'Firms are poaching your furloughed staff' - Marc Sumner on why channel recruitment has not stopped

Recruiter says that opportunistic firms are targeting unsettled employees

Proactive channel firms are recruiting staff from competitors that have been furloughed and feel neglected, according to recruiter Marc Sumner.

The Robertson Sumner boss told CRN that on the surface it may look like recruitment has grinded to a halt during lockdown, with the number of job vacancies posted online plummeting.

But a number of businesses in the channel are seeing it as an opportunity to recruit talent from their counterparts that wouldn't normally consider a move, he said.

"Some companies are seeing this as a massive opportunity," Sumner said. "Before, people may not have been looking at opportunities out there because they're busy and they're in the office.

"Suddenly when you're working from home or you've been furloughed, you see those LinkedIn messages from people trying to recruit you and you can do as many video interviews as you like.

"Those top performers that have much more time on their hands are getting inundated and there are talent acquisition people in the channel who have nothing else to do because they can't see people in the office, so they're just doing video interviews with other companies' staff."

He said that around 50 per cent of the vendors, disties and resellers he has spoken to are nervous about recruitment, but the other half are actively targeting the top staff in their competitors, some of whom have been furloughed.

Some candidates, meanwhile, are becoming nervous about their employer's financial health and are engaging in conversations with recruiters and other businesses to see if they can find a more secure position.

Sumner said that roles are still be filled despite the lack of activity online, revealing that he placed eight staff with an MSPs earlier this week - with that MSP deciding not to do any publicity because of the current climate.

Some firms have however paused recruitment because of the uncertainty in the market, he added, which he said will prove to be a mistake.

"The life blood of any business is its people and some of these businesses are in cardiac arrest at the moment," he said.

"If your strategy is to wait and see what happens then it's like stopping your heart and trying to start it again in two months, or however long it will be."