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Does Recruiting belong under HR? follow this blog post

posted by on Sept. 2, 2009

It's been my privilege to have been part of a number of outstanding recruiting efforts/departments/teams.  But the one that strikes me as the absolute best (incl. most effective, most efficient, and most fun) was being part of an in-house recruiting organization for one of the Big 4 management consulting firms.

There were a number of reasons for my feeling that way.  A few examples include:

1.  Recruiting was a valued part of the organization - we were treated as professionals with an area of expertise and we were allowed to demonstrate that expertise (they didn't mess with us about how we did our jobs) to the fullest of our capabilities. 

2.  As Recruiters, we (mostly) felt appreciated and were a part of the team, both overall and within Recruiting.  As such, we were highly self-motivated and very passionate about our work.

3.  That organization invested more in us, as Recruiters, than any other entity I've ever been affiliated with.  This included excellent training (both specific to recruiting and other professional development, plus conferences, etc...) to the extent that we could take the same professional development courses that the consulting professionals did.

There are numerous other reasons why that particular experience was so professionally rewarding but, IMHO, the bottom-line reason why I consider that to be a world-class model was because Recruiting was recognized as being it's own function and was seperate from HR.

One of the keys to being successful in recruiting in a professional services firm is to recognize that some people are better suited to careers in consulting and some people are better suited to doing similar work, but in a corporate environment.

I suggest that the same type thing applies to the difference between careers in Recruiting and HR (in all it's various flavors).  They are not the same thing, they require completely different skill sets and personality styles, and success in one does not guarantee success in the other (I admit, been there, done that, I'll stick to Recruiting thank-you-very-much).

In my (never) humble professional opinion, it would be extremely difficult for a Recruiting effort to qualify as an example of Best Practice if it's reporting to HR.

Your thoughts?

 

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28 comments

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  • 1 point 2 months ago

    I'm really not sure whether Recruiting belongs under HR.  I do know that Recruiting is often viewed as the "entry point" into human resources.  In many corporation Recruiters are paid less than other positions in HR.  I wonder if this is the reason that SOME companies rely very heavily on 3rd party recruiters.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    A lot of GREAT comments here.  David, a very interesting topic.

    I've been a corporate recruiter (consultant) for most of my career, though I have also filled other shoes within HR organizations. I've also been in both consulting and industry organzations.  My experience is that the answer to this question depends on the organizational needs. 

    Where most of recruiting is tied to revenue generation (i.e. consulting), recruiters need to be closely partnered with hiring managers and the business development teams (which many times are the same folks).  The recruiting strategy there must be more dynamic and is dependent upon realtime market forces, and thus having the close tie-in to BD is critical. Here, flexible candidate pipelines and profile recruiting strategies better support the LOB  However, there must be some dotted line to HR as well, because factors such as employment branding, hiring and onboarding practices and performance management must have consistency across the org.  So in this case, I feel that the recruiter more directly supports the sales plan of the business line, and this is where primary reporting should be.

    Conversely in other corporate recruiting environments where hiring is more closely defined by overall business strategy, I feel that recruiting needs to be a (major) subset of HR.  Here, resource or succession planning becomes a much bigger factor on the organizational level.  Yes, recruiting needs to be a significant voice in those planning sessions, as a component of the overall strategy.  And yes, recruiting needs to partner with their hiring managers to be able to deliver on the plan.  Of course employment branding and hiring practices need consistency here as well, but having it at the org level becomes much more critical for the purposes of retention and succession planning, as well as smooth internal movement.  So here, I view the recruiter as directly supporting the overall org resource plan versus the LOB's sales plan.

    So one good answer across the board?  Not really.  There obviously needs to be some level of synergy between the business lines, HR and recruiting in any case.  Just as any organizational component does, we must demonstrate our value and seek to partner where and at what point it best serves the needs of the company's business strategy.

  • 2 points 2 months ago

    I have thought for a long time that recruiting is an "internal sales person" - not selling the company product, but "selling" the company to prospective employees.  Most HR people do not like the recruiting function and vice verse. 

     

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Recruiting is a fundamental building block of the overall organizational brand. So it should not report into various business units for the same reasons that organizational marketing and communications usually do not-- such distinctions are irrelevant to the outside world. The organization must speak in a consistent manner, albeit with messaging tailored to specific audiences (e.g., you address students differently than engineers and still differently from sales people). Obviously, recruiting-- the act of convincing someone to join the organization-- requires close partnership with the various units. But it should have a strong, unified branding message that is aligned with the overall brand.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Mark, how would you address the emersion that's needed in recruiting for a particular business unit? Shouldn't the BU's goal, culture and midset be yours? Can you really "own it" if you aren't at the table?

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Good grist David and so true,

    Loyalty to recruiting can be ever so fleeting.

    As practicioners, particularly on the corporate side it becomes ever so moch more important for us to understand (metrics) and articulate how we (the function) adds value in good times and bad (within reason).  As has been stated earlier Succession planning, resource management, and performance management are all and/or should be part of the equation/argument for our value to organiztion.

    How we get from where we are (perceived) to there is up to us.

     

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Well, to sum up what I think most commentors have been saying so far...it sounds like most of us (based on experiences and good examples of providing value to the business) would prefer that Recruiting report to business unit leadership rather than to HR.

    Personally, I certainly agree with that.   But I think we need to be careful to recognize that while business unit leaders tend to like to have Recruiting under their control in times when business is good, their stewardship may be a painfully double edged sword.

    Part of the reason HR leadership tends to struggle with Recruiting is because they are simply uncomfortable with it.  They don't like to do it and, like all of us, prefer to stay away from things that make them uncomfortable.

    That very same thing is true of business unit leadership.  We're their close ally when times are good, but do they have enough understanding and appreciation of the value we provide to continue to support us when times are not so good?

    Just more grist for the mill...

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    David,

    Good post and good discussion. I'm currently in (and have been for some yrs now) a Recruiting Mgt role at a Professional Services firm. You're absolutely right... There isn't a better area to be an 'internal' recruiter. The people me and my team find are billed out and make an immediate impact on revenue. Hence, if we don't find someone, its lost money on the table - if we do find someone, its money in the pockets of the various vertical leaders/hiring mgrs.

    In my current role, I have dual reporting - 1 to the VP of HR and 1 to the COO. But then I support (along w/ my team) each of the various business lines. Luckily, my VP of HR defers to me on all things recruiting and I feel sorry those those in recruitment who don't have a similar structure.

    It would be tough to be in a recruitment role where you weren't seen as a valuable asset, but in the professional services industry there is no way not to be appreciated if you can make significant impact to the bottom line.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    I have really enjoyed following the comments to this Blog today.  It seems we have consensus however i am disappointed that no one (HR Folks) spoke up/strogly with an opposing POV/argument.  Such as it is it seems most of recruiting folks would just as soon have as little to do with HR as posible least be directed by HR, can't say I disagree.

    I wonder if there exists a similar discussion on an HR Blog site?

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    I too have worked "both sides of the fence" HR and Recruitment/Staffing.  What I have found and some others have posted as well, is that the VP of HR needs to have experience in recruitment.  If not, the company ends up with a constant tug of war.  The HR group indicating recruitment has no understanding of process--the staffing group indicating HR is just a road block. Neither "side" understanding the value of each other. 

    My husband is a recruiter and this has helped significantly to understading the staffing functions.  Having worked as a recruiter also contributed further to my knowledge base.  As a result, every recruiter I have worked with has indicted--I wish all HR people were like you--you get it.

    Bottom line, I believe it is lack of understanding that has truly caused this "ongoing battle" between HR and Recruitment.

     

     

     

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    In my experience recruiters are not interested in HR/employee relations and HR generalists are not interested in recruiting. I agree that we are two different personality types. I believe in this economy a lot of companies have eliminated their recruiters and their HR generalists are now taking on that role...not that they want to. The two roles are very different and should be operated separately. At one former company as the Director of Recruiting I reported to a COO and then a CFO and it was a far better fit than reporting into a VP of HR. I believe succession planning belongs in the recruiting arena as well because a corporate recruiter usually knows the teams/departments well enough to determine who is next in line for a promotion.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Best experiece I've ever had was with recruiting being directly accountable to the business leader, not to HR.  In fact, all worked pretty well until corporate HR got involved.  Any time there was a hiccup, issues could be worked out and addressed immediately within the business operations.  Recruiting was a part of regular business meetings.  Even though I've seen corporate HR-led recruiting try to emulate that, I haven't seen it done successfully.

    I don't think there's a single right answer for where recruiting should report.  However having been both a third-party consultant and a corporate recruiting manager and a corporate HR leader, there are three things common to all effective recruitment - 1) it has a direct line to the operating areas and does not get bogged down in corporate administrivia; 2) it's linked to the total succession and workforce development structure; and 3) it's led by and heavily participated in by the business professionals who bring in the new hires.

    There is one substantial thing overlooked when it comes to recruiting at companies - the value of developing and retaining top recruitment talent in a company.  Almost every corporate HR-led and owned recruitment team I've worked with was treated more as a service center than a part of the business operation.  In the long-run, most of those efforts have not been significant winners for the organization and suffered through a severe turnover of recruitment professionals.

    I've come to believe the recruiting only works best inside a corporate HR function when the head of that HR organization is the driver and authority on Succession and Workforce Acquisition (recruiting/staffing) and Development; but so few companies are actually structured and truly operate that way.

    Want a more consistent shot at great sales recruiting - put the recruitment directly in the hands of the sales group.  Want more consisency in how you recruit - put the recruitment directly in the hands of corporate HR.  Want both - let the corporate HR group focus on tools/infrastructure to facilitate and simplify recruiting in the line areas, and then get out of the way.

    I haven't done a study around it, but I've also experienced that great business-housed recruiters tend to be easier to retain and grow in value over time more so that general recruiters who are asked to do too many things and be accountable to too many managers at once.

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Cost per hire & Time to fill

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Recruiting and HR are as similar and different as Sales and Accounting, both have common concerns;  people and money respectively however the skill sets reuired to be successful are as different as night and day.  Can you imagine having your sales team run by the accounting department?

    The most enlightened organization I worked in had recruiting reporting into the executive leadership parallel to HR.  We were swimming and competing in the fast commercial current of all things Internet and that autonomy allowed recruiting to function as it should and succeed.

    It is incumbent on us in recruiting to make the business case argument, in botom line impact terms, that helps our executive leadership understand and respect the true value of the function.  It's about metrics and analytics that go beyond CPH & TTF.

     

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    What is CPH and TTF?

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Cost per Hire and Time to Fill

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    I have strong feelings about this.

    It belongs under finance w/a leg into biz dev and mergers & acquisitions as well.

     

     

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Agreed. The BD folks have their hand on the pulse of whats to come and the recruitment folks need to know what to be on the outlook for. Likewise, I share company data thats found w/ our M&A leader as well.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Under which part of the organization did Recruiting fall? Did each recruiter report to the business unit they supported? Before I can comment, i think I'd need to understand the structure better.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Stephanie,

    The devil is in the details, right?  Suffice it to say that, on a local office and regional level, Recruiting was seperate from HR and reported to both Recruiting and the local office leadership (Partners - generally, they wanted to be kept informed, but had no interest in "managing" Recruiting on a daily basis).  Above that the lines got fuzzy and there were frequent changes.  None of that national-level stuff really impacted how we operated as Recruiters.  The adage of the day was that, so long as you kept your local office Partners happy, nobody from National could touch you.  While our headcount dollars were owned by the respective local offices, our annual review process was owned by Recruiting.  Within our Region, Recruiting functioned as a team and we played well together (it's many years later and most of us are still friends and even continue to work together in various combinations).  Each Recruiter had a lot of latitude and autonomy in how they did their jobs each day.

    Not sure if that addresses your question, but that's how it was.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    My ONLY concern with that is growth and mentoring for the recruiter skills. As long as both of those areas was addressed in the structure and process, I would think that would be effective as well as the best way to really be immersed in the organization. 

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    In my experience, you are generally correct.  As a long-time partner in a Retained firm, I would be very hesitant to entertain an engagement where HR had any involvement in the process.  They just didn't seem to "get it".  Now that I've gone to the dark side (I'm a VP HR myself now), it's even more clear that the personalities, methods, and motivations are indeed different between a Recruiting mentality, which is largely a sales exercise; and HR folks, who are administrative-minded, typically.  

    But that is not to say that I believe Corporate Recruiting should not be a part of the HR function.  I think it has to be.  Human Capital entails all the pieces and they can't well be broken up, in my view.  The key to success is having an HR leader who understands and appreciates the difference, and allows for differences in style and compensation. 

    A company might be best-served by having a sales-savy, experienced recruiter running HR, and allow him to hire competent, admin-minded HR people to keep him out of trouble, while he builds a strong recruiting operation.  That's what I did, at least, and it's worked extremely well for us.  We have world-class results in recruiting efficiency (costs/salaries hired), time to fill, and retention. The HR stuff is taken care of, and we can focus mostly on the important recruiting work that needs to be done in a growing company like ours (we've tripled headcount on quadrupled revenue in 3 years, and are a $300M, 460 EE company).

    Or a company may have a traditional senior HR leader, and as long as that person can appreciate the needs of a recruiter-focused operation under them, they could be successful too.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    David,

    From my perspective, you hit the nail on the head!  In most HR organizations, the leadership comes from the HR side (again, a whole 'nother subject right there) and those people tend to not have much affinity or appreciation for what makes for a successful Recruiter.  In that situation, it's tough for the Recruiters to feel understood, much less properly represented in the political aspects, especially when it comes to a somewhat longer window of career management within that kind of an environment.  Talk about hitting glass ceilings!

    Congrat's to you, sir, for being with an organization that appropriately appreciates the talents and perspectives someone with a recruiting background brings to the executive leadership table.

    I wish you well, please keep us posted on how it goes.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    David, as a recruiting consultant I have felt the same way that you did in some companies.  In other companies, they understand that the role of recruitment is different than other HR functions and they work to make the recruiters a valued member of the team. 

    The best way to quickly measure the value of recruitment in a corporate HR environment is to look at their recruiters.  If they are talented pro's, recruitment is valued.  If recruitment is the entry level position into HR, it is not valued.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Recruiters are proactive and HR is reactive.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    David, excellent observation and translation into an article.  I whole-heartedly agree.  From my experience there is usually a very different personality type from a consulting type recruiter(which acts in many ways in an executive search type outside agency) to a typical HR person.  A true internal search type person can add a lot of value to an organization by identifying and bringing talent to the table that helps to grow the company(and shows in a monetary value) and this speaks to senior level management.  I find your article to be very insightful, thank you for sharing.

  • 0 points 2 months ago

    David, as a recruiting consultant I have felt the same way that you did in some companies.  In other companies, they understand that the role of recruitment is different than other HR functions and they work to make the recruiters a valued member of the team. 

    The best way to quickly measure the value of recruitment in a corporate HR environment is to look at their recruiters.  If they are talented pro's, recruitment is valued.  If recruitment is the entry level position into HR, it is not valued.

  • 1 point 2 months ago

    Pardon me, but "holy crap" that sounds amazing Bill. You are very lucky to have such a great structure! 

    Signed,

    Jealous

    aka Steph