Stop Building Someone Else’s Exit Plan. Start a Recruitment Agency of Your Own

Stop us if this sounds familiar: you bill £150k, maybe £200k, maybe considerably more? You’ve built solid client relationships and you know the candidates everyone else struggles to reach? You’ve trained a couple of juniors, rescued a few accounts and turned a patch of the market into something genuinely profitable? And yes, you’re paid well for it?

Lovely stuff. But here’s the thing, what are you actually building?

Because while the commission hits your bank account, much of the long-term value you create stays somewhere else. Your client book, reputation, processes, contractor base and recurring revenue all make the agency you work for more valuable.

There is nothing wrong with being an employed recruiter. But maybe you’ve started wondering whether it makes more sense to start a recruitment agency and build value somewhere you actually own it.

Jump To:

• The Difference Between Earning Commission and Building Equity
• You’re Creating More Value Than Your Billing Figure
• Who Benefits From the Value You Build?
• What Could You Build Instead?
• Addressing the Risks of Recruitment Agency Startup
• The Question Worth Asking Yourself

You’re Creating More Value Than Your Billing Figure

The recruitment industry contributes around £40.6 billion to the UK economy. That’s some serious value. If you’re one of the people consistently generating that value, it’s reasonable to ask how much of it you’re actually building for yourself.

But your value to an agency isn’t limited to the fees next to your name on a billing report. An experienced specialist recruiter creates value in lots of ways.

• You build relationships with clients who return every year
• You develop trust with hard-to-find candidates
• You know the quirks of your market that take years to understand
• If you run contractors, you may have built a reliable book producing recurring margin
• You might have trained consultants who now bill themselves
• Your reputation is closely linked with the agency’s reputation

That all matters because a recruitment business isn’t simply a collection of desks and laptops. Its client relationships, recurring income, staff capability, systems and market position all influence what somebody might eventually be willing to pay for it.

So when you have another record year, you aren’t only producing this year’s profit. You may also be helping create tomorrow’s capital value.

Who Benefits From the Value You Build?

Building a valuable business is exactly what an owner should be trying to do. And if you start your own recruitment agency it’s exactly what we’ll help you to do!

But if you are an experienced recruiter working in someone else’s business you should understand the deal you’re making.

You provide your expertise, relationships and output. In return, you receive salary, commission, infrastructure and relative security.

That’s it. That’s the deal. For many recruiters, it’s a perfectly good deal. But high performers often reach a stage where it starts to itch. After all, golden handcuffs are still handcuffs. Which is often the point when experienced recruiters begin looking seriously at how to start a recruitment agency themselves.

What Could You Build Instead?

There are an estimated 5.64 million small businesses in the UK. Business ownership is hardly some eccentric fringe activity reserved for people who enjoy Dragons’ Den a bit too much.

Your own recruitment business could be just you and a strong specialist desk or it could eventually become a team. It’s really up to you.

We’ve seen that with our Hilton Lord partners. Here are two great examples:

Matt at MTWO initially wanted autonomy and a business that suited his family life. Nearly five years later, he’s built a specialist team. The important bit? The decision to grow was his.

Kieran at CKB Recruitment went from experienced insurance recruiter to owning a specialist business with national reach, while retaining the freedom to decide how that business developed.

Perhaps one day your agency may become an asset somebody else wants to acquire. Nobody can promise that outcome, of course. But ownership at least means the value you create belongs to a business you have a stake in.

Addressing the Risks of Recruitment Agency Startup

Wanting to start a recruitment agency doesn’t come without risk.

There is financial uncertainty. Your first year is unlikely to behave exactly like your last employed year. Clients you think will definitely follow you sometimes don’t. Momentum takes time to rebuild.

Then there’s the admin. Invoicing. Credit control. Bookkeeping. Payroll. VAT. Legal terms. Technology. Contractor funding. All fascinating, assuming your hobbies include spreadsheets and mild anxiety.

There is also the question of isolation. Going from a busy recruitment office to working alone can be a bigger psychological adjustment than people expect.

These are real reasons to think carefully before you set up a recruitment agency. They are not necessarily reasons not to do it.

With Hilton Lord’s support, you don’t need to carry all those risks yourself. We give you the infrastructure, support network and breathing room to discover that you are actually capable of doing this.

The Question Worth Asking Yourself

You don’t need to resign tomorrow. But if you’re five, ten or fifteen years into recruitment and consistently generating serious revenue, it is worth looking at what your effort is actually creating. Right now, that value may be building somebody else’s future.

Ask yourself: if I am already building this much value, why am I building all of it somewhere I don’t own?

Curious about how ownership with Hilton Lord works in practice?