Reply to: SThree doing well !!

[interested]

i think its absolutely absurd that this whole discussion seems to revolve around the fact that a company has a successful competitive business model that you dont like. it's almost as though you're just jealous that you didnt come up with the idea yourself! at the end of the day, every business is there to make money, and good for them if they can come up with a good strategy to do so. its just like saying mars and cadbury should only make one kind of chocolate bar each to give the other one a fairer chance in the market. if your favourite chocolates are maltesers doesnt mean that you automatically have to say mars as a whole are your favourite. you could like maltesers the most and dairy milk second best but have no preference either way when it comes to mars as a whole or cadbury as a whole, you might even like a bit of nestle too!

if other recruitment agencies wanted to split off into a few different brands nobody is stopping them, sthree should get credit for having that initiative and being successful enough to be able to make the most out of it.

at the end of the day its like i said before - if clients are happy with the staff they have working for them and we are happy in our jobs then what does it matter? clients wouldnt pay what they do if they didnt agree to the rates - nobody forces them into it. and we wouldnt accept a job if we werent happy with the rates we were being paid, or anything else about the job. agencies dont force one contractor to work at one company and vice versa, we all still have a choice in the matter

You are Russell Clements, and I claim my £5

[Ardesco]

For me certain companies in the S3 group have a bad rep because of the agents I have talked too. Slimey greasy types phoning me up and pulling every trick in the book to get what they want. I even had one guy phone me up three days running giving a different name every time in an attmpt to get info out of me. My second issue is due to ongoing difficulties gettiong a signed copy of a contract back from an S3 group company T&C are fine but the original contract they sent out had the wrong rate on it.

I keep amending the contract and sending it back and they keep sending me a new copy back saying they can't accept one with amendments, but they don't change the part that is wrong. They have paid me for all the work done so they aren't trying to pull a fasst one with the rates but this has been going on for about 7 months know which is insane.

One of the reasons S3 get a bad rep is probably partly to do with thier success. They have a lot of agents trying to fill a lot of posts so as a result you probably talk to more S3 agents than any other. Because you talk to more of them you end up talking to more tulipe ones (assuming every company has the same percentage of tulipe agents) hence they get a worse rep with the seasoned contractors.

I belive they were also quite inflexible with thier contracts when IR35 first came around which will have got a few backs up.

[Emily]

Just announced - SThree came 24 in the Sunday Times 100 Best Companies to work for

They are obviously good to their staff.

As far as I have heard, they have a poor reputation for the way they treat staff - this is probably why contractors get it so rough from them! They are pushed so hard they can't focus too much on the customer service side. This is all just hear say though.

I reckon the Best Companies to work for should be taken with a pinch of salt - if enough people from one company apply for it then you get on it - this can all be manufactured by management. Ooooh cynical, and at such a young age!!!

[JW1234]

Of course. I'm not saying SThree aren't just doing what businesses do - it's just that there can be (and are) a number of approaches which an employment business can bring to bear to make good profits and they will each receive varying levels of respect from clients and contractors.

SThree's business model is effective, but they and others like them shouldn't be surprised to learn that some of their sales and recruitment techniques don't win them too much sentiment on the client or supply-side. Businesses differentiate themselves in all sorts of ways, so there's no one business model that works for every customer in a diverse market. eg. the finance companies dealing with the sub-prime market have a very different style to those dealing with well-heeled clients.

As for the customers view - it's perfectly good business for a supplier to buy in Tesco Value beans, relabel them and flog them as Taste the Difference, but they won't endear themselves to customers who open the tin and find out they're not quite the beans they think they've paid for !

Professional standards of conduct and profit-making don't always go hand in hand.

For example, I used to be called up by several brands in the SThree group. I'd be talking to a recruiter from Y brand and mention that I was already sourcing people through X brand, and he would never declare that we were already dealing with their organisation through X brand but would happily let us carry on believing these two brands were competitors. I don't believe that is professional good conduct as far as I am concerned. It's probably not the guys fault as such, he's probably been told by his bosses never to reveal the links.

Hear Hear - Total agreement !!!!!!!!!!!!

[JW1234]

SThree Stink

As a matter of interest, the SThree Group consists of the following limited companies:-

SThree Management Services
Computer Futures Solutions
Progressive Computer Recruitment
Pathway Resourcing
Real IT Resourcing
Jobboard Enterprises
Peoplequest
Orgtel
New Wave Resourcing
M G Resourcing
Huxley Associates
IR Solutions
Conexus Recruitment Consultants
Progressive Computer Recruitment International
Huxley Banking and Finance
Banking People
Tactical Resourcing
Staff Search Group Limited
Strategic Resource Group
Madison Black
Huxley International
Solutions in Staffing & Software
JP Gray Ltd
All the Jobs

It could be me in my old age, personally I think companies like SThree who go around gobbling up other small similar companies, stifles REAL competition. What we have at the present is one very large conglomerate masquerading under a variety of "supposedly independent" companies.

The law should have jumped on this a long time ago. I would not mind betting they were responsible for setting up the toothless ATSCO (Association of Technology & Staffing Companies). These are the people you are supposed to complain too if you are unhappy for any reason with an agency's service.

A large American "pyramid selling" company did exactly the same thing a few years back and that also goes under "eleventyhundred" different names too.
I think they called it the DSA.

(Direct Selling Association - founded by guess who - Amway, or whatever they are calling themselves this week !)

The reality of course is that the same contract will be offered by several different agency's all purporting to be "independent" of one another. The wily among us know this to be total rubbish. Surely the OFT must know all about this but are powerless to act on it.

I just wonder how they manage to appear honest and pay the massive payroll bill every week for all these "independent companies".

They even pay VNU publishing to produce a newspaper that largely promotes only those companies that belong to the group. Notice how many pages are taken up with the likes of Progressive, Futures, Huxley, Pathway etc etc.

Notice also how the same position is usually advertised with ALL the aforementioned agencies.

They must have oodles of cash to splash around, they can certainly throw some my way !

This madness might be good for shareholders but not for contractors or clients.

Anyone also noticed how these "agencies" are quite talkative when they smell the money. A certain lady agent of mine, thought i was the vicars knickers last week, so I did a brilliant interview and I knew it went well.

Have I heard from her since despite emailing, phoning and using all manner of modern technology to communicate - Have I bu**ery

The moment the interview is over, they are reluctant to give any feedback - good or bad. they just seem to be interested in numbers, not people and their careers.

JWtantrum:

[abc]

i know the information because i have dealt with one of them who had my up to date cv through me replying to one of their adverts and i was in contact with another one who did not have my up to date cv and i asked why the difference and was told. i did explain that i knew that from past experiences but you clearly didnt pick up on that

my post is only one sided because everyone else here is so negative about everything it would be nice to see some positivity too and like i keep on saying, ive always had really good experiences with them. all i can say is excuse me for being a happy person who appreciates it when someone works hard to get me a contract where i can earn £350 a day. im not saying anybodys perfect but im saying theyre not as bad as everyones making out and why does it make a difference which company is making a profit as long as they ensure we are happy

i could quite easily go into a lot of detail about my last contract and who i have used for it but i wont, because im not here to prove myself to anyone im here trying to advocate a bit of positivity from everyone here. the way everyone talks its like sthree having 12 brands is the end of the world. unless anyone here walks around with their head in the clouds then you will know its not just recruiters who have a negative stereotype - ours is probably worse than theirs, and just reading this thread makes me begin to understand why. im passionate about what i do, and i am loyal to people who treat me well. why is that such an issue?

Perhaps you would not be so "loyal" if you knew the margin they were making on you. That 350 would not look good if the client was paying 500 or more.

If you like being ripped off, well that's up to you of course, but don't expect the rest of us to just shut up and take it!

[senditback]

i know the information because i have dealt with one of them who had my up to date cv through me replying to one of their adverts and i was in contact with another one who did not have my up to date cv and i asked why the difference and was told. i did explain that i knew that from past experiences but you clearly didnt pick up on that

my post is only one sided because everyone else here is so negative about everything it would be nice to see some positivity too and like i keep on saying, ive always had really good experiences with them. all i can say is excuse me for being a happy person who appreciates it when someone works hard to get me a contract where i can earn £350 a day. im not saying anybodys perfect but im saying theyre not as bad as everyones making out and why does it make a difference which company is making a profit as long as they ensure we are happy

i could quite easily go into a lot of detail about my last contract and who i have used for it but i wont, because im not here to prove myself to anyone im here trying to advocate a bit of positivity from everyone here. the way everyone talks its like sthree having 12 brands is the end of the world. unless anyone here walks around with their head in the clouds then you will know its not just recruiters who have a negative stereotype - ours is probably worse than theirs, and just reading this thread makes me begin to understand why. im passionate about what i do, and i am loyal to people who treat me well. why is that such an issue?

Thats better a bit of back bone. For your infomation, my most recent contracts have been through sthree and I do not view them as negatively as others seem to on this site. Nethertheless your post was suspiciously positive.

[whoami]

Who-am-i..I'll tell you who you are, your a relatively new recruitment consultant from an Sthree company. This has to go down as one of the worst attempts at an agent pretending to be a contractor I have ever come across. The language you use in your tidious posts suggests a stronger affiliation with the group then you are making out. For a start how on earth are you supposed to know all of this infomation about each companies database being different? Your post is too one sided.

Prove me wrong, tell me something intersting about your last contract? What do you specialise in? What XX company has got you 3 contracts?

i know the information because i have dealt with one of them who had my up to date cv through me replying to one of their adverts and i was in contact with another one who did not have my up to date cv and i asked why the difference and was told. i did explain that i knew that from past experiences but you clearly didnt pick up on that

my post is only one sided because everyone else here is so negative about everything it would be nice to see some positivity too and like i keep on saying, ive always had really good experiences with them. all i can say is excuse me for being a happy person who appreciates it when someone works hard to get me a contract where i can earn £350 a day. im not saying anybodys perfect but im saying theyre not as bad as everyones making out and why does it make a difference which company is making a profit as long as they ensure we are happy

i could quite easily go into a lot of detail about my last contract and who i have used for it but i wont, because im not here to prove myself to anyone im here trying to advocate a bit of positivity from everyone here. the way everyone talks its like sthree having 12 brands is the end of the world. unless anyone here walks around with their head in the clouds then you will know its not just recruiters who have a negative stereotype - ours is probably worse than theirs, and just reading this thread makes me begin to understand why. im passionate about what i do, and i am loyal to people who treat me well. why is that such an issue?

[senditback]

the title of this thread is "SThree doing well" - perhaps that is the answer to your question

Who-am-i..I'll tell you who you are, your a relatively new recruitment consultant from an Sthree company. This has to go down as one of the worst attempts at an agent pretending to be a contractor I have ever come across. The language you use in your tidious posts suggests a stronger affiliation with the group then you are making out. For a start how on earth are you supposed to know all of this infomation about each companies database being different? Your post is too one sided.

Prove me wrong, tell me something intersting about your last contract? What do you specialise in? What XX company has got you 3 contracts?

[whoami]

Most businesses don't feel the need to go this way, so what is the rationale if not to deceive?

the title of this thread is "SThree doing well" - perhaps that is the answer to your question

[whoami]

i think its absolutely absurd that this whole discussion seems to revolve around the fact that a company has a successful competitive business model that you dont like. it's almost as though you're just jealous that you didnt come up with the idea yourself! at the end of the day, every business is there to make money, and good for them if they can come up with a good strategy to do so. its just like saying mars and cadbury should only make one kind of chocolate bar each to give the other one a fairer chance in the market. if your favourite chocolates are maltesers doesnt mean that you automatically have to say mars as a whole are your favourite. you could like maltesers the most and dairy milk second best but have no preference either way when it comes to mars as a whole or cadbury as a whole, you might even like a bit of nestle too!

if other recruitment agencies wanted to split off into a few different brands nobody is stopping them, sthree should get credit for having that initiative and being successful enough to be able to make the most out of it.

at the end of the day its like i said before - if clients are happy with the staff they have working for them and we are happy in our jobs then what does it matter? clients wouldnt pay what they do if they didnt agree to the rates - nobody forces them into it. and we wouldnt accept a job if we werent happy with the rates we were being paid, or anything else about the job. agencies dont force one contractor to work at one company and vice versa, we all still have a choice in the matter

[whoami]

It doesn't matter how 'competitive' they are with each other. The way both the permie and contract recruitment system usually works is that the client puts out a role/post to a selection of agencies/EB's who are then allowed to submit only a limited number of CV's each.

If say, four of the five agencies/EB's on the clients preferred supplier list are in the same group of companies, this means that group gets roughly four-fifths of the recruitment business from that client. They get to submit several times as many CV's from the group's database than they would normally be allowed to do if they were identified as one firm. Unless the client has done some research they won't have a clue that they're actually dealing with the same group of companies. When they get into this nice cosy situation the group is virtually guaranteed profits from the arrangement, regardless of which sub-firm gets the final business... and the client's view of the availability and price of contractors/permies on the 'market' gets hopelessly skewed.

1) when your company recruits they may only allow a limited selection of CVs from each company, but that is not how every company works. i know that from being involved in the recruitment process myself for a number of different companies i have worked for. most of the time it has been the recruitment agency themself who has set themself a maximum number of CVs to send over

2) from my own experience with a variety of different brands within SThree i know for a fact that the individual brands have their own CV databases and they are not shared between the other brands in the group.

all the brands within SThree operate as their own indivual companies, just at the end of the day they are all making money for the same person. but a lot of successful businesses do that. if you went into a supermarket and looked at all the brands of washing up liquid or washing powder or whatever, including the supermarket's "own brand" names, you would find that there's only actually 2 or 3 actual companies that dominate the market but they just have different varieties operating under different brand names. its a good business model. none of the brands within SThree know anything about the others' clients or the candidates they work with unless they do their research/we tell them - Pathway Resourcing (SThree) would know as little about Computer Futures' (SThree) business as Badenoch & Clark (non SThree) would. it is literally just a case of at the end of the day the guys on the board of directors are getting a bit of money out of each of them. but so what? if they're finding the right candidates for the right clients, the clients are happy with their staff and the service they have received, and we are happy with our jobs, then what does it matter who is making profit from it at the end of the day? does it really make a difference whether or not it's SThree making the profit or Reed or anyone else? if all the different brands were operating in and run the same way, they wouldn't be operating as separate brands. they are 12 different companies being run as 12 separate companies with a few people sitting at the top getting money from each of them

and if you are worrying about clients' knowledge of rates being "hopelessly skewed", 1) u cant know for certain that all the SThree brands work at the same rates (and from different rates I have been quoted myself I don't actually think they do) and 2) all the client has to do is do a tiny bit of research. there are plenty of websites floating around that give details of the average rates of IT contractors working in different areas with different technologies, it only takes 2 seconds to look if it bothers them that much

[abc]

Ii think its a shame that people are so quick to complain about the service they receive from someone but rarely stand up and say when they receive good service

If you operate as a contractor then you provide a service for the client of the agent.

HTH

Glad you are happy

So should we just shut up and not complain then?

[cojak]

*devious

[cojak]

Most businesses don't feel the need to go this way, so what is the rationale if not to deceive?

I would posit that this is the essence of the SSS business model and the reason for their healthy profits since it is a model that very obviously works.

Because of this I would be very surprised if they didn't sack an agent who let slip their main competitive advantage. Being competitive between groups merely squeezes out non-SSS recruitment agencies.

SSS would probably like to view this as an industrial secret and are miffed that they have to declare it at Companies House. In the meantime they rely on the fact that most hiring managers are as savvy* as they are...