How to Identify the Correct Employment Agency to Work With

I have noticed that in the business world, recruitment agencies are categorised along with property agents as consultants who are just there to chase the sale and rob client companies of their money.

According to rumour, agents have the ability to paint you this beautiful picture of your Top Billing dream white-picket-fence house in the perfect town where your kids will grow up playing in the streets and you will wake up every morning to the smell of home-made bread and fresh brewed coffee hearing nothing other than the birds singing their cheerful songs, just to make the sale and to get their cut of commission.

Meanwhile, a month later when you have moved in you notice that your kids can’t play in the streets, the bread is stale and the coffee cold. And opposed to the homely aromas you wake up to the stench of the paper mill that is just situated behind the hill. The bird’s cheerful songs are replaced by the hum of traffic and to top it all off you have to redo the whole house’s electric wiring, costing you a fortune. Since you’ve broke the bank, in summer the only gifts you can afford is scuba gear for your family because the roof is leaking and your perfect house has become the local swimming pool after the first rain. 

Sad but true, most recruitment agencies are in the business simply to make money. However, on the brighter side there are still a few agencies out there that really have a passion for what they are doing and who’s biggest motivation is to make a difference in someone else’s life while generating an honest profit.

The big question still remains. How do you identify the correct agency to work with?

For any business a recruitment agency must be a lot more than just an expense, they must be a business partner and someone that adds value to the organisation and whom you can trust. Trusting an agency with the recruitment process is almost the same as trusting them with your organisations future because when you employ new personnel you are not trying to fill your organisation’s organogram, you want the right people that shares in your common goals and values.

A Candidate must be able to trust a recruitment agency with not only their future but their family’s future. You do not want to accept a promising position just to find out 2 months later that you are worse off.

I can carry on for days about the negative impact choosing an ill-fitting agency  can have, resulting in devastating effects for client companies and a candidate’s future.

Below are five pointers to consider before appointing your recruitment partner.

1)      Eligibility & Credibility

Candidate – Ensure that the company you are entrusting your career path to is eligible and credible; just as recruiters require references and certifications from you, just so you have the right to request their references and certifications. Do a bit of research on your recruitment agency e.g. Visit their website and Google their name

Client – Ensure that the company you intend to entrust the recruitment process to is also both eligible and creditable. As an example fly by nights often do not possess BEE Certification, are not VAT registered and are not affiliated to a professional body. Just as a candidate has the right to request certification and references you as a client reserve that exact same right.

2)      Personal Interest and Relationships

Look for a company that values client / candidate relationships. A good indicator in this case would be a company that takes the time and ensures to conduct proper face-to-face interviews and on a regular basis avail themselves for client visits. This value almost always indicates the intention to build long term and lasting relationships be it between client/recruiter, client/candidate or candidate/recruiter.

3)      Corporate Values with a Sense of Urgency

Ensure that the company you intend on using understands corporate values such as feedback and turnaround times and that they also share in the same sense of urgency as you or your company does, time is money and in the fast paced world we are living in it is important that the company you work with can produce the desired results, on time, on standard and within budget.

4)      Advice and Constructive Criticism

Recruitment agencies that feel comfortable in giving advice and constructive criticism show that they are specialists within their profession and industry.

Candidates – Search for an agency that is willing to give you their honest opinion about your career history and your skills shortage in the market. They will also be able to give you advice on how to improve your CV to a CV that Sells!

Clients – Recruiters that are not afraid to give their opinion represent an agency you definitely need to consider working with. A good consultant should be confident enough to provide advice the job spec should be adapted to make it more ‘place-able’ and give indications to clients who may have unrealistic expectations.

5)      Recruitment fees:

Candidates – Be aware of agencies that is charging you a fee to market your CV or who charge a fee to upload your CV onto their database. According to South African law recruiters are not allowed to charge a recruitment fee to a candidate.

Clients – Look for a recruitment company that is charging a market related fee, anything between 12,5% - 18% of the Candidates annual cost to company. Recruitment agencies charging a fee higher than 20% on a candidates annual Cost to Company are only in the business to make money. Be aware of agencies that are charging less than 10%, normally these agencies are desperate for work. Therefore, they lower their fee. Think about it, we all are in the business world to make a profit and to work for a turnover lower than 10% is not profitable for any recruitment agency, there must be a reason why they are rating their own service worth less than 10%. It is astonishing how much it costs to keep an agency running and on 12.5% the N.O.P. is around the 25% mark.


If you are looking to partner up and build a good working relationship with a recruiter, take the time to select the right one. Time spent selecting the right agency will not only save you time and money in the long run but ensure you the best for your career or company.

The number 1 reason you should form a relationship with a specialist recruitment agency

If you have been following our recent Blog posts you would have noticed that there was no post made last week – yes, that was my fault. Being faced with the realities most working individuals experience on a daily basis, balancing a 9 to 5 working day with a personal life, I understand the time constraints that any individual faces.

Save time by building a good business relationship with a specialist recruiter

While sitting in the infamous William Nicol traffic last night, I found myself wishing for more time or simply a better means to manage my flooded inbox without the prospect of a fender bender. It made me consider what I believe to be the greatest advantage of making use of a recruitment consultancy’s services. From both sides of the spectrum, whether you are a candidate or client, in truth there are many benefits to be gained by using a specialist agency to assist you in finding a new role or searching for the perfect employee to up your revenue growth.  Having had experience as both a job-seeker and an employer, I believe the primary benefit to working with an agency would be that we save you time. After all, time is money and it goes without saying that we could all do with a bit of spare change in our pockets.

As facilitators of achievement, we seek to create mutually beneficial and symbiotic partnerships with candidates and clients to enable them to be fully effective.

As a candidate, once an agency understands your career history and goals going forward, they can keep their eyes out for you – to inform and apply you to only those vacancies that would be best suited to your skill set, level of experience and in-line with the direction you hope to take your career in. This extends the scope of your job search and increases your opportunity to find your dream job.

From a client’s perspective, the need to enter into the time-consuming (and sometimes painful) task of having to read through countless applications and CV’s can be avoided. A well trained consultant, who understands their clients’ needs with confidence, will be meticulous and selective in the filtering of unsuitable applicants, freeing up your interview time to focus on only the most suitable of applicants. Our recruitment consultants handle the entire recruitment and administrative process, from advertising the vacancy and filtering countless applications, to conducting the necessary pre-employment checks on request. We conduct a screening interview and create a shortlist to send to the client as per the brief of each client in order to ensure that we supply our clients with the best candidate who is going to add value to their organisation.

Building a good relationship with a recruitment consultancy firm can yield positive results in a number of ways.

We would love to hear your thoughts: 

Through your experience, what has been the most valuable benefit you have gained through working together with a professional employment agency?  

Jump Starting your Job Search

Jump start your Job Search by Putting your CV into the Right Hands

Now that you have your CV looking up to standard, it is essential to know where to post your CV so that it will be accessible to recruiters and prospective employers. Posting your CV in the right place plays a vital role in getting your job hunt started, bringing you one step closer to your dream job.

Where to post your CV

Pnet is one of the leading online e-Recruiting service providers, by posting your CV on Pnet you automatically make yourself available to ± 9000 recruiters

One of the Differentiators of Careers24 is that you are able to adjust your privacy settings, this may be appealing to some candidates as it allows you to have more “control” over your job search. As the saying goes the more the merrier, I would advise you to keep this option open as you never know what exciting job opportunity might be around the corner.

By building your own personal brand not only are you allowing yourself to keep in touch with people who can help advance your career it is an excellent way to be head-hunted by recruiters based on your professional background. LinkedIn is a great way to build your own personal brand and network with people within your industry.

Social media is an excellent way to stay in touch with recruiters, SkillsPages allows you to create your own professional profile online. By making use of SkillsPages you are able to view what jobs are being advertised and it is a great way for recruiters to contact you

Be proactive and take control of your job search, by making use of Gumtree, indeed and Job Mail you are able to view what jobs are being offered and apply for them online, this allows you to see what jobs are most appealing to you personally and whether or not you fall in line with the current requirements. Staying on top of your game is key in finding the right job.

Applying for Positions

Some candidates are under the misconception that recruiters received thousands of CV’s and they just carry on piling up so they avoid applying altogether. Yes we do receive thousands of CV’s but if you stick to these simple rules, you will be sure to have your application set apart from the rest and into the YES pile:

Be Sure to Stand Out From The Rest by Applying to Positions Strategically

• Read through the job description thoroughly and make sure you have the RELEVANT experience and qualifications for the job
• Don’t apply for the same job more than once
• As silly as it sounds make sure you attach your CV when applying for a job
• Include all contact details ( you’ll be surprise how often I have received excellent CV’s with no contact details)
• Do research on your current job title, for instance if you are a sales consultant there are numerous ways of phrasing this title namely; sales executive, key account manager and new business developer
• Prepare yourself mentally. If you have applied for a job make sure you available to receive all calls concerning this matter and have an idea when you will be available to go for interviews
• Make sure you send an updated version of your CV

Finding a new job can be a job within itself so why not take the time and make use of all the facilities which have been provided to make your life a little easier.

Creating a CV that sells!!!

Whether you are a graduate new to the job market or an experienced exec looking to move up the corporate ladder, there are times that it seems there is no light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to finding a new opportunity.

The following questions often come to mind for many of our candidates:

Why haven’t they called me back???

Why does my CV get trashed???

What do I need to do to be considered being invited for an interview???

Are there any vacancies in South Africa???

A panel of recruitment specialists would quite easily be able to provide the answers to these questions as we have a different perspective on how Job Seekers plan their job search and market themselves in the South African job market.

As we all know by now, Job Hunting can be a tiring process - it requires extensive planning, careful thought, creativity and passion to tailor your resume with your career future in mind. Yet, so many Job Hunters’ CV’s are trashed before the second page of the application has been taken into consideration. This is not because your hair colour doesn’t fit into the organisations colour scheme or whether or not you’ve completed their tertiary qualification at Tukkies as opposed to Maties. But rather, it is most likely that the lack of information provided on your CV (and how and where the information is displayed) has led to it being disregarded despite the fact that you might be a perfect match for the position.

Here are the “Must have’s”, the “Biggest Mistakes” and the “Nice to have’s” for compiling an impressive CV that will not get trashed and that will receive the careful consideration that it deserves.

Every CV “Must have” the following information:

• Full Name and Surname; and please do not forget - known as
• ID number and Date of Birth
• Contact Details - Cell number, Alternative contact number, Email address
• Physical Address and preferred area of occupation
• Nationality and Race
• Languages that you can Read, Write and Understand
• Relationship Status and Dependants
• Drivers and Transport information
• Current Salary per month/ per Annum - Your salary breakdown should include your Basic Salary per month + full details of benefits and lastly, include your Nett Salary
• Salary Expectations - Be realistic – the norm for an increase if you change from companies are 10% - 15% on your current salary if you are lucky
• Availability for interviews and your Notice period
• Brag board - This is a short paragraph of what you have done and achieved in your career thus far. Do not be shy to mention career accomplishments that you are really proud of.
• Computer Literacy and Software Packages you have experience working with
• Secondary Education - Last School attended, Highest grade passed, Year completed, Subjects
• Tertiary Education - Institution, Qualification, Year completed, Subjects
• Courses completed
• Membership information - If you are part of an association like ECSA, SAICA etc.
• Projects worked on - Include the Project Name, Your position & duties on the project
• Work Experience - Include the Name of Company worked for, Your Position within the Company, Dates of employment, Reason for leaving and of course, Duties/ Key Performance Indicators. Remember to include as much information as possible relevant to the products, industry and function you operate in.
• At least 2 contactable References - Preferably contact details of former managers that you reported to.

If you feel that your CV requires some personalisation because you would like to emphasise what a special character you are, or for whatever reason you think it needs a personal touch; you can include the “Nice to have’s” on your CV. But keep in mind that your CV can get quite lengthy and that possible future employers might get bored reading your 30 page CV.

• Cover letter - In our experience, Managers and Directors really do not have the time to read through an essay of a candidate’s career history just to read the same information again within the CV. If you want to include a cover letter, keep it succinct and relevant. State achievements and avoid clichés.
• Photograph of yourself - A headshot of yourself is great for us to put a face to the voice on the other end of the line when I first contact a candidate, but be careful as some people may judge a book by its cover. Be sure to keep it professional and be conscious of the size. Unless you’re applying to be the next top model, it’s unnecessary to have a full page photospread on your CV
• Hobbies and interest
• Extra-curricular activities and achievements
• Part time positions that you have done during school and varsity holidays that are not relevant to your current position or your Career goal
• Skills Matrix - Avoid thumb sucking skills to make your CV look more impressive but list relevant skills such as project management or the ISO’s you currently work with

Then there are the “Big Mistakes” that candidates so often make either because no one has ever cared to educate them on how to compose a professional CV or as a result of sheer carelessness.

• Make sure that there are no gaps or overlapping dates in your career history. If there are, explain the circumstances and what you have done in that period of time
• Never include a negative reason for leaving or “bad mouthing” your previous employers
• Do not write your duties in a paragraph or essay format. Rather, list your duties with bullets but still using full sentences
• Do not use different font’s and colours on your CV, plan beforehand what font and colour you are going to use that suit you best and stick to it
• Do not include family and friends as references
• Always double check your spelling and grammar
• NEVER lie on your CV

To conclude and to answer the above questions: Yes, the quality and appearance of a CV plays a big role in the job-hunting process. They haven’t called you back and your CV gets trashed because your CV lacks the important information that could have convinced them that you are perfect for the position. There are most definitely positions available in South Africa; on Pnet alone there are currently more than 29 282 jobs advertised in South Africa not to even mention the other job portals like CareerJunction, JobMail.

If your CV has all the information that is required and you have spent quality time compiling it to the best of your ability, by applying to positions that match your skill set and level of experience; you will get invited for an interview and land that dream job before you know it.

As a matter of Importance...

One of the great privileges of being in the recruitment is the exposure I’ve had in meeting an immense number of diverse and driven individuals – crazy characters, the occasional negative Nancy and of course great thought leaders.

In an interview I recently held, I asked the candidate to tell me about his work philosophy and how he would be differentiated from other candidates applying from the role. He responded with enthusiasm and explained that in all matters in life he evaluates each situation he encounters with one simple question: “Is this a matter of urgency or a matter of importance?”

With this sentiment in mind (and a growing to-do list marked “urgent”) I decided that it is first and foremost “important” that I introduce Electus and answer that same ubiquitous question.

What sets us apart? The answer, as simple as it might be, is exactly that: our work philosophy – the core values and foundation upon which I started Electus.

As a firm believer of synchronicity, I believe that in some way Electus was destined to be. To put this in context, it is necessary that I shed some light on my background. After graduating from the University of Pretoria, with an Honours in Marketing Management, I stepped out into the working world experiencing the very real fluctuations of the economic downward spiral. At the time, I could not find a job and ironically, found a position where I would be able to assist others in doing so. 

Beyond Alanis Morisette’s music, the only thing that lifted my spirits in an incredibly unpleasant working environment was the opportunity to be a part of inevitably changing another person’s life for the better with each placement I made. I knew that it was purpose to continue to be a facilitator of achievement.

It was not long after having that realisation (again with the irony *smh*) that my employer walked in to the offices and dismissed the entire staff compliment due to the fact the company was declared insolvent. It was not even an hour later that I decided to form Electus – a company that would oppose the industry standard ‘heartless numbers chase’ and transform the tarnished reputation of the recruitment industry.

In essence our work philosophy and our recipe for success are based on three core values that we hold true to, with integrity.

People

As facilitators of achievement we focus on only what is BEST for each individual in every given context.

Purpose

We emphasise working meaningfully in a collaborative environment with quality, customer service and integrity to pursue a common purpose.

Passion 

We consistently work with an absolute love for our profession with positivity and passion.

As a start-up with endless growth opportunity, we look to these values as a guideline in moving forward with the hope of revolutionising recruitment and continuing to facilitate achievement.

We would love to have our clients and candidates to be a part of this process so we invite you all to share your thoughts on how we can continue to incorporate these values to better service you – connect with us on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.