The Institute of Recruiters (IOR) which launched on Wednesday (see 1 June issue of Recruiter) has no intention of poaching members from industry trade bodies, according to its founder.

Azmat Mohammed, told Recruiter: “We are not trying to target the members of other organisations, or to poach anyone. We are interested in the entire recruitment community, who want to engage with us and look at what we have to offer. We are going to take from the 100,000 who are not members of anything.”

Mohammed said he expects the institute to have 10,000 members within three years, a figure, which he said was “conservative”.

Mohammed, also the IOR’s director of ICT and operations, added: “It is possible that our members could be in a trade body as well, and that they get things from trade bodies that we are not focusing on.”  He said the institute’s primary focus was on raising professionalism in recruitment through education and training.

The IOR “would welcome engagement with incumbent bodies” [such as the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and the Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo)] Mohammed said.

He added: “No organisation has a God-given right to exist. You have to provide a good service. My advice is you have to make your organisation better - that is the way to compete.”