Most recruiters follow a process that broadly looks something like this: receive job specification, ring candidates, send CVs. Sometimes, this works, but more often than not, it doesn’t.
Here’s what actually happens in the first two weeks of a search, and why skipping this stage is the reason most recruitment processes fail before they start.
My process is different. Here’s what I actually do first.
When a new search lands on my desk, the first two weeks look nothing like what most clients expect. There’s no wave of CVs in week one. There’s no shortlist forming in week two. What there is, instead, is a period of deliberate, structured interrogation of everything the client thinks they know about the role they are trying to fill.
I call it the diagnostic phase. It’s the part of the process I find most engaging and, without question, the part that most determines whether the search succeeds.
What the diagnostic actually looks like
It starts with a stakeholder meeting. Not just HR. Everyone who will have a meaningful opinion on this hire: the line manager, the operations lead, the finance director if the role touches budget, whoever will be sitting next to this person in six months wondering whether they made the right call. If those people have not been in the same room talking about this role, they have not agreed on what they actually need. That misalignment does not disappear during the search. It surfaces at offer stage, at the worst possible moment, or worse again, within 12 months.
From there, I review the brief against market reality. I benchmark the salary against live comparable roles in Northern Ireland, not last year’s data, not an internal pay band that was set before the market moved. Current data, from current live searches. If there is a gap between what the brief is offering and what the right candidate expects to earn, I show the client that gap in black and white before a single approach is made.
Then comes market mapping:
- Where are the right candidates?
- Who do they work for?
- Are they accessible, or are they locked into long notice periods, counter-offer situations or roles they are genuinely happy in?
- What will it take for them to move?
This is intelligence work, not guesswork.
What this stage uncovers, almost every time
The diagnostic reliably surfaces one or more of the following: scope creep in the job description, where the role has quietly become three jobs; a salary figure that reflects budget rather than market; an unclear reporting structure that will create problems the moment a candidate starts asking sensible questions in interview; or the absence of any genuine employer proposition beyond “it’s a good company,” or “we’re growing” or “we have great culture”.
None of these problems are unsolvable. But you can’t solve a problem you haven’t identified. And if you start placing candidates before you’ve identified the pain points, that damages trust in a professional community where word travels fast, and that’s before you even look at costs.
What weeks one and two actually produce
By the end of the first two weeks of a recruitment project, I have a full picture of the market, a realistic timeline I can stand behind, an aligned brief that all stakeholders have signed off and a candidate approach strategy built on intelligence rather than activity.
That is the foundation every search needs. It’s also the foundation most searches never have.
Most agencies are scrambling to send CVs in week one for fear of losing the client.
I have a 4-step approach:
The diagnostic isn’t optional. It’s the reason searches succeed or fail. Most agencies don’t do it because they’re not paid to. I do it because without it, I’m working blind. And in a market this specialised, working blind isn’t something I’m willing to do to a client or a candidate.
If you’d like to understand what this looks like in practice for a specific role you’re trying to fill, I’m happy to have that conversation.
Kelly Jennings is the Director of Kelly Jennings & Associates, a specialist search consultancy focused exclusively on procurement and supply chain recruitment across Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland and Great Britain.
