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In the high-stakes world of UK recruitment, there’s a nagging anxiety that sits like a ghost in the machine: the "roboticisation" of the industry.
Many recruitment agency owners I speak with worry that leaning too heavily into their tech stack (specifically a powerhouse like Bullhorn) risks turning their recruiters and resourcers into data-entry admins and their candidates and clients into mere serial numbers.
There's a distinct lack of picking up the phone, at a time when it's never been more important.
But if you’re viewing recruitment technology as a barrier to human connection, you’re looking at it through the wrong end of the telescope.
Rehumanisation
The primary goal for almost every high-performing recruitment and staffing agency I partner with isn't to automate people out of the business.
It is to use technology to rehumanise the process.
Here are 3 ways how we move beyond the theory of tech driving stronger relationships and rehumanising the recruitment process.
1️⃣The Paradox of Manual Labour
The irony of modern recruitment is that the "human touch" is often killed by "robotic" manual tasks. When a consultant spends three hours a day manually parsing CVs, dragging files into folders, and sending "just checking in" emails, they aren't being human. They are acting like a slow, expensive algorithm.
And they are likely missing the point of recruitment:
Managing relationships.
Spotting opportunities.
Protecting pipelines.
By the time they actually get a candidate or client on the phone, they’re drained and distracted.
When we optimise Bullhorn by Bullhorn Automation, Analytics and AI, we aren't replacing the recruiter. We are stripping away the administrative "noise" that prevents them from being present.
True automation handles the repetitive, low-value chores so your team can focus on the high-value, high-emotion conversations that actually land placements.
Great analytics helps create meaningful time management and tasks to drive targets!
AI creates space for mindful recruitment!
📌These 3 As lead to a crucial 4th A - adoption! What's often missing from a recruiter's day is a great adoption of process.
2️⃣Restoring the Candidate (and Client) Experience
Many candidates have been on the receiving end of "robotic" recruitment: weeks of radio silence followed by a generic rejection email.
Plus, clients often feel under managed and engaged with, and go elsewhere.
That isn't the fault of the tech; it’s a failure to use it.
📌A rehumanised process uses the ecosystem to ensure no one feels ignored.
In a sophisticated Bullhorn setup:
Speed is Empathy: Candidates and clients receive updates the moment a status changes because your workflow is triggered by their journey, not by a recruiter’s busy diary.
Personalisation at Scale: You can reference a candidate's / client's specific niche, need, or career aspirations automatically, proving you’ve actually engaged with their profile.
Consistency: Every contact receives a gold-standard experience, regardless of how many roles a consultant is juggling that week.
3️⃣Data: The Compass for Connection
Data isn't cold; it’s context.
When your Bullhorn data is clean and your tech is configured correctly, you gain a massive competitive advantage in relationship building. And your recruiters and resourcers value it, want to use it - RoI is achieved!
Automations don't feel automated
Analytics tell the right truth and drive brilliant activity
AI releases procrastination
Candidates and clients are managed - everyone wins!
Imagine a consultant calling a client and knowing exactly when they last spoke, the specific pain points mentioned six months ago, and exactly which candidate profiles resonated most. That isn't tech "taking over". Tech provides the insights needed to be a true consultant rather than just a CV chaser.
💸💸The Bottom Line
Technology shouldn't be a wall between you and your market; it should be the bridge.
My mission is to help you move past the "human vs. machine" debate and start seeing Bullhorn as the ultimate tool for liberation.
When you automate the mundane, you empower your people to do what only humans can do: negotiate, empathise, and consult.
I been in recruitment since 2000. This year, more than any other year, means that your human-connected-tech strategy has never been more important.
Bullhorn ATS / Analytics / Automation / AI RoI
We are Bullhorn experts set on helping ambitious recruitment businesses to increase speed and sales.
We help you weaponise your people, data, time, and tech, so you can recruit and sell!
Our Bullhorn Vision and Buddy service helps generate best-in-class processes, adoption, head space, and ROI.
BOOK A FREE BULLHORN ROI CONSULTATION
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Lisa Jones
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Vodcast: Rehumanising Recruitment ~ Recruiters Versus Tech
I recently had the absolute pleasure of sitting down with a true recruitment "myth and legend," Keith Southern.For those who don't know Keith, he was the seventh person to join Progressive - the company that eventually became the global powerhouse S3.With a career spanning back to the early 90s, he has seen it all: the highs, the recessions, and the technological revolutions.Today, Keith leads The Power Hive, a community of over 170 recruitment leaders dedicated to helping agency owners move from just working in their business to working on it.Over a speedy 19minutes, we dove deep into why the "old school" ways, coupled with data, automation, and AI, might actually be the key to every recruitment leaders' future.Beyond ROI: The Power of "Return on Effort"We started by discussing a concept close to both of our hearts: Return on Effort (ROE). In an industry obsessed with the next shiny recruitment tech tool, many recruitment leaders are accidentally building what we called "Frankenstein tech stacks" - collections of expensive tools and data that don't talk to each other and often create "integration debt" and more admin than they solve. (I call this "Admin Tax".)We talked about how many sales floors today are eerily quiet because recruiters are hiding behind CRMs and marketing tech instead of picking up the phone, and Kevin's ideas for:Using recruitment tech to free your consultants up to have more human conversations (and removing the "admin tax").Auditing your tech stack to see if you’re actually using what you’re paying for, or whether you're actually in "integration debt".Turning Old Data into GoldOne of the most striking parts of our conversation was about the "gold nuggets" sitting right under our noses. Your "old to gold" could be data, processes, tech, people...Keith argues that most agencies already have 95% of the data they need in their own CRM, yet they continue to spend a fortune on expensive external job boards and LinkedIn licenses.We discussed "rehumanising" the process by using technology to lift the heavy weights so that recruiters can focus on building resilience and genuine relationships.We chatted about how to:Preventing your recruiters heading straight to LinkedIn / Job Boards to resource instead of looking "back home" at your own database.Training your recruiters to master the fundamental tasks, like a perfect candidate interview prep, before moving to the next part of the process.Are You the Recruiter Your Website Says You Are?We ended with a challenge for the industry. Many agencies claim to be "at the heart of their sector" on their websites, but the reality is often a messy database and a reliance on reactive advertising. Keith’s advice for this year is simple: stop the abdication to technology and start driving your business with strategy again.This vodcast was a masterclass in recruitment leadership. Watch it to hear more about Keith's "war stories" from the S3 days and how to weaponise the data, systems, and people you already have.Ready to put the world to rights with us? Watch the full 19minute vodcast now.Bullhorn ATS / Analytics / Automation / AI RoIWe are Bullhorn experts set on helping ambitious recruitment businesses to increase speed and sales.We help you weaponise your people, data, time, and tech, so you can recruit and sell!Our Bullhorn Vision and Buddy service helps generate best-in-class processes, adoption, head space, and ROI.BOOK A FREE BULLHORN ROI CONSULTATION
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Lisa Jones
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Are Hairdressers Putting Your Recruitment Business at Risk?
Many recruitment leaders I work with want their recruitment CRM to generate fees, but often recruiters are all too happy to jump back into spreadsheets, LinkedIn, notebooks and “going by memory” rather than use their CRM system properly. This blog is a quick 3-minute read to create some perspective and give you some ideas for a “CRMFirst” strategy.The above results in a nightmare for recruitment leaders who are looking to grow their business, become “GDPR-proof”, use AI, Analytics, and Automation to be more efficient and productive, and of course become more profitable.It above also results in a problem I call “Hairdresser Syndrome” – a term I’ve used for many years to describe a recruitment business that needs to get a grip on its processes and data to see real growth and ROI.(Note: I originally wrote this blog in 2018. Many years have passed and so much has happened to recruitment, but I've barely needed to update this content...)Do You Have a Recruitment Firm, or an Office Full of Desks For Rent?I have been with my hairdresser for 8 years. He knows my taste in magazines, some of my secrets and all of my roots. A few years ago he was based in a large salon in the city, where he rented a chair.The rest of the salon staff barely knew I was there, and I didn’t really notice them either – zero interaction. Perhaps if I was lucky my hair would be washed by one of the juniors. I’d pay the girl at the till on the way out, but my hairdresser was my only real contact at the salon.One day he very quietly commented that he was opening his own salon, and would I like to move with him? I bit his hand off – why wouldn’t I? I had no relationship with the salon. They kept no details on me, perhaps they didn’t even know I existed. Would they miss my business?For me, he was the salon.Are Your Recruiters Hairdressers?Can you see any similarities between your recruitment consultants and my hair dresser?They have exclusive relationships with the clients. Are you simply the “girl” taking my money at the till?Do they use stuff in your business, such as hair washers, tea makers, reception (IT, HR, Finance, Admin) that their fees contribute to, but that I am totally oblivious to?Are your consultants simply logging data at the point of sale to get the cash in but the juicy stuff which is about me, what I like, how I buy is in his/her head?If they left and took “clients” with them, would you know? And don’t forget you’ll only know what data they’ve taken and who’s migrated with them if they told you about these relationships in the first place.Even if you had the data on the client, would it be enough for you to continue the relationship going forward?Are your clients engaging with your business or the consultant? Are their loyalties to the brand or their perceived face of the brand, the consultant (the hairdresser)?I’m still seeing “30-second recruiters” who enter a candidate in the CRM just to place them and board the invoice. That may work for them in the short term, but they’re missing out on opportunities to be more effective and profitable whilst putting the business at risk.CRMFirst (Bullhorn1st): Hairdresser Prevention for Recruitment LeadersThis year needs to be about CRMFirst ~ Bullhorn1st ~ getting your candidates, clients and consultants addicted to your systems.It needs to be about data hygiene, recruiters building effective, retained relationships and recruitment firms focusing on effectiveness and growth.A CRMFirst (BullhornFirst) culture can create a valuable pool of great data that will put you ahead of your competition and create a hidden asset that your clients (and prospective clients!) want access to.Your recruitment CRM should be a USP – a unique selling point. Your recruitment software can be an addiction for your recruiters, your clients, candidates, and investors. All of which does the one job you bought it for – to make your life easier and make you more money.Swap the Salon Culture for CRMFirst Culture…Instilling a culture of data quality is challenging, but highly rewarding. Define the strategy, instil this into your culture and reduce the risk of bad data impacting the recruitment business.Get your recruitment consultants engaged with your system and train them on best practice so they understand why great recruitment process is profitable for them, as well as your business.📌Stop them from simply renting a desk.Once they can see and feel the benefits of following your processes (improving performance, profit, and ROI for themselves as well as the business) then your CRM can become a business growth tool, rather than an expensive data dump.Bullhorn ATS / Analytics / Automation / AI RoIWe are Bullhorn experts set on helping ambitious recruitment businesses to increase speed and sales.We help you weaponise your people, data, time, and tech, so you can recruit and sell!Our Bullhorn Vision and Buddy service helps generate best-in-class processes, adoption, head space, and ROI.BOOK A FREE BULLHORN ROI CONSULTATION
