Looking for Your Dream Job Starts with Choosing the Right Recruitment Agency
You"ve been through the early career stages of building your skills and track record.You have the essential skills like excellent spelling and grammar, excellent computer skills and you know your way around social marketing on sites like Facebook, Twitter and Linked-in, not to mention how to work a Blackberry.You know you"re organised, efficient, understand the need for confidentiality and enjoy managing people"s diaries, bookings, correspondence, record keeping and so on.
So now you"re ready to move up the ladder to a job as a PA or Executive Assistant with a big company in London.
You plan to register with a secretarial recruitment or PA recruitment agency in London. How do you find the right one?
You want one that will be pro-active in seeking out the right appointment for you, one that shows an interest in you and gets to know you.
You have put some effort into your CV and some thought into the kinds of organisations you want to work in but you want to be sure you won"t just be a number in their filing system that any member of staff pulls out using a checklist of qualifications without any reference to you as a person when they are asked to fill a vacancy.
A first step might be some online research of your own searching for secretarial recruitment or PA recruitment agency in London.
Have a look at their client list to see if they have any special niche markets they seem to be particularly expert at and that match the kind of organisation you"ve identified. Many wont advertise their client list but checking the types of jobs they are advertising will give you an indication.
When you have a shortlist of possibilities it may be worth calling to ask a little more about how they operate ð€“ if it isn"t clearly stated on their website.
Do they assign you to one member of staff (with a back-up) so you can build a relationship and create a clear understanding of you as a person and the kinds of environments in which you will shine?
Do they test your skills before they take you on? Do they offer advice on writing a CV?
What kind of further training do they offer in-house ð€“ it could save you a lot of time and money and could be a valuable resource for you.
What about feedback? Do they do a follow-up session with candidates they"ve placed for an interview and do they do it whether or not the candidate got the job?
Do they ask for feedback from the company they"ve sent you to? It may be that these two activities are key to helping you improve your interview technique but also, if they have a depth of knowledge about their clients they will understand the corporate culture and be able to match the right candidate with the right company, saving you hours of time and anguish from being pointed in the wrong direction.
Do they have a list of "difficult" clients or bosses that they would not consider dealing with?
If you"ve narrowed down your choices from these questions and drawn up your own shortlist, then it might be worth spending a day visiting the top three so you can get a feel for the people and the atmosphere of the company.
If they"re any good as an agency they should welcome your approach since it means you"re taking care to match yourself to the right agency and that ultimately will help them make their own business a success.