Hiring is one of the most important decisions a business makes. And the wrong hire can be expensive, costing time, productivity, team morale, customer relationships, and ultimately, revenue.  

But finding the right person also takes time. A lot of it. Hiring managers and HR teams are already managing full workloads – onboarding employees, supporting current teams, conducting performance reviews, managing benefits, solving employee issues, developing leaders, and taking care of many other priorities. 

This is where a specialized recruiting partner can make a difference for your organization.  

Let your team focus on the business  

One of the reasons I enjoy working with hiring teams is simplifying their talent recruiting process. We take ownership of the search while they concentrate on their employees, customers, operations, and business goals.  

Recruiting is more than posting jobs and waiting for applications. A successful talent search requires market research, targeted outreach, top candidate sourcing, screening, interviewing, follow-up, candidate management, and continuous communication with hiring companies and ideal candidates. 

And for positions that are especially difficult to fill, the search often requires going beyond the traditional applicant pool. At Goodwin Recruiting, these are often the searches we love most.  

Your industry matters  

One of the advantages of partnering with Goodwin Recruiting is our specialization across multiple industries. Our Recruiting Partners work in hundreds of industries, verticals, and geographic markets, so we’re not initiating talent searches from zero.  

We also understand our clients’ organizations and industries, and what’s happening in the talent market in real time. For example, we have the answers to questions like these:  

• What compensation is competitive for your open position, in your city or state?  

• What is the availability of talent you need, locally, regionally, or nationally?  

• What will motivate strong candidates to consider your new opportunity?  

• Which skills are truly essential for the role you need to fill?  

• What expectations do you have that may limit the pool of qualified candidates?  

• What are your competitors offering job candidates to attract similar talent?  

With more than 350 recruiting specialists nationwide, Goodwin Recruiting combines broad reach with specialized market expertise. Our network is particularly valuable when a talent search is very demanding, such as a role that is highly specialized, confidential, executive-level, or geographically challenging.  

Your best candidates may not be looking for a job  

One of the biggest differences between posting an open position and conducting a talent search is that some of the strongest candidates for your specific role are not actively looking or applying for new jobs. These passive candidates are most likely performing well in their current jobs, so they’re not posting resumes or visiting job boards.  

That said, many passive candidates are open to the right conversations to learn about potential opportunities. Passive candidates can improve access to hard-to-reach, highly skilled talent, while active candidates are often faster to engage and hire. The goal is to pursue access to the broadest talent pool.  

Every day, Goodwin Recruiting Partners build relationships with both active and passive candidates, so that when we begin a search, we’re not limited to people who happen to see a job ad and click “Apply.”  

Instead, we proactively identify people whose careers and experience align with the role and introduce them to an opportunity they may never have discovered on their own. This part of talent search is especially important for leadership positions and hard-to-fill roles where the applicant pool can be very small.  

A job description is only the beginning of a talent search program  

Finding the right candidate also requires understanding much more than the job description. Before representing an organization in the market, a recruiter needs to understand the business behind the position: 

• What does success look like during the first six or 12 months on the job?  

• What type of leadership style works best within this organization or on this team?  

• What challenges will the new hire inherit?  

• What kind of company culture will they be joining – and is it a good fit?  

• Why would a strong candidate want this opportunity and what value will they bring to the organization?  

• Why have previous candidates or team members succeeded or struggled in this role?  

The more we understand organizational dynamics, the better we can represent the employer brand and evaluate candidates. A recruiter’s role is not simply to send resumes to hiring companies. Our job is to screen, interview, pre-select, and present candidates who have solid, demonstrated reasons to be considered.  

Save time without sacrificing quality or eligibility   

Anyone who has managed the hiring process knows how fast recruiting consumes a daily calendar. Reviewing resumes. Scheduling calls. Conducting introductory interviews. Following up. Answering candidate questions. Coordinating with hiring teams. Keeping strong candidates engaged. The list goes on. Multiplied by dozens or hundreds of applicants and the talent search becomes a full-time job.  

An external recruiting partner manages much of that work before qualified candidates ever reach the hiring team. Instead of spending hours reviewing applicants who may not meet job requirements, hiring managers spend their valuable time speaking with smaller, more relevant groups of candidates who have already been screened.  

We are informed students of the market  

A recruiting partner provides another benefit that is sometimes overlooked: market intelligence. Because our Recruiting Partners are constantly speaking with candidates and employers nationwide, we hear what is happening in the market every day.  

We learn when compensation expectations are changing and which benefits matter most. We hear why candidates are leaving other companies. We discover when a job title is attracting the wrong talent or when a requirement is unnecessarily narrowing the candidate pool. And we closely observe when search strategies are just right – and when the market indicates the need for change.  

A strong recruiting partnership gives employers access to all of these insights and feedback throughout the search for talent.  

What about those hard-to-fill roles? 

Every organization has positions that are relatively easy to fill. And then there are the others… 

• The executive candidate needs a very specific combination of leadership and technical expertise.  

• A specialized professional is needed from within a limited talent pool.  

• A position cannot be publicly advertised because the job opportunity is confidential. 

• The leader must understand a particular market, customer, technology, or operating environment.  

Searches such as these call for a different approach. They require research, direct outreach, solid connections, existing relationships, persistence, and often, conversations with professionals who were not planning to change jobs – until now.  

That is exactly where an experienced recruiting partner adds the most value. Goodwin Recruiting also conducts confidential searches and broader searches when the best candidates may not be within an employer’s immediate geographic market.  

Recruiting is a partnership  

The best recruiting relationships are partnerships, not transactions.  

• We learn about your business.  

• We learn about your company culture, values, and employer brand.  

• We learn what matters to your leadership team and what kind of professional will succeed within your organization.  

Then we take your story to the market. As your brand ambassador, we represent your opportunity to candidates, screen for the right experience and motivation, build a strong candidate pool, assist in the interview process, and negotiate compensation with selected candidates. 

If a placement does not work out as expected, Goodwin Recruiting offers a replacement guarantee as defined in the terms of our search agreement. This provides additional protection for a hiring company’s investment in talent acquisition.  

Hiring will always require involvement from leadership and HR. But your team should not have to choose between running your business and finding the right people to help grow it. Your team can stay focused on your customers, employees, and organizational goals – and your recruiting partner stays focused on strengthening your teams. 

Contact Goodwin Recruiting for your hiring needs 

Let’s have a conversation about the type of talent you’re looking for, what the market is telling us today, and how our services can help you onboard the right talent for your team. We specialize in placing professionals in middle management to senior- and executive-level roles, including hard-to-fill roles and confidential searches. 

Connect with me today(opens in new tab) and let’s start a conversation. My name is Elena Sabry and I am a Recruiting Partner with Goodwin Recruiting.