Sponsored by The Recruit Venture Group which offers recruiters a truly risk-free, fully funded way to entice them to start their own recruitment business.
1. Start with clear idea.
You are ready to use your experience and ‘do it your way’. Start up on your own, become a director of your own recruitment business – that’s great but firstly think about what is you want to do, have a clear idea.
You’ll be looking to reap more of the rewards of your own hard work and that is good. But, be clear about what you want to do. Identify the sector or sectors you know most about. Decide what it is that makes you special and how you can shape a business that offers something your competitors don’t.
2. Research your market.
Be organised. Research is vital. Obviously you’ll have recruitment experience. Why else would you be doing this? But, now that you’re planning to be your own boss you need to really know the market you can best target and service. What geographical areas can you cover? Are there any specific industries or recruitment requirements that are prevalent on your patch, and can you take advantage of them? Do you have special knowledge of any market sector that you can exploit? Who is already operating in your area, and how much competition do they represent?
If you’re doing this properly the answers to some of those questions will inform how you ‘frame’ your branding and company message.
3. Develop and plan.
You won’t get far without a proper business plan, and it’s advisable to get expert help to prepare a strategy that sets out achievable goals and expectations.
Crucially, you need to plan your income and expenditure forecast. You need to establish how you’ll be able to sustain yourself financially from the outset. You also need to plan ahead for the next stage. Do you have a specific goal? How are you defining it? By a turnover target? By plans to expand? If you don’t know where you’re going – you probably won’t get there!
4. Play to your strengths.
It’s just as important to know, and address, your weaknesses, but let’s stay positive! This is a vital area. The reason you’re setting up on your own is to ‘do it your way’. You feel confident about doing it because you’re good at what you do. You’re probably running a busy desk or team right now. But here’s the thing, when you become the boss you’re going to have a lot more responsibilities.
There’s a lot of administration to sort, the rent to pay, staff issues to resolve and of course there’s juggling the numbers to service that loan you took out to get started. All of that distracts you from what you should be, and wanted to be, doing which is getting out there, finding clients and candidates and growing the business.
Stay focused. Get on with the big tasks. Which means you’ll need to have got yourself organised with the right help.
5. Get the right help.
If you’re planning on putting a team together at the outset you should know enough about recruitment to find the right staff for yourself. But it’s wider than that. From the financial backing to the marketing you need the right experts around you. Ideally they should be people who know about recruitment.
And don’t forget supplier relationships. You need to think about hardware, software, furniture and maybe a car. You need good deals on all of them especially at the start, so build good relationships with suppliers. As you get into your stride the supplier relationships will become, to be frank, secondary to the client relationships, but it’s important to maintain them. It helps build your reputation. Those suppliers are also good sources of referrals – and potential clients!
The Recruit Venture Group offers recruiters like you a truly RISK FREE, fully funded way to help YOU start YOUR own recruitment business. A confidential chat is all it takes to make a new beginning.
