Recruitment Ethics
HRQuest
7 Posts
Question, I've been in HR a number of years and it's always been my experience that recruitment within a company for external job candidates is generally confined to job applications on file, newspaper ads, internet searches, employee referrals, walk-ins, and other internal means. It has always been considered unethical for our company recruiters to go directly to competitor companies and "pirate" personnel away. When our internal recruitment efforts are not successful, however, we often put "hard to find" searches out to search firms which, undoubtedly, do recruit job candidates directly away from our competition. Of course, the method(s) by which search firm's do their job is generally not revealed to us. Today I'm told by some that the pendulum has swung the other way and that it is now an acceptable practice for company recruiters to recruit directly from competitor companies, using many of the same methods that search firms do. I'm basically doing a sanity check on this issue and would appreciate your experience and feedback. Thank you.
Comments
How can you tell new employees that your company values ethics and integrity if they were recruited in an un-ethical or sneaky manner.
I like to feel the good guy wins out in the end and the organizations that get ahead by deception or worse will eventually reap what they sow.
Paul
Generally, its okay to offer an at will employee a job a higher pay, even if they work for a competitor. But you need to make sure that they don't bring any confidential business information, etc with them.
Good Luck.
First off I work on identifying people who would be great employees and who may know others in the field. I try to keep a "pool" of candidates I can work from.
What we all need to look at is networking with those that can provide us leads. A common organization, chamber of commerce etc., we need to identify people who we can contact and let them know what we are looking for, what openings we need to fill. They will know when others are looking.
Myself if I am aware of an individual at a competitor that would be an excellent fit I have no problems with trying to hire them away. I would be cautious about going to often to one company. As for them trying to take our employees, I look at it that if we do our job right, by treating them fair, letting them know they are appreciated and valued, and keep them educated about how we are doing as a company then I am not concerned about them being stolen by the competitor. In fact at any given time there might be 2 or 3 that I would love to be "stolen away" by the competitor. Love when that happens!
My $0.02 worth.
DJ The Balloonman
Margaret Morford
theHRedge
615-371-8200
[email]mmorford@mleesmith.com[/email]
[url]http://www.thehredge.net[/url]
UNFORTUNATELY, WHEN ONE IS IN AN INDUSTRY OF ONE (1) (UNO), one does not recruit from your own, there is no other company in our immediate part of the world producing our skills. We, therefore, try always to raise our own or recruit from outside of the area of concern. You can not believe how hard it is to get an IOWAian to come to Mississippi. We have a corporate agreement not to recruit from our associated farms, & BRYAN fOODS and they do not recruit from us. Now on the other hand, we will assist a contract grower with a placement from our organization when it is of benefit to our operation and the employee.
When I was in retail, we got our district managers from anyone in the business. In manufacturing, again we got our employees from whom ever would come our way and they did the same to us. I GUESS I AGREE WITH YOU & TERESA/MARGARET HAVE A GOOD POINT TO BE AWARE OF TRADE SECRETS, THERE IS TROUBLE THERE!
I see the points everyone is making and I still will differ. Everyone can approach recruiting however they feel they should. I have chosen to not approach employees of other organizations because that I wouldn't like other organizations approaching our employees.
Perhaps I feel the way I do because the industry I am in (Christian camps and conferences) is very non-competitive in spirit. I will often pass along an applicant to another camp if the person does not match our needs. I derive great satisfaction from hearing that an applicant I have shared has found full time employment through my networking.
So maybe I live in la la land. It wouldn't be the first time anyone has said that.
Paul
Margaret Morford
theHRedge
615-371-8200
[email]mmorford@mleesmith.com[/email]
[url]http://www.thehredge.net[/url]
I guess what I resent is a company that would constantly be bombarding employees of other organizations with lures and job offers. Its hard enough to help employees learn their jobs, be content and productive, with constant distractions of greener pastures.
The other aspect is that I work for a non-profit that cannot afford to pay what the private sector pays so we are very vulnerable to outside organizations recruiting from our ranks.
I didn't mean to sound high and mighty in what I posted so I hope this explanation might help clarify where I am coming from. I am sure all of you are ethical people.
Paul