Search,
Selection & Recruiting of Professional Staff
"Finding
Tomorrow's Partners. Today."
Using
a search firm has its pros and cons - consider us
the pros.
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Market
Update...
April,
2007
For those
of you visiting our site for the first time, welcome. Something
has probably happened recently in your practice to lead you
to investigate alternative methods of recruiting talent. And
that's not unusual. For returning visitors, welcome back.
Many practitioners
will probably have tried any or all of the following recruiting
techniques before calling in a 'headhunter':
and still you haven't
found the right candidate for your firm.
Frustrating, isn't it?
Some will even have taken the plunge and engaged a 'contingency-based'
recruiter and still not found the calibre of individual they
seek. Why?
Well, most of the techniques
listed above all have one fatal flaw... they are only reaching
candidates who are actively looking to move or are presently
out of work. Even contingency-based recruiters often focus on
collecting resumes of individuals who respond to advertisements,
rather than doing any real 'head-hunting' because of the nature
of their engagement - on a contingency basis.
Sure, we advertise in
CA Magazine too, but mostly for name recognition, or 'brand
awareness' rather than candidate generation.
As a retained search service,
we go elsewhere to find the talent you seek - direct to CAs
at work, those who are unreachable by any other means, and because
we write for the Bottom Line, and CA Magazine, teach for the
Ontario Institute of Chartered Accountants (and all other provincial
Institutes nowadays) and have a published book ' The Succession
Planning Toolkit' by none other than the Canadian Insitute of
Chartered Accountants, (with 5 more books commissioned by them)
many candidates already know of our name and are more likely
to take our call.
But the market right now
is extraordinarily hot. Talent is in short supply, and 'stars'
are even fewer and farther between than ever before. Even the
assignments we are working on can take time to fill. Candidates
often have multiple offers (thought they'd only get one offer
through us) as the mid-sized firms scramble to pick up people
as their firms grow, and that can effect salary levels being
offered as a 'Dutch Auction' develops for the best talent.
Many firms are experiencing
the disappointment of having good candidates turn-down their
offer in favour of another firm.
Unfortunately it is simply
a sign of the times. The economy is hot, and so the war for
talent heats up. For our own clients - public accounting firms
- finding clients is not difficult, serving those clients is
the battle many public accounting firms face, and that's when
having great people on-board counts even more.
Thus firms are becoming
more and more desperate to fill gaps in their rosters as their
major audits are coming up over the horizon and are due for
commencement.
Planning is they key.
Establishing a need early and sourcing the right search firm
to satisfy your recruiting needs with ample time before you
need to put 'bums on seats' will make the process much more
likely to be successful.
As a retained search firm,
we have to be careful which firms we choose to work with and
the circumstances behind the opening, but you too want to be
careful in which firm you select as your recruiting partner.
So here is some information
about us and our process, which we hope you will find useful.
Why
Us?
We have
been involved in the public accounting profession for over
25 years. Here are just some of the lessons we have learned
in that time that we have built into our system:
Quality
Search Firm Experience
Our founder,
Steve McIntyre-Smith has been a candidate and a client of
search firms throughout his career in public accounting and
has spent the last few years in Canada (to 2003) working with
one of the GTA's leading 'boutique' CA search firms before
establishing his own 'shop'.
He was
also Vice President of one of Canada's biggest and longest-established
executive search firms, heading their accounting and finance
practice, and since early 2002 has been (and continues to
be) the human resources columnist for Canada's financial newspaper,
'The Bottom Line', where he has a national audience for his
writings on the trial and trivulations of being in public
practice.
Only
Public Accounting
We are
the recruiting arm of MFA Group Inc. This is a specialist
consulting organization who ONLY work with public accounting
firms, on marketing, practice management, strategic planning,
recruiting, training and mergers & acquisition projects.
You are now at our recruiting web site.
As a result,
we know the public accounting marketplace better than any
search firm in the GTA.
No
Learning Curve = Quick Results
This in-depth
knowledge means that you have no learning curve to guide us
through when discussing a hiring need - we 'get it' straight
away.
We also
appreciate, when a hiring situation occurs, that time is of
the essence, and that you want results from your recruiting
partner.
Specialization
Some of
our competitors would take on your assignment, but also search
for a wide range of other people, from retail store managers
to forklift drivers, and from manufacturing workers and labourers
to call centre representatives. That begs the question: 'What
do these people really know about the accounting profession?'
Others
happily recruit for the 'enemy' - accounting and finance positions
in industry, while also recruiting for public accounting.
How they balance the concept of serving two masters in direct
competition for talent is, quite frankly, beyond us.
The answer
often lies within the level of service provided by these firms;
the accuracy and detail of the job descriptions, the quality
of candidates presented, recruiting methodology used and the
time taken to find suitable candidates. Working with a specialist
usually gets better results.
Value
For Money
Unlike
working for a fortune 500 company, working with a Partner
in a public accounting firm means that you are investing your
own funds into a search, not dipping into the limitless coffers
of a public company.
So a fee
scale based on 30% to 33% of the successful candidate's first
year salary just doesn't cut it for you.
We fully
appreciate that, with Steve having been a partner in a public
accounting firm and a sole practitioner for many years, so
we have developed a unique service and competitive fee structure
designed to deliver maximum value for money to our clients.
An
Unconditional Guarantee
We back
our own service 100%, in two ways, not just one:
1.
We offer an unconditional money back guarantee -
if at any point during the search process you are unhappy
with progress, simply address the fact with us and if you
are still not 100% satisfied after that discussion, we will
cheerfully and unconditionally, refund every cent you have
paid as a retainer. No quibbles, no hassle, guaranteed, period.
2.
All candidates placed by us are guaranteed for a full 12 months.
The industry standard is six months. We truly beleive in making
the right match and so we confidently offer a guarantee that
simply blows the industry standard guarantee out of nthe water.
We double it and offer a full year's guarantee. If, during
this period any candidate we place leaves your firm, for any
reason whatsoever - at your request or theirs - we will conduct
an additional search, completely free of charge, until a suitable
replacement has been found.
Exit
Interviews
We offer
to conduct, free of charge, exit interviews with people leaving
your firm, whether we placed them or not, in order to get
a deep insight into what the reasons were for their decision
to see if anything can be learned from this experience that
will help your firm a better place to work in the future.
Realistic
Salary Counsel
As we know
the public accounting field intimately, we are able to offer
counsel on salary levels for your firm, to help keep ahead
of the curve and ensure that you are aware of what is available
elsewhere for your staff. This helps you to develop a winning
employee value proposition.
We publish
an annual salary guide, available as a 'pdf' file from this
site, free of charge.
Staff
Training & Coaching
We can
help you identify the rising stars within your firm and develop
tailored training programs to help you develop them. This
helps you to provide a more rewarding, enjoyable and professionally
challenging work environment.
Talent
tends to gravitate towards (and then stay at) places where
people are continually stretched and growing as professionals
and individuals.
In turn,
these professionals provide a better return on investment
to their employers by being more productive and capable of
managing higher value projects sooner than their less capable
peers.
Mentoring
Tomorrow's Partners
Public
Accounting is a tough profession. First an individual has
to tackle highly demanding professional exams, while still
performing at their peak in a full-time job.
Once qualified,
if they want to make it to Partner level, they will have to
acquire some critical new skills, fairly quickly as they start
to take on more responsibility with clients and provide leverage
for today's Partners:
Fortunately
these skills can be acquired through an effective mentoring
program, but usually the very people within the firm that
have the capability to pass-on such valuable experience are
the ones who least have the time to do so.
We work
with a number of firms, to provide a mentoring service to
their rising stars, teaching the key skills they will need
to develop their careers within the firm and to add value
to the clients they work with in the interim. This service
is usually sponsored by their employers, but we also work
directly with some CAs and CGAs who see the value in investing
in themselves.
By now
you may well have some questions, so let's address the most
frequently asked ones here and now...
A
Different Kind Of Search Firm…
…Dedicated
To Ontario's Public Accounting Firms.
Our Group
of companies is built on “The Seven Foundations”:
1. Integrity
2. Honesty
3. Reliability
4. Value For Money
5. Responsibility
6. Diligence
7. Client Service
As such,
we have high professional standards in the way we conduct
our business.
Yes,
we know that the recruiting business unfortunately has some
- shall we say 'unethical'? - players in the field, so, let's
get the first question usually asked by clients dealt with:
Q:
"If I use you for my recruiting needs, you're not going
to entice my existing staff away to another client firm are
you?"
No, we're
not. When you become a client of ours, for either search &
selection, merger & acquisition work, or any other project,
you get our total commitment guarantee.
A: “We
will NEVER recruit people away from our clients, either directly
or indirectly. Period."
We also
guarantee NEVER to recruit away an individual we have placed
with you, and been paid a fee for doing so, for the duration
of their employment with you.
The next
question we're usually asked is this:
Q:
"What type of guarantee period do you offer for people
we hire through your firm?"
Glad you
asked. Here's our response:
A: "The
industry standard guarantee period is six months. We offer
a twelve month guarantee with every recruiting project we
undertake. We are also the only firm to offer a money-back
guarantee for retained searches."
Usually
we're asked about our previous experience and recruiting methods:
Q:
"Why should I use you when I have previously used XYZ
Inc in the past?"
Another
great question, let's look at the reasons...
A: "We
ONLY work in the public accounting field, and are active in
the market 5 days a week, 52 weeks a year. We're from public
accounting ourselves, and so really do understand the profession,
the marketplace, the challenges you face and, ultimately,
what to look for in candidates with your firm in mind.
We have
no conflicts of interest - recruiting for industry on one
project and for an accounting firm on the next, and we don't
recruit forklift truck drivers, salespeople or engineers etc,
we ONLY work with CAs, CGAs and CMAs, and ONLY for public
accounting roles.
Our search
methodology is based upon direct approaches to suitable candidates
who meet the criteria we are looking for, and are not necessarily
looking to move firm right now.
These are
often the best candidates. We do not rely on simply posting
an advert and waiting to see what the response is like - you
could do that yourself - but our exposure in the national
and regional professional press (The Bottom Line & CA
Magazine) gives us a high profile in the marketplace, meaning
that candidates usually take our calls."
Then, we
are often asked about pricing:
Q:
"How much is it going to cost to use your services?"
Another
good question. The answer is 'not as much as you might think':
A: When
we started out, we offered a three-tier service, 25%, 20%
or 15% of the successful candidate's first year salary. As
we have matured and have a thriving search practice, we now
only offer the one option, 15%.
This is
an exclusive, retained search service (the only way we work
now) whereby you pay a small retainer up front to initiate
the project, and the balance only upon successful completion
of the recruiting assignment. The retainer covers our research
and recruiting, but we don't ask for a huge sum up front,
it's more a sign of good faith.
Appointing
us on an exclusive basis and paying a modest retainer is a
sign of good faith on your part, and it secures our lowest
rate of 15%, total dedication to your project, and success
guaranteed, or your money back."
Finally,
we are often asked about success rates...
Q:
"What is your track record like, and do you have references
I can check out before I write you a cheque?"
A: "Our
success rate is almost 100% on retained searches. And yes,
we have a long list of highly satisfied clients who have kindly
agreed to provide references should you require them."
So, what’s
the catch?
There isn’t
one. Honestly.
We look
to develop long-term relationships with our clients, where
trust, mutual respect and value-added all play an important
role.
The retainer
provides us with working capital which funds our initial research
into the marketplace for exactly the skills, the experience
and the personality that you require.
Our understanding
of your world, built over 25 years in the Accountancy profession
ourselves, gives us a truly unfair advantage over any other
search firm.
So, what
are you waiting for?
To get
your project started today, or if you just want an informal,
confidential discussion, please call our President, Steve
McIntyre-Smith at 905-842-2284.
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