Are you a clueless recruiter?

You know what they say about first impressions? Do you ever wonder what people think of you based on the emails, InMails, voice mails, LinkedIn group posts, and other messaging efforts you undertake to make an initial contact with potential candidates? You should. Do you think they feel that they can get a sense of your competence as a recruiter … Read More

Do You Have the Proper Perspective in Recruiting?

It is all too easy for sourcers, recruiters, HR professionals, and hiring managers/teams to develop a skewed, distorted, and decidedly one-way view of the world. Perhaps spending 99% of the time on only one side of the recruiting process is to blame. Regardless of the cause, it is absolutely critical to regularly take the time and think about, understand, and … Read More

The Passive Candidate Pipeline Problem

  If you’re in HR or recruiting, you’ve undoubtedly been exposed to (and likely believe in) the concept that proactively building passive talent pipelines is critical to talent acquisition success. Some would say that pipelining passive candidates is one of the sacred cows of recruiting – you just don’t question it. It’s my opinion that the belief in talent pipelines is … Read More

Why Sourcing is Superior to Posting Jobs for Talent

Posting a job online is perhaps the first action most companies take to attract talent when they have an opening. However, posting jobs in an attempt to attract qualified talent has many intrinsic flaws, and here are the top 4 in my opinion: Posting jobs a passive strategy Posting jobs offers no control over candidate qualifications Job advertisements only attract candidates who are actively … Read More

Having Trouble Attracting the Right Candidates?

While attending the Social Recruiting Summit in Minneapolis back in May, I made specific note of a common sentiment expressed by recruiting representatives of two social recruiting powerhouses – Best Buy and Facebook: They don’t have any trouble attracting people, but they do have a tough time attracting the right people. Recruiters in attendance scoffed at the thought that these … Read More

Passive Recruiting Doesn’t Exist!

When most people talk about “passive recruiting,” they’re referring to the practice of targeting and recruiting so-called “passive candidates” – people who are not actively looking to make a move from their current employer. If you accept that notion – what would be the opposite? Active recruiting? Think about it for a moment. Neither phrase even makes sense grammatically. The “passive” … Read More

Resumes Are Like Wine

In response to my recent post about the deficiencies in the search capability of many Applicant Tracking Systems, a few people commented to the fact that resumes stored in applicant tracking systems become stale and outdated over time, which may explain why ATS resume databases are often the candidate “source of last resort.” While candidate records inevitably age over time and can … Read More