Sources of Recruitment: Types, Efficiency and Current Trends 2022

After the COVID-19 pandemic, all the tasks of HR departments, including recruiting, have reached a completely new level. It is no longer possible to use the old methods of recruiting employees. But the pandemic was only one of the reasons for that.

According to Finance Online’s “2021/2022 Data Analysis & Market Share” report, improving the quality of hiring (52 percent), increasing retention rates (24 percent), reducing hiring time (23 percent), developing the talent pool (22 percent) and hiring diversity (22 percent) are among the top five recruiting initiatives.

Today we will talk about the hiring sources that can provide a high level of these indicators.

Most Popular Sources of Hiring
Features of internal recruitment
Types of internal recruitment
Boosting internal recruitment
External sources of recruitment
What is the best source of recruitment
How to make the recruitment process more efficient
Conclusions

Most popular hiring sources

In the study Finance Online it is said that eighty percent of the top recruiting firms have offices in different countries. The trend towards expanding horizons, both geographical and psychological, is one of the most important this year.

As you know, all sources of recruitment can be divided into two main groups — external and internal. Using external means looking for future employees outside the company. The internal recruitment is about finding suitable candidates among its current composition.

Features of internal recruitment sources

The benefits of internal recruitment sources are clear:

• it is no need to spend material resources and time on posting vacancies and searching for new employees;
• there is also no need to study the resume of a potential employee — after all, you know everything about his previous place of work;
• staff motivation is growing rapidly — everyone has the opportunity to make a qualitative leap up their own career ladder;
• the company does not allow brain drain to potential competitors, rationally using the capabilities of each employee.

About saving time is worth mentioning separately. The average time to hire on Internet platforms in 2021-2022, according to Finance Online, is 41 days. According to the same analytical report, 31% of employees work in the company for less than six months, so choosing among your own employees is quite reasonable.

However, this type of recruitment also has a number of disadvantages. First of all, the company may lack "fresh blood" — qualified personnel with a new vision for the tasks. It is also quite difficult to predict how employee loyalty will change after a personnel reshuffle within the company. Friendship between yesterday's colleagues can develop into rivalry between applicants for a promising vacancy. This partly explains the popularity of external method of recruitment.

Yes, and saving does not always work. Sometimes, in order to grow the right specialist from “your people”, you will have to spend twice as many resources as hiring with external recruitment. The quantity of internal recruitment is usually limited — not all vacancies, especially new departments, go out to close in this way.

It’s a paradox, but it’s most profitable for internal hiring to use trainee and junior qualifications. In any case, it is necessary to invest in their growth, and it is most profitable to do this for the position from which both the company and the specialist himself benefit.

Types of internal recruitment

There are the following types of internal recruitment:

• rotation (transfer of an employee from one position to another without changing the place of work as a whole, usually the trigger for this type of hiring is a management decision);
• internal competition (when announcing which everyone can propose their candidacy or participate in the referral program and recommend a friend);
• combining (relevant for those who do an excellent job with their duties and want more).

It is important to note that during the rotation, the set of responsibilities can change both up and down. Such recruitment strategies are universal if you need to stir up a “bored” employee.

When conducting an internal competition, it is necessary to inform each employee about it, describing the new vacancy as accurately as possible. It is important not to create restrictions in the submission of applications, thereby maintaining the motivation of staff at a high level.

For temporary projects combining is great method of hiring. Please note that it should be used only with a salary increase. Carefully monitor the emotional state of the employee, and do not allow him to emotionally burn out.

Boosting internal recruitment

In order to take advantage of the opportunities offered by the internal recruitment, it is important to prepare for it in advance. Even in the near future, the issue of hiring is not acute, you can gradually follow these steps:

1. Create a database of employees.

Include in it all those who currently work or have ever worked in the company, indicating as exhaustively as possible their education, experience, professional skills, and even those that go beyond the current position. Be sure to include data about employee motivation and ambitions in the employee database. Of course, it is more convenient to do this in the form of an individual plan. 

Do not forget about former employees — those who have ever had to say goodbye due to crises and other factors not related to their qualifications and motivation. Sometimes they can become new A-players in your team.

2. Form a database of candidates who did not pass the selection process.

Always collect the data of those who at least once showed interest in your company, but for some reason were not hired. Such a database can be designed in the form of a resume file, of course, in compliance with the legislation on the protection of personal data.

3. Create information channels through which employees will be able to find out information about the possibility of changing positions.

Of course, you can spend time and send “letters of happiness” to employees about the fact that several vacancies are open in the company. But it makes more sense to automate this process using an HRM system.

4. Create the referral programs for internal recruitment.

To interest employees in the emergence of new colleagues, a referral (recommendation) program should be formed.

Why do referral programs work?

Candidates who join your company in this way will be loyal not only to it, but also, first of all, to the acquaintances who recommended them. The motivation of such employees is usually much higher.

External recruitment sources

There are 7 main external sources of recruitment:

• job sites (the most popular way to find suitable candidates today);
• social networks (primarily LinkedIn, Behance and other professional social networks);
• off-line and online professional events (conferences, master classes, workshops etc.);
• vacancies page on the company's website;
• page with resumes of graduates on the universities and EdTech companies websites;
• job fairs;
• recruiting agencies (professional companies that specialize in recruiting).

The main advantage of job portals is the variety of candidates offered. A paradox, but this is also their main drawback. In order to choose the most suitable one, you will have to spend a lot of time. But such example of internal recruitment can be expensive.

The use of social networks is becoming more and more popular every year to search for candidates. Regardless of the fact that this method also requires time and patience, it has one significant advantage — the ability to create a base of so-called "passive" candidates. At the moment, such specialists are not looking for a job, but potentially do not mind changing it in the foreseeable future.

Participation in professional events will help not only to make useful contacts, but also to reach potential candidates. There are also disadvantages of such recruiting — without a resume it can be difficult to determine the real experience and qualifications of an external applicant. 

Posting jobs on the company's website is called direct search. This is a simple and shareware way of hiring. It is important to consider that not all candidates look for work by monitoring potential employers. Therefore, there is a high chance of missing out on a suitable employee. So direct search is effective only in combination with other recruiting methods.

Often educational institutions independently collect a database of promising graduates and share its fragments in the public domain. With the growth of the EdTech industry, the number of portals has also grown, where you can systematically monitor potential candidates.

A job fair, like an employment service, is perfect for hiring lower and middle-level specialists. The database of the employment service will perfectly allow you to weed out unsuitable applicants.

Traditionally, recruiting agencies are considered one of the most expensive sources of finding candidates. But it is with its help that you can find highly qualified specialists in a short time.

What is the best source of recruitment

The best source of recruitment is definitely not uniquely singled out. It is often important not so much what method of recruitment is used, but how well all its stages are passed.

Regardless of the used techniques of recruitment, it is important to follow a number of principles, including:

• competent and honest construction of the employer brand. Sincerely tell the candidate what is important to you and then the likelihood of effective recruiting will increase significantly;
• commitment to a data-driven approach. It is the reliance on the analytical aspects of recruiting that guarantees staff loyalty;
• correct job description. Studies show that different descriptions of the same job attract completely different candidates. Be sure to look deeper into this issue.

Remember that not only the company is looking for the right candidate. Applicants are also looking for a team with which to build relationships. Therefore, the recruiting process is always two-way and the role of the employer brand should never be underestimated.

Separately, it is worth highlighting impartiality. It is very difficult to be objective, especially when closing promising vacancies. In order not to miss a single important detail, and at the same time not to drown in the recruitment routine, it is worth automating the recruiting process. At the same time, it is important to use technology to increase efficiency, and not for the sake of the fact of application.

A correct assessment of the candidate will help to make the final decision about hiring an employee.

But even if you did everything right, there is still a chance of a bad hiring. A study by the American company IQ found that only 19% of new hires are considered fully successful, and 48% will be considered unsuccessful after the first 18 months of work. There is only one correct way out of the situation when the hiring was unsuccessful — it is necessary to analyze the situation and draw the appropriate conclusions. This is where recruiting analytics comes in handy.

How to make your hiring process more efficient

Speed ​​is the essential weapon of productivity today. Spending too much time manually managing vacancies is pointless when there is an alternative tool. At the same time, all recruitment options should be simple, accessible and transparent.

Remember that the criterion for good recruiting software is essentially the same — it should do most of the work for the recruiter. In particular, sort the best candidates, send emails to candidates who did not fit.

HURMA system has all these functions. Information about all candidates will be stored within a single database, and convenient filters and a quick search will help you select the most suitable specialists in a couple of clicks.

With the help of the AI ​​Fox plugin, you can easily expand it by adding candidates from job portals and social networks in just a couple of clicks. And the resume parser built into the system and the plugin will automatically transfer all the information about the candidate to his card.

All communication with each of the candidates will be securely stored in the system. Without leaving it, you can conduct email correspondence with applicants or set up automatic follow-up letters. After all, working with a huge number of unsuitable candidates creates a dilemma for employers. Sending out responses and rejection letters takes time and effort. It is also impossible to neglect the feedback, because it can harm the candidate's experience. It is the setting of automatic emails that is the best way to solve this problem. And the entire recruiting process will be conveniently displayed on the built-in Kanban board for all used recruitment approaches.

70% of companies in the Engage Rocket survey cited HR analytics as a top priority. Only if it is used and automated will hiring decisions be effective. Free recruiting analytics is available in HURMA, including information about the productivity of each of the recruiters, the reasons for refusals, and more than 10 different hiring reports.

An ideal automated recruiting system will even help you say goodbye to an employee who didn’t work out. It is important that the departing specialist has the most positive opinion about the company. With HURMA, you can quickly schedule Exit interviews and other surveys, track employee turnover, and predict employee layoffs.

Conclusions

Only the right combination of several ways to recruit employees and the appropriate use of each of them can lead you to success. Choose one primary type of recruitment, such as job portals, and spend up to 80% of your search time interacting with it. Distribute the rest of the time, for example, between professional social networks and internal search for candidates.

Do not forget that strategic recruiting is always a long game. Forming a full base of employees always takes time and effort, which in a couple of years will pay off in full.

For hiring, always choose the software for work that meets the maximum number of your requirements, which is comfortable and easy to deal with. Then the recruiting process will be simple, economical and efficient.