...according to Peter Searle, CEO of global workforce solutions provider Airswift.  

Searle told Recruiter that more and more of those entering the industry today saw recruitment as a genuine career. “Graduates join us now thinking they will either be with us or with the industry for the rest of their careers. In the past it used to be they fell into recruitment by default.” As people have become more career-minded, Searle said, “the professionalism of large organisations, the Adeccos of the world, means there are genuine career opportunities in companies”. These were not only opportunities governed by large companies’ ability to allow staff to move geographically, but also to attain new skill sets.

Brian Wilkinson, CEO of engineering and technology recruiter Gattaca, agreed that recruitment was now more attractive to those looking to build a career. “The job has changed,” Wilkinson told Recruiter. “The growth of different business models, such as MSPs [managed service providers], RPOs [recruitment process outsourcing] and on-site teams means there is need for a whole different set of skill sets.”

One such need is for “more mature, experienced people, who want to evolve their career away from banging a phone to being relationship managers”, Wilkinson said.

Searle said there was growing recognition that “very small, one-dimensional recruitment companies” often didn’t provide the same career opportunities as larger companies, and that branching out on your own wasn’t always the best option either. “I think people are recognising that sometimes you are better off staying where you are and climbing the corporate ladder and getting those corporate skills,” he said. 

Wilkinson said he had noticed “quite a few recruiters on the perm side” who after venturing out on their own were now keen “to come back into corporate life”. 

• For more views from Searle and Wilkinson on life after Adecco and Randstad respectively, see this month’s cover feature.