A recruitment update should help you make a decision

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“Recruitment is progressing.”

That might be reassuring. It does not tell you whether the difficult quota is moving, whether validation is keeping pace or whether a decision is needed to protect fieldwork.

A useful update should leave the research team knowing where things stand and what happens next.

Application numbers are only part of the picture

A growing list of applicants can hide a shortage of suitable players.

Some may not pass screening. Others may not complete validation. A healthy overall total can also conceal a gap in one particular audience.

Updates should distinguish between applicants, those who have passed initial screening, those who have passed validation and those who are booked. Where quotas matter, progress needs to be visible against those quotas.

Otherwise, “nearly there” can mean very different things to the recruiter and the client.

Explain the problem and recommend a response

Consider this illustrative example:

A study needs players with recent experience of a particular game. Applications are arriving, but validation suggests that many applicants’ experience falls outside the agreed timeframe.

The useful update explains where those applicants are being lost, what sourcing changes are being made and whether the original requirement remains feasible within the available time.

If a client decision is needed, it should include a recommendation and its consequences. Quietly relaxing the criteria is not a recruitment fix.

Agree when clients need to be involved

At the start of a project, agree the update schedule, the decisions requiring client input and the issues that should trigger an immediate conversation.

Routine recruitment activity should not require repeated permission. A genuine change to the brief, budget or delivery plan does.

This gives the recruiter room to manage the work while keeping the client involved where their judgement is needed.

Include the next action

A useful recruitment update answers four questions:

• Where are we against the agreed requirements?

• What is slowing progress or creating risk?

• What are we doing about it?

• What, if anything, do we need from you, and by when?

The aim is to give the research team enough information to plan and make decisions, without making them manage the recruiter.

Discuss your next project with Gromotion. Let’s agree on the recruitment milestones, communication and escalation points before work begins.