During my career as a Recruiter in the USA, Asia and in New Zealand, I have always had a lot of contact from people overseas who want to get a job in the region I am working. Currently I have some strong clients in the software industry here in New Zealand and for positions for these clients, we currently get more response from candidates overseas than those who are here in New Zealand.
These responses are normally from job boards where we post the positions. As a direct search firm we don't rely on job boards but we do try to use them at times. I have placed people who have applied from overseas, but it has been rare, so personally, I think it is pointless applying in this manner. For the candidate I guess it falls into the "mud at a wall" strategy of job hunting.
However just recently, I was made aware of this business - NewZealand-JobSearch.com. This is a company who will search for a job for new immigrants or people with an interest in moving to New Zealand. Their fee is about US$1300 (NZ$1800) as a retainer and another US$700 if or when they find you a position.
This is really interesting to me as a Recruiter because as most people are aware, we charge absolutely nothing for candidates if we introduce them to a position. And rightly so too, because we don't work for the candidate; we work for the client. But the premise of NewZealandJobSearch.com is that they work for the candidate in helping you find a job and only charge you for it.
However, while I don't know much about this company and can't comment on the success of their model, I do have some points for anyone overseas who is thinking of engaging this type of service. Firstly, since recruiting companies in New Zealand charge recruitment fees of anywhere from 12% - 20% depending on the kind of position, you can take your salary and work out what a good recruiter can do if they market you to clients they feel will be interested in your skills. So if you think you will earn NZ$50000 in New Zealand, a good recruiter could market you for a fee of NZ$6000 to NZ$10000.
Now the problem is that Recruiters won't necessarily market you because you don't pay them. But my point is that if marketing your skills is worth that much to some clients in this market, and a job search firm charges considerably lower, the question is: how much marketing and how effective will it honestly be for $1800 NZ?
I would think that most companies like this would claim to have a huge database of companies to introduce your details. In New Zealand though, if they didn't have the entire database of every company in New Zealand I would be surprised. After all, it is available free online at www.companies.govt.nz. But as most people know, it is one thing to have a database; it is something else altogether to be able to actually get someone to take the time to look at your career details and work out whether they are interested in you for a position.
I am not going to say that this method cannot be successful, but it does concern me a little bit. US$1300 is not an inconsiderate amount of money to pay someone to help you find a job, depending on what they do for you. If all they do is email your CV to companies then it is exorbitant. But if they do what I think would be useful, then it would involve a lot of cold-calling and some thoughtful research into where you would fit, how to approach the right people, and then persuading them that there is a lot of value in them meeting with you. That is very, very hard work and time consuming. But that is what we do when we market candidates and headhunt, and as you are aware, the fee for that is considerably higher.
Buyer beware?
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