How to stop recruiters poaching your staff

There’s a particular sting to losing an employee through the recruitment agency you pay. It happens more often than most agencies would admit. In fairness to them, it’s usually a process failure rather than a deliberate raid.

Here’s what actually reduces the risk, roughly in order of effort.

1. Put non-solicitation clauses in your agency agreements

The baseline. Your terms of business with any recruitment agency should state that they will not approach your employees while working with you and for a defined period afterwards (12–24 months is typical).

Two honest caveats:

• A clause is a deterrent and a remedy, not a prevention. It gives you recourse after an approach has happened; it doesn’t stop the approach.
• Enforcement is awkward. Suing an agency you otherwise like working with is rarely how anyone wants to spend a quarter.

2. Ask the harder question: “How do you enforce your off-limits list?”

Every agency will tell you they have an off-limits list and that you’ll be on it. The revealing follow-up is how it’s enforced. Common answers, in ascending order of reassurance:

1. “Our consultants know who our clients are.” (Tribal knowledge; expect mistakes.)
2. “It’s in our CRM / a central spreadsheet.” (Better, but sourcing happens on LinkedIn, not in the CRM.)
3. “Your company is flagged in the tools our consultants source with, so your employees show a warning before anyone contacts them.” (This is the answer you want.)

That third answer is what Bycatch provides: agencies mark your company as off-limits once, and every recruiter on their team sees a flag directly on your employees’ LinkedIn profiles, including in LinkedIn Recruiter, before any message is sent.

3. Make software-enforced protection a condition of engagement

If you’re a meaningful client, you have leverage. Alongside the non-solicitation clause, ask your agencies to demonstrate systematic enforcement, and point them at tooling if they don’t have any. It’s a small ask: off-limits software costs agencies from about £30 a month and takes minutes to set up. An agency that resists a two-minute setup to protect your staff is telling you something.

4. Don’t forget your own house

If you run an internal talent team, the same risk points the other way: your sourcers approaching staff at customers, partners, or group companies you’ve agreed not to touch. The fix is identical: a shared off-limits list enforced where your team sources. In-house teams use Bycatch for exactly this.

5. Reduce the pull, not just the push

Finally, the uncomfortable truth: off-limits protection controls who approaches your people, not whether your people want to leave. Compensation reviews, career paths, and manager quality do more for retention than any contract clause. Treat poaching protection as insurance, not a strategy.

The short version

• Non-solicitation clauses: necessary, not sufficient.
• Ask every agency how their off-limits list is enforced, not whether it exists.
• Prefer partners whose enforcement is software-backed, at the point of contact.
• If your agencies don’t have tooling for this, introduce them to Bycatch. It protects you and saves them from an awkward conversation neither of you wants.