switch between sections. Each section contains the key learnings and takeaways on that subject matter with an 'Explore further' section for further reading.
Explore further: This guide is a compilation of the key learnings from our webinars and podcasts. Under the 'Explore further' section, you'll find links to watch the full webinars or listen to our podcasts to get a more in-depth understanding of these topics.
Want to see all the webinars and pods in one place? Head to the bottom of this page
Need to access this page anytime? Bookmark it under your favourites.
The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the need for recruitment businesses to be even more well-informed of changing labour market conditions so they can provide the strategic consultation that clients need. Our latest Research Bitesize will provide you with the most up-to-date information you need to understand the jobs market and plan ahead. It brings together all the latest REC research and labour market developments.
According to our latest JobsOutlook report:
Three in ten (28%) employers reported making redundancies in the year to October-December 2020, while two in five (39%) had reduced workers’ hours. In both cases this was up from just 10% in the year to October-December 2019.
Satisfaction levels with the candidates presented by recruitment agencies rose from 67% in October-December 2019 to 79% in the last quarter of 2020. Satisfaction with agencies themselves rose from 65% to 78% over the same period.
In December 2020, when asked what would be their biggest challenges for 2021:
two in five (41%) cited ongoing public health restrictions and social distancing measures
one in three (36%) said regulatory changes related to Brexit
1. What does leadership look like in the new norm?
Enhance your standards of communication; technology allows you to reach out to and engage with wider groups, incl. internationally.
Embrace agility and diminish bureaucracy; provide support and give freedom to others to develop skill sets to achieve goals.
Look outside of your business at trends and networking opportunities – use the 80/20 principle focusing on areas that will make a difference for your people and business.
Have the courage and strength to lead people and make informed decisions using data.
Invest in people and continue to learn yourself; live the ideals and exhibit the behaviours you want others to adopt.
2. How do I manage redundancies and provide support to staff?
You have a duty of care to all your employees; let them go with the same dignity as when you hired them.
Ensure to show compassion when delivering the news and do not, in any way, place the blame on the individual (you never know when your paths may cross again!).
If someone else is delivering the news to a colleague, spend time with them in advance to ensure they truly understand the reasons why the business is making this decision.
Be courteous and clear about any dates and any settlements; do not tell (or expect) them to not tell others about their circumstances.
Provide counselling and help to your staff who are being laid off with their CVs, give directions on how to find a new job and train them on how to go through interviews.
Never give bad news on a bank holiday or a Friday.
3. How can I achieve the most outcome with fewer staff?
Start with rationally reviewing and rewriting your business and individual consultant’s targets:
Review pre-lockdown profit per head that each consultant was achieving.
Evaluate in conjunction with your company’s strategy how quickly your business can get back to that benchmark and how quickly you can drive above that line (use your CMR data).
Optimise your time management through appraising your processes, internal procedures and technology; remove potential impediments and “waste”.
Be honest with your people, utilise and direct their strengths and link your reward system to the behaviours you want them to demonstrate.
Consider promoting people to increase motivation (does not need to necessarily be supported by a pay increase).
4. How can leaders create better mindsets within their teams and help staff adjust post furlough?
Exude a positive mindset and create that upbeat environment – start with yourself, understand what we’re saying to ourselves to take control of our thoughts.
Listen to your staff and their personal needs – COVID has reset some of the individual values, so as leaders we must re-learn what is important to our people (map their personal and career plans to see how they align).
Apply the 5:1 rule – find 5 positives about the team/individual and 1 area you want them to focus on.
Get your staff on the phone speaking with clients and candidates to readjust quicker – focus on things they can do and encourage them to make progress.
Use data to make informed decisions if you need to reduce your workforce but hold on to great talent within your business.
5. Where should I start and how can I compete with others already offering RPO/MSP services?
Start with your business strategy – target markets, products and your unique selling points.
Understand your relationship with clients – do they come to you for advice or to solve issues? If not, think how you can build your relationship up with them and increase trust levels.
Different services will have different decision makers – HR, procurement or line managers, CEO, etc. – know who they are and get close to them.
Learn the drivers behind your client’s business, what their business and people strategy is, are they reskilling or re-hiring, etc. Analyse the market (PESTLE/Ansoff matrix).
Be innovative and stand out from the crowd – in-depth research is key.
6. What are the hallmarks of Professional Services that differentiates them from recruitment?
The outsourced service provider:
Is contractually liable for the end result, the outcome.
Will be required to meet agreed deadlines and quality standards.
Decides, without any input from the customer, which resources to use, and where and when, to get the project completed for the customer.
Ownership is key to deciding whether something is outsourced. If the success or otherwise of the project is owned by the services provider, then it will usually be a genuinely outsourced service. If the customer retains ownership of the outcomes, then it’s probably not.
Fixed price work carries a lot more risk, as all extra costs, contingencies, etc. need to be thought through in the contract upfront. Clients are generally charged a fixed price and invoices are sent to the client upon completion of fixed milestones or deliverables.
Time and materials-based services (as opposed to fixed price) can work but won’t be considered “contracted-out” for the purposes of the new IR35 rules coming into force in April 2021.
7. How can I identify the right technology for my business to stay competitive post-recession?
Digitalisation is about simplifying tasks and being operationally efficient – ensure you measure what matters
Ensure your data and assets are secured and protected from external cyber threats. Your staff needs to be digitally upskilled and educated around basic cybersecurity
Video technology allows businesses to be market influencers; utilise technology to showcase your and the employers’ branding, provide short video introductions of potential candidates to your client; explore candidate shortlisting.
8. Should my leadership style need to change as we plan to return to work?
To successfully lead your teams into the new norm leaders should be purposeful, empathetic, calm, action-oriented (and reflective), inspiring, resilient, courageous, and be aware of the mindset of your people.
The current way in which we communicate will differentiate us from the old-style recruitment; as leaders, delegate and empower people so that they are part of your mission and part of your succession planning.
As a recruitment business leader, getting your strategy right and seeing it through is critical for success and sustainability. We've pulled together some of the essential lessons this crisis has taught us on crisis management, cash flow, strategy planning, and client management.
Businesses were in a race to protect their customers and bottom lines at the advent of the crisis. Panic was certainly an emotion that swept the nation, but the dilemma for leaders was whether to prioritise strategy or urgency - either way, at its core, was making the right day-to-day business decisions to keep the business afloat. The four core areas we advised businesses to focus on were:
Cashflow
Furlough
Homeworking
Strategy planning
Essential lessons for recruitment leaders:
Be resilient – by adapting to new circumstances you can maintain productivity
Put a process in place so that you’re ready to move forward when the time comes
Don’t panic, don’t make irrational and instant decisions – pause until all information is available
Make decisions based on facts
Strategy is three-fold: a day-to-day strategy, a short-term strategy and a longer-term recovery strategy
Crisis communications:
Our comms team have created a guide to help members deal with crisis communications and managing journalists. To request the guide, contact Director of Sales and Marketing, Kate Shoesmith, or Head of Communications, Shazia Ejaz.
Cash is the lifeblood of any business. Automatically, cashflow was certainly a major concern for many businesses.
Essential lessons for recruitment leaders:
Our advice has been to have a conversation with suppliers early on. For very small businesses it might be uncomfortable but essential to chase up clients to pay.
We put together this cashflow checklist to help business owners navigate the primary cashflow challenges:
Be realistic and prepare a 13-week cashflow plan – to give visibility and understand what cash is coming in and out
Utilise the Government’s Job Retention Scheme where appropriate
Consider providing outplacement services as a way of generating revenue
Chase down outstanding debts and agree payment plans where relevant, but ensure to use the appropriate tone of voice with clients
Build your interim and temp business – these will be the quick growth areas
Update your database – establish and widen your talent pool
Train and develop staff so they are ready for the upturn
Have daily conversations with clients – identify those who are able to bounce back quickly and/or have a good recovery plan, and align your business to theirs
Discover new opportunities to bring value to your clients
Re-evaluate your assets and your delivery methods – do you need the office, or can you downsize? Can you implement shift work or desk sharing?
Invest wisely - avoid having a complete spending paralysis that can bring your business to a halt
Use cost-effective ways to promote your brand e.g., via social media or thought leadership content
Evaluate your staff’s performance and KPIs, focus on the team and assign top recruiters to orchestrate the process to maximise benefits
Seek and provide professional advice – reach out to your suppliers and clients, and be supportive in return
Know that you will be remembered by how you act now
Consider creating a reserve fund that can sustain your business in unprecedented times for 3-4 months (future risk mitigation)
As well as crisis management and cashflow, one of the big questions was whether to diversify into new markets or deep specialise in the existing spaces. We had some big lessons for both sides.
Deep specialisation in an existing market:
Retain your position as a specialist where possible, concentrate on being at least 1% better than others in your space by improving your operational and service levels to separate yourself from the competition.
Future proof your business: understand what opportunities are costing you money - drive your purpose, create trust, invest in training, and look after your peoples’ well-being to create loyalty to your business.
Develop strong recruiting skills - remember the ACE model:
what authority do you have in the market,
how well are you connected within your industry, and
focus on your education.
Remember that people pay for quality: a critical success factor is to be able to articulate value over price, work hard on your service offerings.
Have a process to understand what does and doesn’t make money - try the Jigsaw analogy:
corner piece: people – your consultants, clients, and candidates
frame: your infrastructure and its capabilities
body: your service offering
Diversification into new markets:
Understand your WHY’s: why are you working in the current market and why do you want to move into a new market?
Do your market research: what do you know about your market and competition? Focus on the SME market, as it has a lower entry barrier
Strategic thinking: exercise caution as a transactional model will not create longevity and therefore diversification should be part of your long-term strategy
Clients: explore options to expand across a client, understand their trends, and see if you can expand in sectors that go “hand in glove”.
Watch the webinars below to learn about seven other areas you need to consider before diversifying into new markets.
What should a modern recruitment firm look like? How do you offer true value and stand out from the crowd?
"The advice I'd give to business leaders is now is the time to really invest heavily on your network, your relationships and your brand - you've got to make sure people know who you are and what you stand for, and this is the time to do it." Hung Lee, Recruiting Brainfood
Big lessons:
Be devoted to your purpose: review and adapt your strategy - do not give up on what got your business to where it was before this pandemic; continue to understand your customers’ needs and become a subject matter expert in your market.
Communication creates opportunities: continue to network and deepen relationships with clients, look at your internal collaboration structure and how you incentivise teams.
Coming together to gain quick wins: consider options to partner or collaborate with other companies (e.g., look at mergers and acquisitions where appropriate) – it is about servicing the client the best way we can.
Strategic selling: get closer to your existing clients, understand what value you provide that others don’t. What is your USP and where do you already operate as a 'trusted advisor'? Are there opportunities to upsell/cross-sell, or provide other services?
How do I stay connected with clients and provide value in order to be at the top of their list when they start hiring again?
To be on the list, start by helping your clients create that list; understand your client’s requirements, and demonstrate your commitment to their welfare by being agile, aligning to their long-term plans, advising them along the journey, and helping with other suppliers.
Good leaders recognise the importance of communication and showing empathy to support their remote workforce. We've pulled together some of the essential lessons for recruitment leaders on the four core components in people management during a crisis - leadership, culture, mental health and well-being, and skills for the new era.
“Get your head in the right space – let your team know how enthusiastic and proud you are of your business and how excited you are of the new opportunities that are lying ahead” – Paul Jacobs, Founder, LoveWorkLife
What should leaders focus on?
Lead your staff out of this crisis:
Write down what you’ve learned about the disruption – decisions, teams and yourself
Create a “perfect nemesis” – write down what that perfect recruiter would do in this crisis and analyse how your business is responding to it now in comparison
Purpose is the new strategy – align these by focusing on the critical behaviours and continue to amplify your success stories.
Putting people first: Great leaders recognise the need to develop a people strategy that is driven by a purpose.
Communication: Central to your business success, but will have greater importance when the time comes to start returning to the office, interacting with furlough staff and introducing them to new work structures.
Technology: “Time kills deals” – a slow process will cost you so use tech to avoid this and revise your business models.
Refine your recruitment processes and policies: advance your recruitment and technology skills, enhance your CRM (e.g., to store video files), use platforms like Zoom or MS Teams to screen candidates and share files with clients using Dropbox.
"At the heart of what leaders need to build in a crisis is trust, and that's a challenging thing to navigate when we ourselves are not sure about what the future will bring." Penny de Valk, Leadership Coach
As a business leader, how high is preserving your company culture on your agenda - not just for existing employees but for new talent? It certainly was a big concern for some of our attendees and members, and we've pulled together these two themes into one big Q&A to help you.
"Deploying a SWAT team, a culture squad, who were our cross-functional team of people who came together to cook up different ideas and ways of working that meant that we could still keep growing the culture of the new organisation that we were building, but do in a remote way." Ruth Penfold, Launchpad by bp
What can we do to develop and maintain that all-important team dynamic and culture?
Company culture is the greatest source of well-being; ask your staff “how are you?” and “how is your family” and listen to understand, before moving onto talking about business.
Engagement: celebrate all successes, act with integrity; the more people trust your actions the better engagement it creates.
Make sure people are ready for “the future” – are they equipped properly and trained?
Manage and monitor your staff performance – trust people and support those who are less experienced.
Will homeworking become part of the new normal?
It is anticipated that there will be a split between office and homeworking; people use the office environment to socialise and mixing with others that helps people feel part of something, so it is integral for us to keep a healthy balance.
As an industry we need to adapt - we need to extend/shift the standard working hours including different work patterns and shifts (to suit both our clients, candidates and consultants).
An increase in remote working is likely to impact on how we recruit, manage, and develop our people. Trust will become paramount - trust in staff to deliver what's needed; providing access to training & development (coaches/mentors) and looking after people's wellbeing will all be key factors if working remotely is here to stay.
How can I make the office and home working environments safe for my staff?
Have a Health & Safety plan in place and make sure your staff is familiar with it.
Ensure you have high hygiene and engineering control levels e.g., hand sanitisers, masks, potential temperature regulatory procedures and make sure your common areas are clean.
Set up visitor control measurements and management.
Carry out a Display Screen Equipment (DSE) checks for all employees at home and in the office.
Support lone homeworkers –regular support and checks are necessary to make sure they are okay.
“Strength from adversity - we are more resilient than we might give ourselves credit for; if we dig deep we will come through in this crisis, and it might not be easy but there will be another side whereby we could take advantage of at the appropriate time” Bradley Placks, Co-founder, ToAugment
The lockdown measures put in place as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic have restricted human interaction and lead to some work-life imbalances. This has put the topic of 'mental health and well-being' under the spotlight.
Over the past few weeks, we collaborated with mental health coaches and consultants from across the industry to bring together expert advice for recruiters and recruitment business leaders to look after their mental well-being, while being dispersed and isolated.
Assessing your staff's well-being:
Understand what they are going through and what is it that is affecting their mental well-being (e.g., personal or work life, medication)
Understand what access and support they have in order to help them get through the difficulties (e.g., access to counselling, therapy, mental first aiders)
Decide if they should be in work or not depending on their situation, should they take some time off to recover – is it a case of presenteeism, as it can cost employers more than absenteeism
Where appropriate, work with the individual to ensure they have a routine in place, that they are exercising regularly and eating healthy, as collectively it can make a difference
Encourage people to focus on their personal development (e.g., attend courses, listen to webinars or podcasts)
Think about the reasonable adjustments that you can provide (e.g., adjusting their workload or hours, ensure they are taking breaks), have a plan in place to give structure to their workday
Technology - where video technology is the new norm
Market-intelligence - using data to understand and advise clients
Emotional intelligence - using our personalities to establish long-lasting connections
"Because of the employment and recruitment industry, many essential services were able to access talent and skills they were looking for to maintain their own operations." Denis Pennel, Managing Director, World Employment Confederation (WEC)
What key skills do recruiters and leaders need for the new era?
Adaptability and flexibility: be agile as rigid ways of working can cause your business to fall behind your competition
Being tech-savvy: mastering the available tech is key to staying ahead of the game
Creativity and innovation: be future-oriented and inventive in how you engage with people
Data literate: your business is driven by using your data intelligently
Curiosity and critical thinking: be a critical thinker to understand and analyse your candidate base
Leadership: be honest with yourself and your people. It's okay to say you're not sure about some things.
Emotional intelligence: we are moving to an era where personalities are the power of influence for businesses to develop
Commitment to life-long learning: keep challenging yourself and others, encourage people to learn skills outside of the recruitment merits
How do I identify and develop skills to drive business performance to create a fit for purpose workforce?
Ask yourself as if you were a buyer of your services “what skills would you like to see?” and “in what would you place your trust?” – this should help identify the skills your business needs right now.
Try using psychometric testing to understand an individual’s level of Emotional intelligence (EQ). In the new world, it’s important to be empathetic, be an active listener, be genuine, and have a level of charisma connected with good verbal skills.
Segment roles to best utilise people’s strengths; employer value proposition (EVP): external (face of the business), internal (internal culture needs to reflect the external culture) and people (how you treat them, empower them, delegate, etc.)
We are on our road to recovery, but we're still not out of the woods yet. As Tony Wilson, Director of The Institute of Employment Studies pointed out in his latest podcast,
"Even with a sharp recovery, we're going to face huge challenges around how we support those people who're now unemployed to get back into work, and how we support people who will become unemployed in the summer as Job Retention Scheme winds up to find new jobs."
But what can you do as a business leader to prepare for the months ahead? Here are some of the big questions raised by like-minded recruitment professionals:
What should be expected in a business framework going forward?
The framework is the core on which your business is built; it should include the culture and methodologies your organisation will use to drive the company (referencing the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs).
Put people first; look at how you cascade responsibilities, explore options to reinvent some roles by breaking jobs into various components to better utilise people's strengths and at how you measure performance and manage remote staff.
Don’t waste this crisis - reflect and incorporate the lessons learned into your business to enhance your service model to create value for your clients and candidates - it's about outperforming your competitors (be at least 1% better).
What are the experts' thoughts around sharing your annual and 90-days goals plan?
A 90-day rolling business plan that sits alongside a 90-day rolling cashflow and sales forecasting plan is the right thing to do and must be updated every quarter: it should cover the best-, likely- and worst-case scenarios and a blend of all three should be your de facto plan.
Speak with your clients to understand and align with their long-term plans (not just the short- to mid-term).
Share the plan and involve your teams - ensure your people understand where and how they fit and how you will support them. Be clear on the input required to achieve the outputs you desire, as it will increase engagement and staff motivation. To get people involved, ask these three questions:
What is the work that needs to be done?
How do we close the gap between the workforce that we have got and the workforce that we need?
Protect your business from ransomware and cyber attacks while working remotely. Our cyber security partners Mitigo and Beyond Encryption can help.
Preparing for 2021 changes
COVID-19 isn’t the only challenge that the recruitment industry will face in 2021. Brexit and IR35 will also take the spotlight in the coming months. Are you ready for these changes? Our range of resources below will guide you through what lies ahead.
