For those of you who recently participated in Carnival in Trinidad, I hope you had as much fun as I did. I have graced this issue with a photo of two of our recruiters having a great time.
Warning to those self employed consultants in T&T who are VAT Registered:
WASA is now levying Non-Domestic water rates on all premises where VAT registered businesses operate. In other words, if you have registered your VAT business at your home, then you will be billed water rates at the commercial rate. You can petition the Regulated Industries Commission if you consider this unfair. Their website is http://www.ric.org.tt .
Ethical Recruiting
You are probably thinking that I’m going to talk about how recruiting agencies should operate in an ethical manner. Actually, I want to reverse this thought and explore how candidates and company hirers work with agencies to get the best out of the partnership so that all parties benefit from the relationship.
What does each party expect from each other?
– the candidate expects the agency to provide appropriate job opportunities and present him/her fairly and positively to prospective employers
– the company expects the agency to provide vetted candidates that match their job requirements, arrange candidate interviews, and help with the negotiations for hire, in return for an agreed fee
– the agency expects that the candidate has accurately and completely represented themselves in terms of their qualifications, skills, work experience and future job goals
– the agency expects that the company gives appropriate feedback on candidates submitted and works with the agency until the recruitment cycle is complete
The above arrangement works very well and only goes wrong when any one party fails to live up to the expectations of another. For example, if a candidate agrees with an agency to meet a company for a job interview and never shows up and avoids all the agency’s calls, or if the candidate agrees to the salary and other employment terms with the agency before the interview, then demands much more at the interview, then they are letting down the agency and wasting the hirer’s time.
A more serious example is when a candidate misrepresents their qualifications or experience on their resume.
Now that candidate has destroyed the trust of both the agency and the hirer who will have a negative view of this person should they come across them when considering candidates for future jobs. Remember that the hirer may move to another company and so the candidate’s prospects may become blocked by that company too.
Hirers sometimes also misuse the relationship between themselves and the agency. This could be a simple case of not telling the recruiter why her candidates are unsuitable so that she could adjust her search to find better matches. Hirers who work closely with their recruiter definitely get the best results, as people are naturally more effective when they have a good working relationship.
There are extreme cases where the hirer deliberately misrepresents the facts! For example, a hirer may get the candidate to agree to tell the agency that he/she had already applied directly to the hiring company, so the hirer can avoid paying the agency’s recruitment fees. Another tactic is to get the candidate to tell the agency that their salary is lower than what was agreed, so that the recruitment fee is reduced.
Any act of dishonesty is almost always found out eventually by the agency staff, if they are good at maintaining a relationship with their candidates. You can imagine how badly this reflects on the hiring company’s ethics and I have known cases where the candidate refused the job because of this. Of course this creates an unpleasant dilemma for the agency as to whether or how to deal with that company again, especially if they are giving a lot of business to the agency.
Yes, the agency needs to be honest with all parties as well, and never knowingly submit a candidate with a negative history or inaccurate resume. I strive to live according to the following code of ethics which you may have heard of:
“In all things that I think, say or do ….
1. Is it the TRUTH?
2. Is it FAIR to all concerned?
3. Will it build GOOD WILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
4. Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?”
Do you have any experiences to share along these lines?
Tell Us What You Think
We would love to hear what you think of this issue of CRS News. And of course, if you have any suggestions for upcoming issues that you would like to share with us, please send those too.