Manpower consultants, also known as job consultants, act as middlemen between employers and potential employees. Their roles and responsibilities when dealing with employers are significantly different than that while contacting potential employees. So if you are looking for a new job through a manpower consultant, you need to understand how manpower consultants actually work, what roles do they play and most importantly how to deal with manpower consultants. Only then you will be able to make the best use of job consultants and grab the best opportunities you are made for.
Primary Objectives of Manpower Consultants
First of all be very clear that manpower consultants are not the actual employers; instead, they are acting as middlemen or in simpler terms as a ‘sales brokers’. They have to sell your skills and experience to some relevant buyers (employer) and as a result of this sale they get profit from the annual salary you are going to receive from your employer. So whatever you are paid, the consultants will apply a particular percentage of profit on it, which is their income and the reason they are in the recruitment industry.
Mind you, do not think of job consultants in a negative manner as everyone pursues monetary benefit in the business he does. However, just keep in your mind that:
- manpower consultants are not essentially here to help you excel in your career
- they may not be concerned about your advancement as a skilful individual
- You may not be the most demanded product for them as they are selling a wide pool of divergent products (employees); some are more profit-oriented than others.
If your understand the main objectives of manpower consultants, you will not have to feel you have been cheated, used or abused by those consultants who promised you in vain the excellent career ahead.
The Roles of Manpower Consultants
Acting as an intermediary between organizations looking for new staff and professionals seeking a new job, a manpower consultant has to play different roles in accordance with the party he is dealing with. No doubt his major objective is to meet the requirements of both the employer and the employee in order to ensure the best mutual fit. So at the same time he has to truly understand an organization’s setup, its culture and requirements as well as the career expectations and aspirations of a candidate. A job consultant’s important roles are given below:
Dealing with Candidates
- Providing general career advice and assistance
- Informing the candidates about current job opportunities
- Educating candidates on their appropriate roles and guiding them how to appear in final interview conducted by employers
Clients
- Getting talent-search business from new clients through different means and sources.
- Developing long-term relationships with clients by learning comprehensively all about the organization, its culture and hiring requirements
- Conducting short-term and long-term recruitment campaigns depending upon the requirements of clients
- Administrating the recruitment process that involves candidate screening through interviews, personality tests, feedback, offer negotiation and others.
Who is more important to Manpower Consultants?
Well, the answer to this question varies in accordance with the market conditions. If professional candidates in a certain sector or industry are in short supply, the value of employers obviously increases very high. Conversely, employers hold more importance when there the employees in a particular sector are in abundance. However, manpower consultants give more importance to their clients as they are actually the real source of income.
How to deal with Manpower Consultants?
If you have just given up your job for one or the other reason and want to get a similar position with another employer, then manpower consultants will be a more suitable option. It is so because most of the consultants like to place candidates into positions for which they are qualified and have already acquired a good experience. By this way, they want to fulfill the requirements of employers in a perfect way, offering the services of individuals experienced in the chosen field.
Conversely, you should not expect the same welcoming attitude of manpower consultant when you are interested in a higher level job in the same or different field. The reason of this contradiction in their attitude is that they are not interested to better your career. Their role is to discover you, land you quickly in a job position, make your new employer satisfied and get their profit share, without concerning to wait for long until they are able to find a job according to your aspirations. This analysis may sound over-generalize to some, but this should be in your mind when manpower consultants present different positions to you.
Another factor augmenting our view about general job consultants is that they often have a wide number of applicants on their books. As soon as some employer comes through to them, they attempt to find the most suitable match among the list of candidates they already have in their books. It means they are less likely to proactively strive to find the kind of organization you would like to work in, because this consumes a lot of time and is also at the risk of failure.
The Bottom Line
Having said this, you should be cognizant of how actually manpower consultants execute their business in the industry. Do consult these people and also follow up by contacting them periodically to learn about the progress of your case but at the same time use other sources as well. Drop your resumes at different recruitment agencies, make direct contacts with employers, use good references and ask your friends working in the same field to help you find a good job.
