Hospitality recruitment - The truth

For us hospitality recruitment consultants, the challenges we face are a lot to do with peoples' perceptions.

Some clients and temps will think we are earning a fortune per hour off their backs or fee, but the market won't allow this. Maybe over ten years ago it did, but since the recession, benchmarking is very important (there isn't a lot in it) and it's really not about making a quick buck.

The money we earn is from volume and not very often the price we can charge per hour. We also have to keep our costs very low to actually see the net profit. Then employers tend to think us consultants are all about the money, I think this is a bit outdated. It's a mental assault course, and many of us put in a lot out of hours including being on call for an industry that never sleeps.

Other perceptions include thinking recruitment is easy. I don't want to make out we are feeding the third world, but it is hard to be diplomatic, get clients in, keep them, get chefs in, keep them, turn a profit, keep accounts happy and to communicate clearly and fairly at all times. I love it though, and it is the job that keeps on giving - generally speaking!