There are clearly many reasons that someone would have their head turned by a headhunter but ultimately cash talks! Naturally there are people who are very loyal and would not move under any circumstance but it is very easy to be loyal if your current employer pays well, has a good benefits package and a clearly defined career path mapped out for you.
Lately we have been working for a client who are loyal to us and we enjoy working for them – a client with a good reputation in the market and a strong management team. However their pay structure needs a dramatic overhaul. Their competitors are paying their staff at least the same but on the whole more and similar businesses outside of their industry are paying their staff at least 20% more. This leaves us with an extremely difficult situation. We have found handfuls of suitable candidates who are interested in working for our client but then they inform us of their current salary the conversation is over. It clearly leaves us with a dilemma because we want to advise our client of this without sounding like we are making any excuse for why the search is taking so long.
But the basics are there: offer someone a good career opportunity working for a successful business where the salary is at least 10% more than they are currently earning and you will get people wanting to work for you. Not only that you will protect them from the overtures of headhunters in the future.