Unfortunately, there are occasions when your client may view their ideal prospect differently than you do. This frequently occurs in recruitment, and you are undoubtedly accustomed to dealing with it as a recruiter.
But what if you had another ideal role for your prospect and went to LinkedIn to try and contact them? And then, you find out that the applicant is working for a client who rejected them after you submitted their CV to them six months prior.
Yes. And below, we sum up how you can avoid backdoor hire placements moving forward.
What is backdoor hiring?
Backdoor hires refers to a hiring firm accepting a candidate from a recruiting agent.
Then at some point in the near or medium future, the hiring company decides to hire the applicant directly behind the recruitment agency’s back to avoid paying a charge or placement fee. What makes it worse is that sometimes, the recruiter doesn’t even know they missed out on a particular payment.
What are ways to avoid backdoor hire placements?
Before you fall victim to backdoor hires or get too paranoid, you need to double-check a few things to improve your odds of collecting because some clients can be harder to approach than others.
- Obtain a written agreement
A written agreement should be a must for all business transactions. Having a signed contract strengthens the stance of the recruiter, who may have been too trusting or just disorganized for many reasons.
- Implement a 12-month possessory period following your presentation of candidates
An arrangement between the hiring firm and the agency known as a possessory period states that if the customer hires the applicant within a specified period, they are responsible for paying a charge.
- Create a name-clearing clause
Most likely, the client and candidate had already met before the presentation in specialized sectors where everyone knows everyone. So, your agreement must specify that if the client has spoken with the applicant within the past 30 days, they must notify you in writing within a 24-hour name-clearing period.
- Know the company’s affiliates
Knowing the affiliates, branches, or subsidiaries is a good idea because your customer can send your candidates to one of them or a different division.
Declare in your contract that the client will still be responsible for the hiring charge if the parent firm refers the candidate to an affiliate and they are hired.
Also, ask the parent business to sign the contract to ensure no backdoor placements.
- Invest in backdoor technology
AI has come a long way for the recruiting industry. Investing in backdoor technology gives you the ability to track or monitor your candidates.
To Summarize
There is nothing worse than putting so much hard work into sourcing and placing a candidate than having to waive the placement fee because you were missing a few agreements or foolproof strategies.
Ensure you protect yourself—your contracts, provisions, and even technological solutions should all be geared in your favor.