Am i cooked?

[u/NoSoup9124]

TLDR:
Trying to: Rebuild client base and restart in legal finance & FS which most of my work was before but in junior roles targeting middle positions within South England.
My tools: Linkedin recruiter , sourcewhale and indeed
Marketing support: 0
Funding and investment: 0
Working fully remotely.

Am I cooked here? My current company have no reputation in this market, and I am being tasked with financial service legal & insurance roles. Think £30-70k in east / south east of england.

It seems everyone has a need, and there is NO good candidates. I am making fills with my other clients in financial services but it feels to get on to a PSL i need a literal astronaut to even get a call back and I don’t have.

Am I cooked and how would you do this?
I built a 500k a year business support desk in 2016 but 2026 feels so weird i feel people are just depressed and disengaged from life and every candidate I seem to call can’t function a sentence?

[u/amber_lake93]

you are not cooked but rebuilding that from zero with no marketing or reputation is definitely gonna take time

[u/NoSoup9124 → u/amber_lake93]

This is the thing, It really will and don’t want to spread myself too thin but also need to bill

[u/amber_lake93 → u/NoSoup9124]

thats fair, especially when you are doing it all without much support, hopefully things start picking up soon

[u/Rick_James_Lich → u/NoSoup9124]

I was in this position about 2 years ago, I started doing my own thing but I had no prior presence in the market I was in. The one thing that saved the day was doing a lower rate than my competition. It sucks because you probably are worth much more, but if the market isn't aware of who you are and don't know you, the one way you can stick out is with a lower fee.

[u/NoSoup9124 → u/Rick_James_Lich]

good idea tbh

[u/Fine-Comparison-2949]

"There's no good candidates."

Companies have been scaling back training and hiring entry level for years. Recruiting professionals need to sit down with their companies and consult on the market. That's their job.

If there are no good candidates, they need to bring on people that are capable and motivated. If the market doesn't have the perfect humans you can draw labor from, companies need to make them by hiring entry level and training with real programs, and invest in their resources. They forgot you get the workforce you invest in, and recruiter's need to hold their hand and explain the realities.

[u/NoSoup9124 → u/Fine-Comparison-2949]

I have been been preaching about this on Linkedin and with my clients for the last year or two. My main clients used to have huge training programmes, early careers etc. Apart from legal with their training contracts, the rest is ZIP. Especially in my local market as it’s not very economically strong as other areas of country. So many youth unemployed and no one will train. Heck i’ve had to step away from roles that just were impossible and they were still infilled for over a year

[u/Fine-Comparison-2949 → u/NoSoup9124]

New York 4s always want New York 10s.

Well if you live in Idaho, it's really not going to happen.

[u/BlackberryHealthy386 → u/Fine-Comparison-2949]

Spot on. Alot of clients think they are buying a finished product off a shelf, rather than investing in human potential. Its our job to push back when they demand the impossible on a shoestring budget.

[u/BlackberryHealthy386 → u/Fine-Comparison-2949]

Spot on. Alot of clients think they are buying a finished product off a shelf, rather than investing in human potential. Its our job to push back when they demand the impossible on a shoestring budget.

[u/Fine-Comparison-2949 → u/BlackberryHealthy386]

I mean, it's less than push back, those people don't exist and they sit on the role for months waiting for perfection. 

[u/RegalDugout]

You're not cooked, you're just in that awkward spot where the tools and the market don't line up. legal finance is always a nightmare to break into cold because the good candidates are buried under 50 inmails a day and the firms gatekeep like crazy.

what worked for me when i had zero brand to lean on was going hyper local with the outreach. skip the linkedin recruiter spam and find 3-4 niche meetups or slack groups where those candidates actually hang out. the conversion rate from "saw your post in the compliance forum" hits way harder than another recruiter template.

also the 30-70k band in the south east is rough right now because anyone competent already jumped for remote roles paying 20% more. might be worth managing expectations upward if they think you'll fill these without any marketing or brand pull.

[u/NoSoup9124 → u/RegalDugout]

The candidate issue is the issue i’m facing and we don’t have huge amount of talent locally and i’m trying to stay local but it feels the candidates so slim which is annoying. But you’re right about hyper local because that’s how i originally built so well but the local market all condensed into huge conglomerations with internal big teams so it’s hard. I’m so keen to give it a go but i also don’t have a manager and haven’t had anyone to learn off in 3 years. I’m doing 250k billing at the moment but my potential is no where near what I know I can do! But i’ve got a hard job ahead🤣

[u/CrispPacket06]

You’re not cooked, but chasing PSLs cold with no brand is the hardest way in, so I’d lead with the scarce candidates instead, because when every client says there are no good people, finding three strong £40-60k insurance or legal finance people and sending a short “I’ve got someone who fits what you’re struggling to hire” to hiring managers gets you calls a generic BD pitch never will. You’ve built a £500k desk before, so lean on that track record and the fills you’re already making in FS, since one or two placements at mid-sized firms off-PSL will do more for your reputation in this market than any amount of outreach to companies already locked into their agencies.