There is no doubt that the recruitment industry receives a pretty bad reputation. I’ve been in the industry over 12 years and I genuinely love what I do, there is a real snobbery however towards recruiters who are generally seen as ‘sales people’. For some reason ‘sales’ is not seen as a profession.
To me this seems odd. Every company needs sales, without it they wouldn’t exist! So why the snobbery?
Selling is a real skill, a skill that not everyone has, but not everyone is great with numbers! We live in a commercial world, for a business to operate, people need to know about it and then buy the goods from it. Sales people makes this happen and are the key to future business success.
A good sales person focuses on selling to the right person, someone that wants a specific product/service. They listen carefully and position the brand in a way to attract that target audience. Once they have them on board, they then provide a fantastic service, and aftercare thus encouraging repeat business and referrals.
At ‘Four’ we have experienced great prejudice and ignorance towards recruitment and sales as a profession. Recently a local university couldn’t understand why ‘Four’ would want to exhibit at one of their graduate careers fair, the head of careers didn’t think anyone would want to consider recruitment/sales as a career! This seems crazy to us, what will businesses do in the future when we don’t have anyone to sell our products and services?
Winning Pitch – the national entrepreneurial coaching business – has recently established its ‘Sales Academy’ a formal qualification that recognises sales as a profession and the value that it has to a business, as they say:
“Great sales people know what they’re talking about, know their customer, and can combine motivational firepower with the cool-headed organisational skills that secure the lifeblood contracts of your business.”
Couldn’t have said it better myself! Lets hope with programmes like this and by attracting graduates and educating universities we can encourage people to see the sales industry as a profession.
