How recruiters work

Greg Wyatt • April 3, 2024

I’ll start with some disclaimers and points for consideration:

My knowledge is principally in the UK. I’ve worked as an external recruiter, in-house recruiter, hiring manager, and I’ve looked for work in a downturn.
This post is aimed at giving a little insight into standard working practices, how we work with hiring processes, and why that leads to some of the experiences commonly talked about. It’s about expectation management.
I’ll use broad terms where applicable, and a steer on how others may use more obscure terminology to discuss the same

These are the areas I’ll cover today:

What a candidate is
Different agency recruitment models
Different types of agency recruiter
The internal recruiter
A few takeaways

What a candidate is

If you jump on any recruiter website, I’m pretty sure the vast majority will say something along these lines:

“We’re disrupting the market with better candidate experience.” As well as a lot of promises of being different in a way that looks much the same as everyone else.

And yet what your experience is will differ wildly.

Part of this may be marketing gumpf.

My belief, based on many discussions with fellow recruiters, is that the industry definition is different to a job seeker’s definition.

The vast majority of hiring processes see candidates as an employable person being considered for a job.

I use this terminology myself. For example, a job advert may have 99 applications, while only 5 are potential candidates - because they meet the criteria of the role, while the remaining applicants don’t.

The nuance of this definition is that the more cynical the process, the worse the memory retention of which candidates were considered.

By this I mean some companies may have seen you as a candidate at 2nd stage interview, then completely forget about you if they’ve discounted you from the process - because you are no longer a candidate.

Using this definition, many recruiters think they give a first class of candidate experience because they only relate it to the people they consider as candidates.

This is equally true of someone who treats everyone decently and those who only treat people they place into jobs decently.

On the other hand, pretty much everyone that considers employment sees themselves as a candidate for employment.

After all, assuming you are accountable, you wouldn’t apply for any job you didn’t see yourself as suitable for.

And even if you chose not to apply, it’s not necessarily because you didn’t see yourself as a candidate. It may be because though you are a great candidate for that vacancy, your experience of the process made you choose to step away. Which might be as simple as not liking the advert or email you read.

There’s another industry nuance to the candidate definition.

In the same way you may have heard about the hidden jobs market, so too do we talk about the passive candidate market:

“70% of candidates aren’t looking for a job, and these are the best candidates.”

Not my words, btw.

If you’re interested in reading more on the active vs candidate debate, I’ve written about it on my other newsletter: Your Mileage May Vary.

If you think it strange that I’ve started an article on ‘how recruiters work’ with a discussion on candidates, it’s simply because our relationship with our candidates is a sign of how we work with employers.

Without placing candidates in one form or another, most recruiters wouldn’t make any money, so it is deeply integrated into how we work.

Different agency recruitment models

Typically agencies earn their money through the successful placement of staff, irrespective of the nature of work.

The fee is often derived as a percentage of salary, and in most situations is budgeted for separately from the pay the new employee receives.

The overall steps any recruiter works to are these:

Receive job description from employer
Advertise job (either on a job board or through outreach like emails, calls)
Find and submit qualified candidates
Arrange interviews
Coordinate offer process

The differentiator is the quality of information at each step, and how rigorously they are executed.

For example, my requirement for recruiting a vacancy is a full consultation on the company, vacancy, context and culture, which I summarise in writing in a detailed candidate pack. Where there are issues, I advise the employer on how we can overcome them. This is a simplified version of the first bullet point for me.

There are nuances around this type of process.

Some agencies may rely more on a video presentation, others may ‘sell in’ candidates.

Some agencies will use psychometrics or other types of assessments.

Some will meet all candidates, some won't even talk to them.

But the general steps have a lot of crossover.

In a 100% transactional process, the steps are reliant on the quality of documentation- job description and CV- and leave the candidate and employer to do much of the rest.

Most recruitment processes are somewhere in between (I’m sure some are better than mine too, or do it differently, but this is for illustration).

You can tell a transactional process from public adverts - if an advert looks like a copypasta job description, it’s likely they haven’t qualified the vacancy in detail. Equally it shows in how the agency interacts with you.

How we are paid also has an impact in quality of service.

2.1 Contingency

This is the most popular recruitment model, akin to ‘no win, no fee’ where we only derive income from placements. This might be a percentage of salary or fixed fee.

In the UK it’s estimated that the average fill rate is between 20% and 33%. This is a range from several sources, but next to impossible to pinpoint clearly.

At the lower end, for ease of math, for every vacancy filled, that recruiter won’t fill four vacancies. Therefore their fee implicitly accounts for unfulfilled work.

The reason it’s so low is that most vacancies provided to recruiters are given on a ‘multi-agency’ basis and even in competition with the employer themselves.

A lot of contingency recruitment is ‘first past the post’ too, in that a submitted CV is seen to be owned by the agency that submitted them first.

As a small exercise - let’s say Joe Recruiter has to fill 3 vacancies a month to hit target. This means he has to work on 15 vacancies a month to achieve the goal. You can see how this might impact quality of service, especially if there are multiple different candidates for each role. And especially if the race is on to get CVs over as quickly as possible.

This can result in some of the bad experiences talked about in recruitment, from refusing to divulge company information (for fear of divulging competitor secrets), to trying to find out who you are interviewing with (which may be so they can use them as leads) to dropping contact if there is nothing they can do for you.

It isn’t necessarily the case, and there are some great contingency recruiters out there, especially those that work more closely with employers, often with exclusivity.

Fwiw, when I was a pure contingency recruiter, early in my career, my fill rate varied between 50 and 70%, annually. It’s higher, consistently, now.

2.2 Other models

The traditional counterpoint to contingency is ‘ retained ’ where we receive a portion of a fee up front to service a vacancy. This also requires exclusivity, and because employers have skin in the game, better access to hiring process information.

I don’t like this term personally, because it can be used to imply one approach is better than the other. That’s not true, neither is inherently better, each with their own issues and challenges, and it is just a fee model.

However, what it can mean, in how it can lead to mutual obligation from the employer while allowing a more qualitative approach to candidate work - this is what can lead to superior service. I.e. the philosophy is what’s important, and a fee model can reflect that.

A different approach is through RPO (recruitment process outsourcing) whereby, like any outsourced arrangement, a 3rd party can manage recruitment for the employer, to different service levels.

Over the past few years we’ve seen other models come through from subscription types (bizarrely called Recruitment As A Service), to embedded/insourced (acting as an in-house talent/recruitment function but as a 3rd party, similar in notion to RPO) to Uber-style apps.

Personally, my approach is try and find employers who benefit from a strategic partnership - any fee is just a consequence, and can take roughly the shape of any of those above.

I think two important points come from the paragraphs above:

a/ that candidate experience is really hard to deliver consistently when dealing with the volume of vacancies you see in a contingency model, and still takes intent in other models

b/ that agencies are paid to fill jobs, not to help find people jobs

That second point can cause so much frustration if you assume it’s the job of a recruiter to help you find a role, especially when our marketing talks about how we help candidates - which comes back to that definition above.

Recruitment is typically quite a short-term business, so it’s rare that you’ll see recruiters cultivate long-term relationships with job seekers, if they can’t help you directly.

Which is ironic, considering many jobseekers will reciprocate the help they’ve received, with people they’ve built trust with. Doubly ironic when it’s someone with hiring authority that gets radio silence from previous suppliers.

I don’t mind saying that while my goal is to help job seekers, a happy byproduct is the same job seekers occasionally ask for my help recruiting in future, with less of the need to sell my credibility.

Different types of agency recruiter

There’s around as many types of agency recruiter as there are recruitment agencies.

What complicates matters is that as an industry we sometimes try to hide what we do by clever names, some of which may have meaning, some of which are smoke and mirrors.

Am I a boutique headhunter or am I a recruiter? Or a Talent Ecosystem Intelligence Officer?

I’m proud to be a recruiter who wears my process on my sleeve.

Whatever we term ourselves there are broadly a limited number of types of agency:

2.1 Temps/interim Agency

This is where you sign up for temporary work, on an hourly/daily rate employed through a contract for service.

This is typically on-demand recruitment, where the agency will make money through a margin/markup related to your rate.

Interim recruitment is a little different technically, in that interim typically have a skills set a traditional employee wouldn’t have, and provide a service through their limited company that is held outside of IR35.

The agency here will likely have a margin on the daily rate.

2.2 Permanent agency

An agency that works mainly on permanent vacancy, typically paid on filling a job by the employer.

2.3 Specialist recruiter

These are typically recruitment agencies that specialise in a domain. This could be a broad industry like ‘industrial’ or a market vertical like ‘marketing’.

It doesn’t necessarily mean they have specialist knowledge of the roles they recruit, although this can be the case. It means more that they regularly recruit on a type of role.

2.4 Generalist recruiter

Typically they don’t have one specialty, but may work closer with certain employers across a variety of vacancies. They might be pure scattergun of course!

2.5 Headhunter

This can mean many things, principally as a marketing spiel.

The idea is that headhunters access candidates who don’t apply for jobs, typically passive. Although broadly they use many of the same tools other recruiters do.

The crux of the message for employers is that they have a capability beyond what the employer can achieve themselves, which can be true.

2.6 RPO / embedded / insourced

An approach which manages part or all of a recruitment function. I find RPOs often are pitched at the multinational end of the market, while embedded / insourced are geared more towards start-ups and scale-ups.

2.7 And many more

Ultimately it shouldn’t matter what a recruiter does, more how they can be a conduit to a job.

It’s quite common to hear of job seekers blacklisting agencies for poor service. I get it - so frustrating, demoralising and occasionally crushing to be on the end of bad experience.

However, a key message I always say is this

Don’t let a bad process get in the way of what might be good employment

This is as true at the employer end as with agencies.

With agencies, the onus is often on winning the next vacancy, rather than giving service to people who may or may not be candidates. And that employer may not know how those agencies work.

While with employers, many hiring managers have never been trained on recruitment or interview, while being very busy at work. It’s not an excuse, but can lead to a more polarised experience as a candidate, than what they would be like to work with.

The internal recruiter

These are recruiters employed directly by the employer to fulfil their recruitment. Often these are termed Talent Acquisition Managers, Internal Recruiter, Recruitment Manager.

They aren’t always about just filling vacancies, but also about managing the system of recruitment.

It’s a field that is overwhelmed due to a huge amount of layoffs, where internal recruiters are often overburdened, even in very large companies.

When working on vacancies, the mandate is to fill those vacancies, and again this can lead to frustration if you ask corporate recruiters “do you have any jobs I might be suitable for?”.

Whether or not there is an argument that they could help you, it’s more effective to do the work yourself and either research the business to what they are recruiting, or simply ask directly “could you tell me who is the best contact for <your field>”, “when are you likely to recruit for these roles” and help them help you.

Takeaways

There’s so much to talk about on this subject, and I’ve no doubt I’ve missed glaringly obvious topics. If I have, let me know and I’ll update this article.

Equally it’s easy to oversimplify what is a huge and complex industry - please treat this as an illustration rather than something to specifically rely on.

Some takeaways:

It’s worth learning the rules of the recruitment game when you can. Be curious and ask questions.
While we should be criticised for poor behaviour, if you don’t understand why a recruiter works in a certain way, please don’t assume it’s for bad reason.
Recruitment is a stressful job at the best of times, which can lead to thick skin and callous behaviour. It’s not an excuse, more a symptom of the system we all work in.

The next article will be on ‘principles of a good CV’.

Thanks for reading.

Greg

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My new book - A Recruitment AiDE

By Greg Wyatt • April 30, 2026

I'm thrilled to announce the publication of A Recruitment AiDE. A guide, philosophy and discipline for effective key hire recruitment. The timing’s perfect, given the deluge of AI content that floods our feeds. Imagine how these similarly produced generic adverts land with people you want to talk to. "We're thrilled to announce we want, we need, here’s our shopping list, why aren’t you responding and oh what’s this flood of AI CVs?" It doesn’t have to be this way. This has taken twenty-five years of hard graft - talking to job seekers, researching the market and recruitment practice, learning about candidate resentment, problem awareness, marketing, copywriting, and the psychology of what moves people. With the evidence that backs this up. The result is something that may make you rethink your approach to recruitment. That will improve the number of qualified candidates, while reducing the total number of applications. It's too early to prove, but my expectation is this will reduce the number of AI CVs too, given there is less for AI to grab when you speak to professional identity. You’ll have to be bold, go against the grain, do something that feels counterintuitive, especially if someone has their hand on your shoulder saying "This isn't the company style!" But then, what does it take to stand out from the crowd? And if you really want to attract the best people, shouldn’t your first step be focused on them, and not you? Kindle version out now. Here's the link: https://amzn.eu/d/03idlAVM. Paperback in two weeks. If you don’t like Evilcorp, let me know and we can work something out.

Content strategy and philosophy

By Greg Wyatt • April 27, 2026

What follows is Chapter 40 of A Career Breakdown Kit , and part two of a three part series on Personal Branding. Except it isn't. There are various definitions I revolt against, with good reason, in a job search. Personal branding, hidden jobs markets, ATS compliance, and all the others. Terms that seem to hide secret wins, not replicable steps, especially when hidden behind a paywall. I call it the title that's expected because of the questions job seekers ask me. You may recall my article on the Hidden Jobs Market breaks it apart and rebuilds it into a cohesive multichannel marketing strategy that allows you to access the whole of your jobs market. And so it is with my personal branding series. This isn't about your brand. Or even about your reputation. It's about pushing content that starts conversations with relevant people - such as peers, former colleagues, recruiters with a vested interest in these content areas, and even people that can put you closer to a job. Not forgetting fellow job seekers you can share experiences with - as long as you don't dwell on the negative. And it's also about writing in a way that is both true to you and your profession - because conversation has to follow in the same voice as you write, and should support your work, when in work. It's a strategy and philosophy that mirrors earlier chapters on networking, doorknocking, getting found and converting interest. It isn't about writing credible statements in a content savvy way that shares unprovable anecdotes, hacks that lack substance, and where a funnel means more than a lesson. That way is the way of social media marketing - this is about conversations that matter. 40 - Content strategy and philosophy While a personal brand might be the goal, your content strategy should be the priority. It can be applied even if you don’t like the idea of branding. Much is made about LinkedIn’s algorithm and how you need to do this that and the other to get engagement. You can look at it differently, ignoring the algorithm on the whole, and still achieve much the same. These are the outcomes I aim for and see when writing content: Start conversations Help others Sharpen and spark ideas Raise awareness and trust Have a laugh and a chat I’ve gained friends I’ve never spoken to and friendly acquaintances I only know through ‘comments.’ As well as paying clients who have benefitted from my service. Just as importantly, I have more credibility with candidates who place weight on LinkedIn content. Content makes it easier for me to start conversations. It’s important for me that I either enjoy the content and its consequences or find it fulfilling. I don’t talk openly about my personal life, family or challenges. Something I agreed with my wife when I started publishing content. Instead, I show all of myself in my words - quirks and all. So that if we ever speak in real life, there isn’t much of a disconnect. Start with other people’s content Find content writers who inspire you and use them as a catalyst for your own words. There are two ways to do this. Firstly, if you’re thinking about writing on LinkedIn, you are presumably already reading content. What inspires you? What do you enjoy reading? Which authors resonate with your career, your values, your goals and the problems you solve? When you read their content, do you engage and comment? Do you connect with them? Do you ask them who they recommend as writers in your field? Secondly, look within. What do you want to be known for in your career? Maybe it’s procurement or your CIPD membership. React or agile. 5 Whys or Gemba. If these are areas that interest you, use the LinkedIn search bar to find posts on these topics. Now filter the results by ‘Posts’ and ‘Sort by’ latest. Read through the results both for posts that interest you and those that have high engagement (less likely on a niche topic). When you’ve found inspiring content, what next ? One first step in content creation is to respond to these posts with your own ideas. Less ‘Agree’ and more how you might respond in a real-life conversation on this topic. Commenting on other people’s posts is a good way to find your voice, particularly if the conversation continues. Like any skill, writing takes practice, and comments are a low-friction way of developing your tone. If a comment sparks interest from other readers, it can be a concept to build on as a post in its own right. The other benefit of this kind of niche content is that those who engage are likely to have similar interests to you. Make sure to read other comments and see if there are more conversations to be had. The comments you build with them can be the start of a mutually beneficial relationship. Check out their profiles - do their interests and values reflect yours? These are people to connect with, then DM to continue the conversation. Check out their posting history, which will be available on their profile - there may well be a lot of interesting content to absorb. With conversation comes content. Ideas and discussion that grow are an effective way to share your voice. Here’s a suggestion for how you can do this in practice: Look for 5 posts daily that interest you professionally - manually, using a search, or checking what your valuable connections are up to Engage and comment on each Check out new relevant profiles - connect and follow their content On each post, look at who is engaging and respond naturally Try to connect with 5 new relevant people from these interactions Perhaps follow up with a message Take note of the most interesting conversations and at the end of the week pick at least one to inspire your own posts You don’t need to publish them if you aren’t comfortable - save for later if not I’d avoid the viral content that combines relevance + relatability + entitlement + readability. These writers are more interested in engagement numbers than your specific interest. You can see the truth of their words in how they respond in the comments sections. From a marketing perspective, different types of content have different places in your lead generation: Awareness Interest Consideration Evaluation Purchase Each post, comment, DM and real-life conversation can relate to these steps and support your goals, even if you aren’t treating these as a marketing activity. Time and time again There’s a lot of investigation into optimal times to post. It’s more important that you are available to reply attentively in the first hour. The course of a post is often dictated by the performance during this time. I actively reply to comments for around an hour a day with LinkedIn on in the background of other work. How much time can you set aside per week and per day for content? Even if you only write a couple of posts a week, this will probably take a couple of hours. You can expect low performance initially, with some exceptions, as it takes time to build inertia. Set aside a sustainable amount of time each week and commit to it over a period - try for 10-12 weeks and track how things have developed. You may find it becomes an enjoyable task. Try not to get distracted by engagement for its own sake and keep your goals in mind. Types of content to try Engagement on LinkedIn is built primarily on relevance and relatability. Even ragebait, given it drives strong feeling. You can write a 100% relatable post that everyone takes relevance from and see massive engagement. Though that engagement may not serve your goals. Or you can write a post that is 100% relevant to the problems you solve in your career, and the people who will find it relevant are from a small niche facing the same problems. This is why a photo of you with your dog will fly, while a carefully thought out post about the optimisation of widgets in a byzantine setting will appear to be shouting into a void. Or you can blend the two through storytelling, pivoting observations into business content, and copywriting formulae like AIDA (attention interest desire action) and PAS (problem agitation solution). Everyone will have different forms of content that will be effective for them. What do you want your ideal readers to experience? What would ‘you five years ago’ would find helpful? Do you want readers to see you as a credible expert? Someone who is authentically vulnerable? Your warts and all personality? Someone who stands out in a sea of competition? Someone who is thought-provoking, helpful, or altruistic? The answers are much the same if you posed these questions of interviewing. This is no coincidence, given your message should be consistently delivered no matter where it is received. With that in mind, here are some content ideas you can try: How you might solve a problem specific to your industry Stories from your everyday life The challenges in your job search Observations on a news story and how it relates to your work A flair post highlighting your availability Asking for thoughts on an idea you are interested in Sharing insight you find fascinating, whether that’s films, video games, science or sport Stories from your career where you can show growth (everyone loves a hero’s journey) Business frameworks, processes and techniques you find useful - Pomodoro Technique, scientific method, STAR, what do you use? Equipment you use for work Developments in your workplace and culture Thoughts on content you find inspiring Memes, humour, satire Google content ideas for LinkedIn or ask ChatGPT, Claude and others. I wouldn’t use AI to write articles. I do use them for ideation and to sense check. ‘Write me a post for LinkedIn that shows the link between Tesla cars and how to develop an HR strategy.’ The vulnerability of writing You can be a content creator without ever publishing a post if you continue conversations through comments, connections, DMs and real-life. This avoids sticking your head above the parapets and is low risk, but misses the gain of publishing your own content. I know that some people are held back for fear of failure. I can tell you that clicking ‘send’ is always a high point of anxiety for me in sending newsletters. Imagine how I felt when I clicked Publish for this book. What’s the worst that can happen with a carefully thought-out post? Tumbleweed? If no one reads it, you can always post it again another time. Disagreement? Loads of people disagree on my posts - you’ll see from my comments that I am always constructive in my dialogue and typically this supports the intent of my post. Everyone has an opinion and they are welcome to theirs - as long as it’s constructive, there is always a learning opportunity. Trolls? These people exist and will at some point rear their ugly heads. I imagine them naked on the Underground, which takes the sting out of their vitriol. I’m sure it’s their unhappiness that drives their behaviour. Marriage requests? Unfortunately, dubious and toxic behaviour isn’t uncommon. Don’t be afraid to block and report if you receive harmful messages. As long as you are constructive in what you write and you work to build a conversation, it’s unlikely anything bad will happen. You will open yourself up to the opportunity of new relevant people starting conversations with you: hiring managers, recruiters, peers, fellow job seekers, and friendly strangers. Weight and depth of opinion A couple of years ago, I had a message from an out-of-work Sales Director asking for some feedback. He’d shot a video for LinkedIn where he talked about why he should be snapped up and received a lot of praise for the post. However, he was confused because a CEO he trusts told him it was poor and made him look boring. He knew I’d give him unvarnished feedback, which was what he needed to find some clarity on what had happened. Truthfully, the CEO was correct. What had happened? All of the positive engagement was from fellow job seekers and people who wanted to support him. That he’d done it was praiseworthy in itself and was rightly celebrated, rather than the quality of what he had produced. None of them had hiring authority or were in a career similar to someone who would be his line manager. The video didn’t show him how he comes across in person either. While the positive feedback was fantastic for validation, his video worked against him. What might happen if a hiring process thought his video was boring when the role being recruited for has persuasion as a key requirement? I’m pleased to say his redo was excellent, showing off his charisma while delivering the same message. Who can you rely on to be this CEO for you in your career? Why you should start now, even if you don’t see any benefit for months. Starting cold on LinkedIn can take time to get traction. When your first post bombs you might never think to do a second. Going in with the expectation of little impact for the first three to six months is healthy in making a sustainable habit. If you’re out of work though, three to six months may seem too far off to be worthwhile when there are many activities that offer a quick turnaround, such as applying for jobs. I’ve spoken to many job seekers who’ve been out of work for more than six months and had decided not to write content at the outset of their search. If they had, they might now be seeing the benefit of their work.