I spend a lot of my time looking at growth. What does it cost? Is it sustainable? And are we creating value, or just getting bigger?
I’m close enough to network recruitment to understand the pressure to grow. I’m also close enough to the numbers to know that growth and good business aren’t automatically the same thing.
Which brings me to network recruitment. Because parts of it need dragging out of the 1970s.
Every week I hear about brokers being cold called by somebody in a call centre whose job is to book an appointment with a network recruiter.
Before the conversation has even started, you’ve potentially created the wrong impression.
If somebody is being paid to make 200 calls a day, that’s 1,000 calls a week. So if you’re adviser number 783, what are you supposed to think?
Do they genuinely want my business? Have they researched me? Do they know what I specialise in or what I’m trying to build? Or am I just another number on a spreadsheet?
You’re trying to tell somebody how important their business would be to your network while approaching them in a way that potentially says the exact opposite.
And here’s the bit I really don’t understand. We employ recruiters to recruit businesses, then employ somebody else to call the businesses so the recruiter can recruit them.
Why isn’t the recruiter making the call?
Research the firm. Follow them. Understand their business. Work out where you could genuinely help. Then pick up the phone.
I’d rather make ten researched calls to ten firms I genuinely wanted than 1,000 calls hoping somebody agrees to a meeting.
That’s recruitment.
NOW FOLLOW THE MONEY
If you’re a CEO, board member or investor in a network, I’d look beyond how many firms were signed last month. What’s the true cost of acquiring them?
If your recruitment operation costs £500,000 a year and you’re potentially putting millions more into signing on fees, what’s the real cost per firm?
And when do you get it back? Three years? Five years? Longer?
If the answer to missing a recruitment target is always another recruiter, a bigger budget or a larger signing on cheque, somebody around the board table needs to ask whether the problem is really resource. Maybe it’s the strategy.
That’s not an attack on recruitment teams. It’s what good businesses should do: challenge the numbers.
What did each firm cost? When does it become profitable? How long do we expect it to stay? What happens if it leaves early?
If it takes four years to recover the acquisition cost but the firm doesn’t stay for four years, you haven’t got a recruitment success story. You’ve got a maths problem.
A big recruitment number looks great in a board pack. It needs to look just as good on the P&L.
BUYING GROWTH IS DIFFERENT
I understand acquiring another network. If the numbers work, you’re buying scale, income, advisers and infrastructure immediately. You can model the return.
But paying increasingly large amounts to recruit individual AR firms is different.
If you’re offering £50,000 or £100,000 to persuade one firm to move, add the recruiter, call centre, marketing and everything else behind the acquisition.
How long before you’ve actually made any money? There’s no such thing as free money and that applies to both sides.
If you’re writing the cheque, understand the return. If you’re receiving it, understand why somebody is prepared to write it.
What are you committing to? For how long? What happens if you leave? Is anything repayable?
The £100,000 might be spent within a year.
The network decision could affect your business for the next decade.
RECRUITMENT IS A BIY LIKE FLIRTING
I’m not against everything old school. I still believe in a good mailshot. It puts your name in somebody’s head.
And social media can do the same thing. Follow people. Engage. Congratulate them. Have conversations.
Recruitment is a bit like flirting. You don’t walk across a room, introduce yourself and immediately ask somebody to marry you. You build some rapport first.
Good recruitment isn’t about being there when you want them. It’s about being there when they need you.
If you’re invisible for 364 days of the year and suddenly appear when you want somebody’s business, don’t be surprised when the conversation feels cold.
THEY’RE NOT POKEMON CARD
Recruitment isn’t about collecting firms.
They’re not Pokémon cards. You don’t get a prize for filling the book.
A 20 adviser business doesn’t have the same needs as a one person brokerage. If their biggest concern is compliance, don’t spend half the meeting talking about commission.
It’s like football. If your team can’t score goals, you don’t go out and sign another goalkeeper.
Understand what you need. Understand what they need. And sometimes the most professional answer is: “We’re probably not the right network for you.”
That might not help this month’s target. But signing a firm isn’t success. Keeping it is.
Retention is the real test of recruitment.
Your existing firms should be your best recruiters.
Good businesses know other good businesses. A recommendation from somebody who already trusts you is worth more than a thousand cold calls.
WHO OWNS THE BUSINESS
There’s another question advisers should ask more often. Who owns the network and what’s their long term plan?
External investment can be brilliant. It can fund technology, infrastructure, acquisitions and growth.
But nobody invests millions without expecting a return.
That’s not criticism. That’s business.
And an investor’s time horizon might be very different from an adviser’s.
If one owner has several networks, I’d want to understand what the group is intended to look like in five or 10 years.
Does it make commercial sense forever to maintain separate management teams, recruitment operations, systems and duplicated costs?
Maybe it does. Maybe it doesn’t.
But if somebody is asking you to trust them with the next decade of your business, it’s reasonable to ask what they expect their own business to look like during it.
MAYBE IT’S THE STRATEGY
Modern recruitment isn’t about having the biggest team, making the most calls or writing the biggest cheque. And it shouldn’t be about telling brokers how terrible everybody else is.
Sell your own strengths. Know who you want. Understand their business. Build relationships before you need them. Look after the firms you’ve already got.
Then measure what actually matters.
What did they cost? Did they grow? Did they stay? Did they recommend you?
If you’re spending more and more money to achieve the same result, another recruiter, another call centre or another signing on cheque might not be the answer.
Maybe it’s the strategy.
No script. No call centre. No nonsense.
Just two businesses deciding whether they can be better together.
The advisers have changed. The businesses have changed. The industry has changed.
It’s time network recruitment finally left the 1970s behind.
