Recruiting networks can be formal or informal. There are many different business models that are successful. Some recruiters are drawn to a transactional model, where the focus is on the placement, not necessarily on a long-term partnership. Other networks, like NPAworldwide, are relationship-based. While our members are certainly focused on making placements, they are vested in their network as member-owners of our cooperative structure. They spend time cultivating relationships.
I am proud of the close relationships our members have with each other, and equally proud of the relationships between our members and our staff. Our members are successful because they meet each other face-to-face. They talk on the phone. They shake hands, they share war stories, they vacation together, and they cheer for each others’ kids. NPAworldwide members celebrate their successes together, and lift each other up when the chips are down.
These relationships proved extremely strong in the midst of the global pandemic this year. Instantly, we found members reaching out to us offering to train other recruiters in niches that were not as heavily impacted, such as healthcare and technology, and roles being posted heavily by members who were not in encountering hiring freezes, wanting to share with their NPAworldwide family the business they still had available to make sure their businesses stayed afloat. When the network released a message urging those severely impacted to reach out directly for help, more members contacted us wanting to contribute to a business relief fund to help their peers rather than asking for help themselves. Most notably were the instances of the recruitment firm owners hit physically with COVID-19. These recruiter’s families and friends knew to reach out to the network and their partners in the organization to take over their desks and roles and clients for them while they were unable to.
I share this inside perspective for those independent owners not part of a formal network to see the support of having a community and network in an otherwise lone ranger business. We are never sure what will be the next business or personal obstacle we will have to tackle, but our organization definitely proves it’s easier to not have to endure it alone.