In Defense of Generalist Recruiters

By Jeffrey Audette, president of VMG Recruiting

When you have niche or highly skilled positions in your organization that need filling, you might think it's common sense to seek out a specialist recruiter. After all, if you're placing candidates in specialized roles, shouldn't you work with a recruiter who specializes in filling those kinds of roles?

Maybe not. We'll get into the specifics in just a minute, but for now let's focus on a relatively basic question: What's the point of hiring a recruiter in the first place?

You might say it's to fill your vacant positions with the right candidates. If that's what hiring a recruiter is really all about, then there are times when a more broadly focused recruiter might be better at fulfilling that function than an industry specialist. Specialist recruiters seem like a great deal — and sometimes they are — but the specialist recruiting model also has some problems you might not expect.

Specialists May Be Bound by Prior Commitments

One of the biggest challenges when working with a specialist recruiter can sound like a major advantage at first: A specialist recruiter already has a network of connections in your industry.

A wider pool of qualified talent right off the bat sounds great, right? Not always. See, the specialist recruiter's vast network means they are likely to have client relationships with many (competing) businesses in your industry. If you're working with an ethical recruiter — and you should be — that means the recruiter won't be able to go after candidates who work for those clients. While a specialist may know who all the best candidates in the field are, they may not be able to send any of those candidates your way because of preexisting commitments.

Now, maybe there are some shady specialist outfits out there willing to poach candidates from their clients. You can bet that if they'd poach from your competition, they'll do the same thing to your organization when the time comes.

While it might sound counterintuitive, the best way to solve this problem might be to bring in a nonspecialist. An all-around recruiter may not have the same kind of preexisting network in your industry, but that also means they don't have burdensome preexisting commitments. When you go with the all-around recruiter, you have a better shot at attracting the best talent, no matter where they happen to work.

A Good Recruiter Is a Good Recruiter

You might think the reason you need a specialist is because only a specialist will be able to recognize the right candidates. Maybe your industry is so specialized that you feel a recruiter needs extensive industry experience to be able to evaluate candidates with reasonable accuracy.

On the surface, this thinking makes sense, but let's consider the matter from another angle. Isn't recruiting itself a specialized industry? Wouldn't an excellent recruiter specialize in finding the right candidates, no matter their industry specialty?

Recruiting is recruiting. The most important skills in the field — like interviewing skills, communication skills, critical thinking, and the ability to find the right candidates — will be held by any top-tier recruiter, no matter what their specialty. An all-around recruiter who is good at what they do will be worth more to you than an industry specialist whose skills aren't up to snuff.

Not Every Hire Is a Specialist Hire

For the sake of argument, let's assume there are some positions for which you always need a specialist recruiter, like placing a PhD in some hyper-specialized branch of physics or chemistry.

Even if such positions exist at your company, you're going to need many more nonspecialist employees over the course of your organization's existence, no matter how specialized your industry is. Every organization needs administrators, managers, receptionists, clerical workers, accountants, and many other kinds of employees who don't necessarily need to be industry specialists. When you're hiring for these positions, the best candidate for you might not even currently work in your industry. In that case, choosing a specialist recruiter only ties your hands.

Even if some positions always require a specialist, there are many more positions for which an all-around recruiter will give you stronger service.

Generalists Specialize in Customer Service

Perhaps most importantly, an all-around recruiter's success depends on delivering excellent customer service. That's the only way a nonspecialist recruiter can stay competitive and keep their business alive.

In my experience, an all-around recruiter will almost always be more dedicated than the specialist recruiter to ensuring you get exactly the right candidate. Why is that?

A specialist recruiter can always lean on their industry specialty to bring in more business, but an all-around recruiter has more to prove from the start. The nonspecialist knows their business will be judged by the quality of the candidates they bring in, so they will focus on finding the perfect fit. They can't afford to burn any bridges if they want to keep winning new business.

This is not to say that a specialist recruiter is never the right call. Sometimes, they may be exactly what you need. However, specialists are not always better than generalists, and there are plenty of situations in which an all-around recruiter may be capable of bringing in better candidates, faster.

So the next time you have hiring to do, consider whether an all-around recruiter might be the best choice.