I’ve been conducting a retainer search for an executive within the Business Technology space as of late and have necessarily been doing a lot of "Referral Based Recruiting."

One of the things that struck me during this recruiting effort is the number of people who still ask “who referred me to you?” While this is a perfectly natural response and I might actually ask the same thing myself put in that position, the fact is that most recruiting firms are farming your name off Jigsaw or ZoomInfo. Fewer and fewer firms see the benefit in or have the talent to conduct real world referral based recruiting. With the proliferation of these sites and other social/ business networking sites the world of prospective candidates (i.e. Names) is a professional recruiter’s oyster. It was put well in a recent blog I read from Lawrence Brown; “Is a Cold Call still a Cold Call?”

His premise is that if a Recruiter does their homework there’s absolutely no reason Cold Calling is necessary. I think the better question is whether “how someone got your name” is still relevant? Our take is that it does. While we use these tools ourselves, 30 years of experience has proven that the single best way to access the best talent the most quickly isn’t through Monster or Jigsaw or any site but through personal contacts and referrals.

Our contention is that while Referral Based Recruiting is more time-consuming, the results are almost always more direct and generates a higher level of talent. When you hear from us you can believe someone suggested we speak!