Finding good talent remains a challenge for everyone, including sourcing recruiters!

The talent shortage continues to affect Australia, including an industry that is often overlooked: recruitment agencies themselves.

APSCo, the association for what’s traditionally known as ‘white collar recruitment’, has seen its members face challenges recruiting both for themselves and their clients. APSCo managing director, Lesley Horsburgh, spoke with The HR Leader about the hurdles facing recruiters.

In the recruitment industry, Ms Horsburgh noted that it’s not only difficult to find talent for clients, but it’s become a struggle to even attract candidates for recruitment consultant roles. With high demand on both sides, it’s “a double-edged sword.”

“The demand for clientsis incredibly high and meeting that demand in hiring at the pace that's necessary is quite challenging,” explained Ms Horsburgh.

“I think in terms of the recruitment industry, we are faced now with an opportunity… to start to grow and train people into recruitment roles. Not hire within the industry, [because] really, what we are doing is shifting the problem from one business to another when hiring people with [recruitment] experience.”

By looking beyond those with experience, you are opening your doors to many more possibilities.

Ms Horsburgh suggested: “If you're a medical recruiter, maybe someone that's coming from a nursing profession that has left that profession and had enough of that profession and knows that market inside out, so half of the equation is dealt with immediately,” might be a good candidate for a recruitment role.

This approach to hiring can be very beneficial. People will adapt and grow into a role just as they learned foundational skills. Ms Horsburgh believes employers should, “ease up on their very stringent requirements.”

“Look outside the box and really look at the qualities of the person that they want, cultural fit, and the rest can hopefully be developed and nurtured as time goes on.”

In these situations where recruitment is challenging, Ms Horsburgh believes that employers should be focused on their staff, as they are an essential commodity. By making the effort with the health and wellbeing of employees, employers can increase retention and attraction.

“We're running an event in Melbourne next month with the founders of ‘R U OK? Day’ around how to have that conversation beyond that initial statement or question, ‘Are you okay?’ and giving our members some really practical leadership tools to walk away and implement within their teams,” shared Ms Horsburgh.

“How [do we make] sure that these wellbeing initiatives are accessible for them? Is it a case of spending some time outside the office or is it a case of trying to embed it in how you work on a daily basis?” These are the sorts of questions Ms Horsburgh suggests employers should be asking themselves.

The transcript of this podcast episode, when quoted above, was slightly edited for publishing purposes. The full conversation with Lesley Horsburgh is below.