Personnel management and the use of executive recruitment consultancies
Abstract
This article examines the use of executive recruitment consultants by personnel managers. Although it is concerned with one particular activity - executive recruitment - the analysis has implications for the use of consultants more generally. In particular, it provides a critique of Torrington and Mackay's largely prescriptive assertion that the peronnel function is becoming 'increasingly vulnerable to the advance of external consultancy' (1986:37). The article divides into three sections. The first outlines our survey results and reasons for initially rejecting Torrington and Mackay's (1986) explanation of the use of consultants by the personnel function. The second section proposes an alternative explanation to Torrington and Mackay's for the externalization of the executive recruitment function. In the final section these findings are put in the context of recent writings on the role and position of personnel in the organization.