Should You Give a 3 Week Exclusivity?

By Dave Lucas | What Makes Us Different?

Mar 09

Xenitho offers both exclusive and non-exclusive packages. Our customers often wonder which option they should choose.

This is a fundamentally important question. But not for the reason you think.

Most people when asked this question will respond with questions like, “Will they be able to find me someone? What if they can’t find me someone? What if it takes them too long? What if I can find someone myself and don’t need them? Aren’t these guys just trying to knock out the competition?”

In other cases, they may already have contracted someone to work on the role and actually can’t give exclusivity. Or, alternatively, they are trying to DIY the role.

All of these considerations are misaligned to the key point. Which is, does it make sense to partner with a talent search consultancy, or not?

Well firstly you need to consider how critical the role is to your business. For one company a receptionist is not critical, for another it is one of their most critical roles as they need someone to represent the company brand.

What about an Exec job? Is it critical. Well in that case, we would all agree, “yes”.

Hiring the wrong exec, can ruin your business. We have seen this. One exec mis-hire led to the liquidation of a R500 Million company in just 2 years. Ouch!

What about other roles like engineers, financial managers, operations managers etc…? The guiding principle is this. What will happen to your business if the person cocks it up badly? Will it matter? If your answer is yes, then you have a critical hire. If it is no, then your hire is not critical and you may as well get any old agency to work on the role or DIY if you have the time.

So, let’s assume that your role is critical. Would you want to leave it to just anybody, like getting just anybody to do brain surgery on you? Or, would you want to give yourself the best chance of success?

We think the answer there is obvious too. You would want to give yourself the best chance of success. You want to partner with a reputable and capable talent search consultancy like Xenitho, to maximise your chances of success.

You see the reason we offer an exclusivity option is not for our benefit. It is actually for yours. Exclusivity gives us the ability to provide your with a deeply focused, high-quality service. We intimately involve you in our process so that you are assured of the best possible outcome, for your critical hiring decision. Further, by only making the exclusivity for 3 weeks, you are assured of a speedy but high-quality service. 3 weeks gives us enough time to do the job well, without rushing or distraction, but also puts pressure on us to deliver in reasonable timeframes. Which is better for you.

Finally, exclusivity is actually better for you as you get a 6 month guarantee and a number of other meaningful benefits. We reward our customers who partner with us.

It’s time to reconsider exclusivity. Is it better to have a bunch of agencies competing to send you as many CVs as possible, as quickly as possible? The current norm. Or, does it make more sense partnering with the industry’s leading talent search consultancy to jointly find a top 2% performer– who uplifts your business for years to come?

We will leave the decision up to you. It really depends on how much you care about the success of your organisation.

About the Author

Dave Lucas is the CEO of Xenitho. He has been sourcing Top 2% High-Impact performers since 2010. He is also the author of the book, "Become Great and Powerful.