Recruitment Business Idea!

 

Traditional recruitment agencies are suffering because the recession has resulted in less companies recruiting and creating new jobs. I've been thinking about ways that recruitment agents might be able to expand their range of services and survive the downturn.
One thing that I've seen some recruitment agents do is change their focus from recruiting solely for permanent roles and begin to provide temporary staff to their clients. This helps their clients to keep costs down because they don't have the overhead of a permanent employee. The companies that I've seen use this have managed to generate some extra much needed revenue, but it is limited.
An approach that I've been considering involves turning the traditional recruitment business model on it's head, and charging candidates to help secure a job for them, as opposed to charging the employers. Jobs are hard to come by at the moment and candidates may  be prepared to pay for such a service, plus businesses that are recruiting may well be very happy to receive a free service.
If I was unemployed and looking for a job I'd be prepared to pay someone to help me with CV preparation, interview preparation and who would help to identify job opportunities that were suitable to my requirements. The service could include researching the relevant industry for companies that are expanding or who have recently lost key people.
I know of someone who is highly skilled in a specialist area and is facing redundancy in a few months time. He is currently spending his spare time, up-skilling and researching areas that will be important in a new employment position.
His time is valuable and I'd imagine he'd be prepared to pay for this type of service. This would allow him to focus on his area of expertise and outsource time consuming recruitment preparation and research to a specialist in the field.
The business that I'm suggesting would be similar in concept to the agencies that models and actors use all the time.
So what do you think, would the idea work?