Although this is an issue that can face many businesses, seasonal quiet times place incredible stress on recruitment businesses. It varies with each sector, but often as a recruitment agency you have quieter months, which place stress on your cashflow and your staff.
As with many industries, slow payers can be a serious issue for those working in recruitment. Whether you have a few consistent late payers or one-off late payments, these can cause serious issues in your business. Not only does it affect your cashflow, but it can be a big source of stress too.
Many permanent recruiters secure fees from their placed candidates staying in a role. When that candidate leaves early, you as a recruiter can lose out on that extra money. This can often be a surprise, which makes it more difficult to predict and overcome.
If you’re a newer business, you may not have had time to implement a good credit control process - especially if you’re busy and have a smaller team focused on recruitment. This means when the staff member responsible gets to credit control, they may not have the skills or experience to successfully follow up for payment, or even send out consistent communication.
After the past couple of years, we’re all been craving more stability, especially in our jobs. When you improve your business's cash flow and make the business more efficient, your business will be more stable - your cashflow will be more consistent and things will feel easier to manage.
More cash in your business bank account means that you can expand your business in lots of different ways, either by going after new customers or expanding into new markets - you’ll also have more time to do this as you’ll be wasting less time.
When you’re stressed, it’s easy to snap at employees and be impatient - it happens to us all. However, when you’ve got systems in place that ensure you’re less stressed, you’ll be in a better position to be the best version of yourself - and therefore the best employer that you can be.
It depends how you go about it - it can be very quick to implement these changes or it can take longer. If you use an automated software such as itsettled, which only takes a few minutes to set up, you’ll be improving efficiency and cashflow in no time. Of course, it can take time to familiarise yourself with new software and workflows, but itsettled was designed to be simple and easily understandable, so you can get back to the important things.
If you haven’t looked over your recruitment businesses workflows and processes for a while, you may find that they’re outdated and inefficient. As businesses develop and grow, so should workflows and the way that things are done. New technologies can change things too, so bear this in mind. If you or your staff are doing things in an inefficient way, look to change things.
Although this might not work for everyone, time blocks can be very beneficial. They can help you prioritise what tasks are the most important and also stop you from becoming overwhelmed with everything you’ve got to do. For example, you could assign a one hour block to each role you’ve got to fill - maximise that one hour, but remember to take breaks too.
If you’re getting sidetracked by low priority tasks because they’re quick and easy, try to build in a mixture of to-dos. You could try writing out your top three priorities for the day as soon as you start work, and then focus on those, doing the one you’re dreading most first.
The best way to get things done quickly? Communicate effectively. Make sure you’re being clear in what you want done - and ask for feedback too. If there’s a deadline, make sure to mention it too.
Make it easy for clients to pay you by ensuring that every piece of information on your invoice is clear and correct. Make sure that you invoice on time as well - this is where a software like itsettled can really help out.
Consider increasing your rates if you’re more established and have a firm customer base. Know your own worth - if you’re doing a good job your clients will stick with you. This can be scary to do, but you don’t get it if you don’t ask.
Consider expanding into new areas - if you currently only offer hospitality recruitment, think about heading into retail or sales. Do your research and see what new markets you could expand into - are there any customers who maybe have contacts you could be referred to?
Ensure your clients are happy - if they’re not happy, they’ll begin to look elsewhere and you risk losing money. Even if you talk to a client regularly about vacancies and placements, you should also make time to ask them if there’s anything else you could be doing for them, or if there’s any improvements they’d like to see. Consider providing a survey for new clients which you send after they’ve been with you for six months.
You can read more of itsettled’s cashflow tips in this blog post. Written by our CEO Glen Morgan FCICM, a credit management expert with nearly three decades experience, the guide is full of useful tips to boost the amount of money in your bank account. We also post weekly cashflow tips on our LinkedIn page - follow us here.
By using an automated credit control software like itsettled, you can save time and boost your cashflow. As itsettled is completely automated, you can leave the software to do the work without having to worry. itsettled will collect your invoices faster by using a proven process, built on our CEO’s 28 years of experience in the credit management industry.
itsettled was designed to be accessible to everyone, so that any staff member in the office can use it. This means that you can designate tasks to anyone, and with the ability to add multiple users, you can share the responsibility with other members of the team.
itsettled was built to be the most efficient software possible - as the process is completely automated, the user just has to spend a few minutes regularly pulling across invoices to the platform.
Read more about how itsettled works for recruiters here.
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