The Slow Path to Faster Results in Recruiting
Most recruiters are playing a numbers game they can’t win. They’re spraying resumes like a garden hose, hoping something sticks. But here’s the thing: recruiting isn’t a numbers game — it’s a relationships game.
I’ve watched countless firms chase what I call the “volume fallacy.” They believe more calls equals more placements equals more success. But that’s like thinking you’ll make more friends by speaking to more strangers at a party. Sure, you might — but you’ll probably just end up with a lot of shallow conversations and forgotten names.
The math actually works better when you slow down. When you focus on building genuine relationships, the numbers start looking different. We’re seeing 95% of our business coming from referrals, with a 75% close rate on contingency recruiting. That’s not because we’re making more calls — it’s because we’re making better ones.
Think of it like farming versus hunting. Most recruiters are hunters, always chasing the next kill. But farmers know something hunters don’t: if you tend to your relationships carefully, they’ll yield crops year after year. Even during winter (or hiring freezes), you keep tending the soil.
This approach requires a different operational mindset. Instead of training recruiters to blast out hundreds of LinkedIn messages, we’ve built a three-tier system where researchers handle sourcing, freeing up recruiters to focus on relationship building. It’s like having gardeners prepare the soil so the farmers can focus on growing the crops.
The secret sauce? Specialization. Don’t try to be everything to everyone. Pick your patch of land and become the expert there. When you focus on a “niche within a niche” — like only placing partners at specific sized law firms — you build deeper expertise and stronger relationships.
But here’s the counterintuitive part: to build trust, you need to be willing to lose deals. Tell the truth consistently, even when it might cost you. If a candidate is a “10,” position them as an “8.” Address potential issues upfront. It feels like you’re shooting yourself in the foot, but you’re actually building a foundation for long-term success.
The irony is that by slowing down, focusing on fewer but deeper relationships, and being painfully honest, you actually speed up your long-term success. It’s the difference between building a house of cards and building a brick house. One looks impressive quickly but falls with the slightest breeze. The other takes time but lasts for generations.
In recruiting, as in life, the slow path is often the fastest route to lasting success.