The legal profession, much like all other aspects of society, has been greatly-impacted by rapid technological advances now at the fingertips of most practicing lawyers. In lockstep with those high-tech, career-enhancement tools, stand the better legal recruiters, or headhunters, as they expertly assist talented law professionals throughout the entire search and placement process.
Today’s World of Legal Recruitment Starts with Advanced Technology
Using the latest technology as a resource, highly-respected legal recruitment firms can more-effectively and quickly screen, interview and place the best candidates into established and prestigious law firm and corporate counsel openings. Communication is instantaneous in today’s world, and information king, as legal headhunters strive to partner qualified legal professionals with mutually-beneficial career growth opportunities.
One false step however, and the recruitment process must begin all over anew. Time is the most limited resource there is, and that fact must be considered whenever a legal recruitment firm utilizes high-tech resources while working with a potential candidate. Information, as aforementioned, is also imperative to the process, inclusive of the fact that the best legal recruiters also stay informed daily, as they position themselves in order to be the first to learn about a coveted law practice opening.
Having said all that, these are 3 of the most common technological advancements that elite law recruitment firms now use routinely in order to facilitate a smooth and more streamlined legal hiring process.
- Artificial Intelligence Interviewing Capabilities
Artificial Intelligence, also known as AI, is rapidly supplanting antiquated phone interviews and Skype as a means to conduct screening conversations with many potential legal candidates. Automated AI technology, in the form of chatbots, can carry out the interviews anytime, with the geographic location of the law professional also not being a factor. In fact, chatbots can initially screen an attorney applicant by asking basic job-related questions, while even responding to people in a convincingly-human conversational fashion.
For all busy parties involved, notably the law professional being interviewed, time is not an issue as has been the case in the past. Further, legal recruiters can program updates about, for example, the current availability of respected law firm job openings by using chatbots, and thus make that rapidly-changing information available to active candidates on a real time basis.
Time is money, as they say, and the latest AI technology has become a viable cost-effective applicant screening alternative to more conventional means.
- Legal Applicant Tracking Systems
Another rapidly-expanding legal recruitment resource is called an Applicant Tracking System, or ATS for short. They function to more-efficiently collect, store and disseminate applicant information records based upon their employment histories. As they say, we are all “in one big database”, and ATS have advanced us one more step down that road. However, it is a powerful tool in the hands of experienced legal headhunters, and one they are progressively using more often.
When might an ATS come into play? Well, compliance with employment laws and regulations is critical in today’s fast-paced and ever-litigious society. That most-assuredly rings true within the legal field, and existing employee/employer contracts and other workplace agreements must be reviewed and understood by all parties involved, and to prevent a violation of said policies. To save time and money, legal recruitment firms can quickly access a potential hiring candidate’s employment files to ensure that all the “loose ends” have been tied up.
To provide an illustration of ATS capabilities, it may be necessary to ascertain whether or not the attorney candidate being recruited signed an enforceable non-compete clause when hired by their current law firm or corporate employer. Many prohibit an employee from accepting another job within so many miles of their present employer. Or, some lawyers have included in their benefit package law school loan payoff relief clauses, where the firm employing them takes on that responsibility in exchange for the law professional’s services. The minutia gets complicated for even the best legal headhunters, and ATS assets have come a long way in simplifying the process.
- Legal Recruiters Seek HRMS Company Advice
Health Resource Management Service (HRMS) companies are another powerful arrow found in the quiver of top legal headhunting firms. HRMS providers basically serve as conduits between information technology (IT) and human resource personnel. Using the latest computer software programs, HRMS businesses gather, store and can then analyze a potential law professional employee’s data and make it quickly available to HR representatives.
In today’s competitive legal recruitment environment, headhunters have also signed on as HRMS clients in an effort to more cost-effectively manage their recruiting tactics. The overall goal of incorporating HRMS into the equation is to facilitate a more efficient screening, hiring and transitioning pathway for legal recruitment firms, along with the prestigious clients they represent and, of course, the highly-qualified attorney candidates being recruited.
For Legal Professionals Seeking Career Advancement, Tech Rules the Day
As this article has shown, technology has drastically altered the way in which the practice of law operates, while also infiltrating the job search process when legal professionals are seeking to promote and advance their careers. Further, legal recruitment firms, and the headhunters therein, are also engaged in utilizing the latest high-tech recruiting resources, such as chatbot interviewing, ATS and HRMS. Overall, these technological innovations make the legal recruitment process more time and cost-effective, with the benefits spilling over to their law firm and corporate legal counsel clients, along with the attorney candidates themselves.
What does the future hold for the best and most-innovative legal recruitment agencies moving forward? Time, as they say, will tell.
