When looking for a new position, a person has to consider many things, one of which is whether to work with a recruiter. And if one does decide to, then which recruiter or firm is best? The same can be said when a company is hiring – should they use a recruiting firm, and if so, who and why?
My biggest recommendation is to locate a recruiter or company who specializes in recruiting for your career specialty. Ask former co-workers, colleagues, and mentors for referrals; check out their backgrounds and speak to different firms to find the best fit for you.
The main advantage of working with a specialized recruiter, or better yet, a niched recruiting firm is the extent of their knowledge. For example, our firm only recruits in regulatory affairs within the biotech and pharmaceutical industries. This means we work as a team with a common goal of attaining more regulatory knowledge than anyone else. Each person has a role in educating others and bringing new ideas and information to the team. The advantage to this is that it is our only focus. It ensures we are always doing the best for our clients, bringing new issues to light, new players to market, offering industry and staffing news that is specific to just regulatory affairs. People look to us for advice, expertise and opinions.
Our candidates are enormously important as well, just as important as our clients, and it’s not because of the fee. It’s because at the end of the day, we believe that the people in regulatory affairs are doing things to make life better. They are working towards curing diseases ranging from different cancers to Alzheimer’s to vaccines and so on. These people play an enormous role in bringing important, often life changing, drugs to market. For us, it’s about constantly trying to do right thing, getting right person into the company so that company can do what it needs to do to get the drug approved and start affecting lives and patient outcomes.
A specialized recruiter should have passion for their industry and specialty. This passion to learn, grow and bring more insight to their co-workers, clients and candidates will easily separate them from a generalist who knows and understands very little about this niche.