Social Recruiting – Are you a fence sitter?

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Comment by Paul Jacobs on April 8, 2010 at 1:07

In saying my spiel Justin I recognise some of the frustrations corporate recruitment managers encounter trying to convince and lobby others in their organisation to come on board. But this shouldn't have to be a long convoluted process that involves endless strategising, report writing, and talking. As more employers participate, the industry will become aware of the success stories, which will make the sell easier for recruitment managers and consultants. I must admit I get a bit tired of the negatively-framed question of "what is the ROI of social media?" when those asking don't know that answer for their existing recruitment approaches. It therefore becomes a non-argument.

Comment by Justin Hillier on April 7, 2010 at 23:45

Paul brilliant and couldn't agree more. That is the blog that I wanted to write but decided not to and went the diplomatic angle, love your work.

Comment by Paul Jacobs on April 7, 2010 at 23:30

Justin, I will not be popular for saying this but in my opinion many HR / corporate recruitment managers and RPOs in Australia and NZ need to seriously lift the game. They seem to be stuck in the cycle of sameness and mediocrity. They spend too much time in LinkedIn and fighting over low-lying fruit on the job boards. They over-rely on third party recruiters when they should be putting time and money into building their company's employment and brand experiences. They need to be thinking market segmentation, sourcing strategies, and actively building online communities and tapping referral networks - employee referrals should be a key source of hire.

If you're fence sitting in 2010 you should consider resigning and getting a new job in real estate sales. If you don't get the point of social networking and social media, or feel there are too many risks, or haven't got time for it, you're most likely behind the times and missing big opportunities and limiting yourself and your company to reach active and passive jobseekers who are hanging out online. If you're not getting success using social recruiting, reconsider if you're using it in the right way - maybe the problem's with you. If you're fence sitting you may also be blind to opportunities to use collaborative and social technologies inside the business. Social recruiting requires a real commitment and desire to want to get "social" with talent, wherever they hang out. If this is important to you then start participating, start learning, experiment, and evolve the profession.

Do me a favour, if you're brokering in the services of a third-party to take you on the social recruiting journey, look first if the agency / provider / consultant is active on the social web and had some success themselves or with their clients. I'm seeing employers getting some crap advice from some so-called social media experts. An old advertising model doesn't necessarily fit in a social media world.

Let me know if you agree or disagree, or if I've offended any practitioners out there ...