Recruitment is fundamentally simple and the basics don’t change but those basics have to be done right, according to a panel discussion at the Recruiter Show in London yesterday.

The fundamentals – talking to people, engaging with people and asking questions – don’t change, panel speakers Ricky Martin, Jane Vincent and Lee McQueen agreed.

Martin, managing director and founder of Hyper Recruitment Solutions and former winner of BBC’s The Apprentice, said recruiters currently were lazy and hiding behind emails and LinkedIn inmails though.

“Pick up the bloody phone,” he said. 

However, technology was changing the industry and all recruiters need to be aware of how and where candidates were looking for jobs, the panelists all said, though face-to-face interaction with candidates was preferable.

Talent pooling will always be a fundamental part of the industry, McQueen, founder of Raw Talent Academy and another former winner of BBC’s The Apprentice said. 

But recruiters should not “put aside” candidates if the market happened to be candidate rich. The economy will always swing from candidate short to candidate rich but relationships should be built and maintained throughout, he said.

Vincent, managing director of Candelisa People and star of Channel 4’s The Job Centre, added while a recruiter was technically a sales person, they also had to be a chameleon and adapt to different people, different organisations. Resilience was key to this, as well as high emotional intelligence, she said.

While recruiter skill sets will remain the same, the future of the recruitment industry was all about the talent agencies were bringing through, McQueen said: “If you get the right people, they will be able to pick anything up.”

But be sure not to fire them too early if they are not performing, he said.

“You have to give new consultants time to understand the industry.

“To invest in the future we need to make sure we train and develop people in the right way to keep them in the industry.”