For those searching for a job where they can use their innate curiosity about people, investigative aptitude, and interpersonal abilities to their full potential, the world of recruitment usually stands out as a solid career option.
As luck would have it: this is an incredible time to join the profession. Not only are there a slew of opportunities available, you'll be entering the field just as it is ascendent in the eyes of the business community. A profession that was, unfortunately, long considered a cost center that most execs (and, even HR colleagues) considered first on the chopping block when recession hits, is now proving why it is invaluable to business success. You'll have the opportunity to be recognized, gain budget, and make an impact at a critical time in the economy.
There's staying power, as well, even after we emerge from this fascinating time in hiring. In 2019, roughly 157.54 million individuals were employed in the United States. By the end of 2022, an increase of roughly 2 million employed persons is predicted. With the increase in job openings across the country, an increasingly mobile workforce, and the continued drain of talent as the Boomer generation retires, the need for experienced and skilled recruiters has gone up tenfold.
Human resources professionals are expected to see a 10% increase in employment between 2020 and 2030, which is about the same rate of growth as the whole workforce. Over the next decade, an average of 73,400 positions for human resources specialists are expected to open each year.
Furthermore, according to Career Explorer, the United States will require 45,500 recruiters during the next decade. 38,900 new recruiters and 6,600 retirees are the basis for this estimate.
A corporate recruiter, may expect to earn - on average - $56,000 per year, according to Salary.com.
If the recruiter works for a recruiting agency, they have the chance to exceed this amount - often making six-figure incomes. The more they are successful people at finding talent for their clients, the more money the recruiter is paid out of commissions for their efforts. The downside to this model is that it can be feast-or-famine, with sudden and precipitous drops in earnings when the economy slows. Along with that, the career path can be limiting, and the sales component of the role can turn some people off. Despite that, for hunters who enjoy chasing high income, it can be a major career for some individuals.
With regards to job growth, on the corporate side, if you're a recruiter, you don't have to stick with the same title for the rest of your career. The industry is in constant evolution. Careers in recruitment marketing, employment branding, operations, technology, and more are all possibilities. For staffing firms, hiring manager, team leader, hiring director, or even a leadership position in a major firm are all common career paths.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a Bachelor's degree in human resources or business is often necessary for recruiter positions. While a recruiter's formal education can help, it is frequently their interpersonal and communication abilities that make or break their career. This is why recruiters tend to look beyond just certifications and degrees while hiring fellow recruiters.
Communication and relationship development are examples of soft talents. When a recruiter interacts with hundreds of prospects throughout their career, they can build and enhance these skills. Moreover, to be able to recruit the best of candidates from the talent pool, it’s important for recruiters to be able to gain the trust of candidates.
Being an experienced recruiter doesn't mandate having a college degree, although it does help. There is a wide range of educational paths that great recruiters can take, and many of them have degrees in fields such as business administration, psychology, marketing, sociology, or human resources. We can observe a recurring theme in these degrees: They all deal with the study of people and their behavior.
In order to be a successful recruiter, you must have a thorough grasp of how people fit into various roles. People skills can be learned without attending a college or university. Many of us pick up our interpersonal abilities in the course of our normal daily activities. That being said, a recruiter also needs to have a basic understanding of labor and employment laws, and other technical aspects that you can’t learn in day-to-day life. So, in terms of education, recruiters should take advantage of both academic and informal sources of learning.
Moreover, a good recruiter should also know how to tackle internal and external challenges, like the recent hiring challenges U.S employers faced in December. According to Indeed, recruiters can also greatly benefit by attending seminars and workshops to learn about the latest trends and stay current on the latest hiring practices.
Here is a simple step-by-step method to assist you to get started on your path to your first recruiting position.
Bachelor's degrees in human-centered fields can be an asset to a recruiter. Additionally, there are a number of credentials that can be used to fill in any gaps in your schooling or work experience.
If you don't have recruiting experience yet, there are careers with transferable skills. A job that requires you to interact with clients and/or demonstrate leadership abilities is a fantastic lead-in to recruiting. Some of the industries top recruiters spent time in service industries, from waitstaff to retail. Others cut their teeth in journalism, building skills at research as well as networking. Still others came out of social work or traditional HR-related roles.
Recruiters are trained at finding talent - and, when talent comes to them, they have a hard time not helping. It's in their DNA. Get in touch with other recruiters to see if they'd be prepared to provide you with some guidance or insight into the current state of the sector. This strategy is particularly useful if you want to work for a specific company. If you're on social media, you'll almost certainly find the company’s employees who are more than ready to share advice on how to break into the industry. Join industry-related groups, such as Talent Product Plays on Facebook, where you can ask people in the profession for help, as well as learn about what sorts of concerns they discuss.
Recruitment is about talent and how it interact with business, and that cannot be emphasized enough. Your unique skills can make or break on organization. Nothing can stop you from having an exciting career ahead of you if you're willing to dedicate yourself to this cause. But, you should also be able to adapt and keep learning new skills to thrive in this tough job market. For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, recruiters needed to adopt innovative strategies to meet new requirements of recruiting in the virtual world. In such situations, only those recruiters who have sufficient knowledge are able to adapt and succeed.
With the rising demand for job placements and based on the data presented above, becoming a recruiter is a fairly stable and smart choice for those looking for a career opportunity that involves having great people skills and a keen eye for finding the right talent for a job.