A worrying disconnect between talent and recruitment professionals is leading to organisations employing the wrong kind of people, and this is storing up future problems, recruiters have heard.

Ian Gooden, director of people at HR consultancy Chiumento, told a meeting of the Recruitment Society in London last night that while recruiters were focused in meeting the demands of the business to get staff in quickly, the equally important focus of meeting the future needs of organisations was being lost.

Gooden said the danger was that because recruiters spent so much time “fire fighting”, organisations would end up 18 months down the track with what he termed ‘corporate prisoners’.  These were staff who wanted to leave, but because of the recession couldn’t because there were so few opportunities available, he said.

Gooden said one reason why this disconnect had come about was because recruiters were measured according to efficiency targets, such as cost per hire and time to hire. However, he warned this was not the same as effectiveness.

“How many recruiters are measured on long-term retention, performance, career progression and employee engagement?” he asked.

Gooden warned that when the recession ends, recruiters faced the challenge of suddenly having to find replacements as these corporate prisoners left and went elsewhere.  “A lot of organisations will suddenly have huge recruitment needs. Can they scale up quickly?”