Leading staffing firms such as TeamLease Services, Quess Corp, and Adecco India, and RPO, CIEL HR Services, are increasingly turning to homemakers to scout for recruiting talent for India Inc. as they strain to fill openings amid a spike in demand according to an article in MINT.

“These homemakers don’t rely on a database but tap into their circles of former colleagues, building societies, social circles to get the right candidate for the company,” said Guruprasad Srinivasan, Group CEO of Quess Corp which has between 800-1,000 such people working for a fee. Recruitment firms discovered the effectiveness of homemakers as hiring agents during the pandemic when many decided to join the recruitment industry as gig workers. Subsequently, homemakers who had taken a sabbatical from their careers or were entrepreneurs until Covid-19 hit their businesses are becoming the talent pipeline for the recruitment industry.

A.R. Ramesh, director of digital business solutions at Adecco India commented, “The homemakers are asking the right questions to the candidates. They know when the candidate may be too tired to talk, can figure out if they are genuinely job hunting or will drop out during the negotiations”.

In some circumstances, staffing firms are also having to offer their in house recruiters double-digit salary increments and bonuses in the hope of retaining them as demand for their services explodes.