If you are like me, an occasional business trip isn’t all that bad. Then again, I have no kids, one wife who’d rather I stay and one cat who believes the world revolves around him and can’t believe I didn’t consult with him first.
So I am going on a recruiting trip to Southern California and I am excited about the possibility of seeing sunshine.
Often times, when taking a vacation trip to a nice area of the country to recruit, some jealous concerned people question the expense of it. Are we really getting our money’s worth? Let’s breakdown the cost of a trip for two people for four days:
- Plane tickets: $800 ($400 a piece)
- Hotel rooms: $900 (2 rooms, 3 nights, $150 a night)
- Event Registration: $900
- Food: $320 (8 meals for two people at $20 per person)
- Promo materials: $500
- Personnel cost (time lost, hourly with benefits): $2,500
Grand Total: $5,920
Now some of you accountant types may be saying OUCH. Yeah, I can see that reaction. But let’s consider this:
Specialized field: We are looking for very specific positions. A couple thousand people may have the qualifications we are looking for.
Good concentration: We will see several hundred of these qualified people at this event.
Expensive outsourcing: We pay up to a 50% wage premium for contract workers and 30% of first year salary for direct hires. For the most part, that is still a good value for the decrease risk and opportunity cost factor.
Of those several hundred people, if we pick up one person, we have paid for our current and next trip out there. That’s not bad and if you’re decent at it, you should be able to pick up more.
Any other good ROI stories out there?
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One ad in the Minneapolis Star Tribune costs more than that so in that context, super return on investment
As both you and Lisa (the other comment) point out, I think most companies are willing to pay just about anything for solid employees…the “return” has such a premium that the amount of the investment is almost inconsequential (to those who can afford it), which is a real shame. No offense to you, Lance! I think those kind of recruiting “events” can be really cost-effective, but ads in major classifieds and most large recruiting agencies can really be a money drain quickly.
Well, maybe I speak too soon. There seems to be a new generation of companies coming along, that are combining the best aspects of free marketplace models into a recruiting platform. I used one of them, Dayak, for my company’s last open position and it worked out well, costing us much less than the 30% salary industry standard. But, these kinds of agencies are few and far between.
I will say that the best ROI I’ve been getting lately has nothing to do with investing money — just time, and in some cases friendship. I’ve been working as a manager for a while now and the industry-wide connections I’ve made have enabled me to find some excellent hires just with a few friendly calls. But not everyone has my rolodex. Which is why folks like you get the vacation…er…business trips! What part of Socal were you in, by the way? I was at a fantastic recruit event in San Diego about a year back.
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