International law firm Eversheds is introducing a number of changes to its relationship with recruiters, aimed at encouraging a partnership approach.

Recruiters who sign up to the new approach will benefit from a new two-tier payment system, due to come into effect in the middle of December.

“The aim is to reward those recruiters that follow our procedures and stick to our policies,” Nicky Bizzell, Eversheds’ resourcing manager, told Recruiter.

For example, under the terms of the agreement, those bypassing the law firm’s specified recruitment portal by sending in reduction in their placement fee.

Agencies that don’t provide Eversheds with the information it requires based on its service level agreement will also face a financial penalty, even if a placement is made.

The new terms and conditions were finalised after consulting with a group of 25 recruitment consultants. “We have taken all of the feedback from this pilot group and incorporated it into the terms,” said Bizzell, adding that the aim is to “create mutually beneficial and commercially satisfactory ongoing relationships”.

Fees to agencies will also be closely aligned with the level of service provided, said Bizzell. “If we only ask recruiters to get involved in one part of the recruitment process, we are not going to pay them the full fee. For example, if we just ask recruiters to provide us with a name or to do screening, we would only pay a certain amount per candidate,” she explained.

A lot of companies let themselves down in the way that they handle recruitment and that makes it very difficult for an agency to be successful on their behalf

Eversheds is also introducing a recruitment consultant portal, containing information such as its terms and conditions, and biographies of members of its recruitment team “This will provide recruiters with all the information they need to work successfully with Eversheds,” said Bizzell.

“We have asked recruiters to review the new terms and conditions with their legal teams, and decide whether or not to accept them,” said Bizzell.

As part of developing this partnership approach with its agencies, Eversheds is bringing in a service level agreement for itself.

“Our agencies will be able to monitor our performance against set service level agreements, and we will publish those and tell them what we are going to do to address any issues using a traffic light system - if it falls below a certain level in a particular area in to red, then we would implement an immediate action plan to deal with that.”

The service level agreement, which will be published for recruiters to see, will include commitments such as:

• vacancies released only after headcount approval
• commitment to diversity and equal opportunities
• feedback to candidates and consultants

Bizzell added: “A lot of companies let themselves down in the way that they handle recruitment and that makes it very difficult for an agency to be successful on their behalf. We want to work with our agencies to eliminate any potential problems in this area.

“Part of this process is to get more commitment from our agencies to find new and improved ways of working, but it wouldn’t be fair of us and it wouldn’t be operating in a true partnership if we didn’t monitor our performance as well.”