Tag Archives: Predictive Analytics

The Moneyball Recruiting Opportunity: Analytics & Big Data

4 Replies

 

Earlier this year, I traveled to Australia to present a keynote at the Australasian Talent Conference on the topic of the Moneyball opportunity that exists for companies when they are sourcing, identifying, assessing, recruiting, and developing talent, and how big data and predictive analytics will be the next major area of competitive advantage in the war for talent.

Below you will find my keynote presentation, including a couple of YouTube videos.

Big Data and predictive analytics are just beginning to be leveraged in talent acquisition by a few forward thinking companies, and I am convinced they will both play major roles in the near future.

Unfortunately, at this time there is still some confusion around exactly what “Big Data” is and is not. For example, this Wall Street Journal article incorrectly references the use of personality assessments and other online tests to facilitate hiring as an application of Big Data, when in fact it is really just an example of analytics.

Data from personality assessments and online tests coupled with other human capital data doesn’t represent a combination of high-volume, high-velocity, and/or high-variety information assets, which most experts agree is required for something to be classified as “Big Data.”

In this presentation, I think you will find the examples of how companies are currently leveraging analytics in their recruitment as well as in the analysis of their current workforce to be quite interesting, as well as some of the tools that already exist that do in fact harness high volume, high velocity, and high variety information assets.

You may be shocked to find that data supports the finding that taller and more attractive men and women make more money than their shorter and less attractive peers (especially shocked to find out exactly how much more!) – which gives us a glimpse into how people make hiring and promotion decisions on a daily basis based on unconscious prejudice, similar to how unconscious prejudice, wisdom, and “gut” instincts are and have been used in athletic recruiting – which Billy Beane and Paul Depodesta of the Oakland A’s specifically set out to counter.

As demonstrated in Moneyball, very strong teams can be built with data-based decision making, throwing conventional wisdom to the wind.

Enjoy the presentation, and please do let me know your thoughts. Thanks!

 

 

If you like what you’ve seen in the Slideshare, you may want to read this post I wrote on Big Data, Data Science, and Moneyball recruiting last year.

 

Why Boolean Search is Such a Big Deal in Recruiting

103 Replies

In the past, I’ve explained the Boolean Black Belt concept and exposed what I feel is the real “secret” behind learning how to master the art and science of leveraging information systems for talent identification and acquisition.

Now I would like to show you precisely WHY Boolean search is such a big deal in recruiting.

There are 2 main factors:

  1. Candidate variable control
  2. Speed of qualified candidate identification.

The goal of this article is to shed significant light on the science behind talent mining, how it can lead to higher productivity levels (more and better results with less effort), why I am so passionate sourcing, and why everyone in the HR, recruiting, and staffing industry should be as well.

Control is Power

Talent identification is arguably the most critical step in recruiting life cycle – you can’t engage, recruit, acquire, hire and develop someone you haven’t found and identified in the first place.

My experience has shown me that properly leveraging deep sources of talent/candidate data (ATS/CRM’s, resume databases, LinkedIn, etc.) can enable recruiters to more quickly identify a high volume of well matched and qualified candidates than any other method of candidate identification and acquisition (e.g., cold calling, referral recruiting, job posting).

The true power of Boolean search lies in the intrinsically high degree of control over critical candidate variables that using Boolean strings to search deep data sources such as resume databases, the Internet, and social media affords sourcers and recruiters.

Applying that that high degree of control to large populations of candidates – tens of thousands (small internal ATS, niche resume database) to tens of millions (large ATS/CRM, Monster resume database, LinkedIn, etc.) enables adept sourcers to perform feats of talent identification and acquisition most would think impossible.

Continue reading →

The Current and Future State of Talent Sourcing

14 Replies

I had the distinct honor and privilege of serving as the conference chair of the biggest-ever SourceCon, held at the Georgia Aquarium in February. Part of my responsibility in that role involved kicking off the event, and I took the opportunity to touch upon my observations and opinions on the current state of sourcing, as well as what I believe will be the future of sourcing.

Even as I was standing on stage I knew I would be writing a post on this topic, because it was apparent that there is much misunderstanding and debate surrounding sourcing, and certainly no shortage of opinion, qualified or otherwise.

If you’re ready, I’ll walk you though my definition of sourcing, my observations on the current state of sourcing, and what I (and others!) see as the future state of sourcing.

WARNING: If you don’t like/have time to read long posts, I suggest you turn back now. While I could have split this content up into 9 weeks worth of 500 word posts, I’d prefer to give you the goods rather than string you along.

What is Sourcing?

First and foremost, I believe it is critical to have a common understanding of what sourcing is.

I define sourcing to include any and all activities whose primary purpose is talent discovery and identification.

My definition is purposefully broad, because I find too many people seem to associate sourcing solely with searching the Internet with Boolean search strings.

While some companies may limit their sourcers to exactly that – searching only the Internet and generating names for someone else to engage – sourcing is and should be much more than that.

Sourcing encompasses the use of any source of human capital data – an ATS, Monster, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, mobile apps, etc., and it can also include the phone, email, and messaging work of engaging potential candidates and networking with them to yield referrals and the opportunity to identify more potential candidates.

Yes, networking with people – whether they be new hires, existing staff and management, or complete strangers – to find and identify potential candidates is also sourcing, regardless of method (electronically, over the phone, or in person).

Of course, sourcing also includes traditional phone sourcing as effectively addressed and dramatically demonstrated at the SourceCon event by Conni LaDouceur.

And finally, although passive and offering little-to-no control over the qualifications and experience of the talent discovered, job posting is even a form of sourcing – the primary purpose of posting a job is to discover talent.

The Critical Importance of Sourcing

When it comes to the entire talent management lifecycle, nothing is more important than sourcing.

That’s because, quite simply, the entire talent management lifecycle is completely dependent upon discovering and identifying potential talent in the first place.

You cannot engage, build a relationship with, recruit, hire, retain and develop someone you haven’t found.

Period.

Try cutting and polishing a poor quality diamond, or better yet – try cutting a diamond you don’t actually have. You could have the best diamond cutters in the world on your staff, but without a steady supply of high quality rough diamonds, you simply won’t be in business.

When it comes to hiring and retaining, all future outcomes are dependent upon that magical moment when a sourcer/recruiter first finds and makes contact with a potential candidate.

The Current State of Sourcing

I believe that sourcing is largely misunderstood, undervalued, and under-invested in today.

I offer as evidence:

  • An alarming number of people seem to believe that sourcing is all about Boolean logic
  • There are people who believe that sourcing is a function that can be easily replaced by software
  • There are well respected companies who don’t give their sourcers or recruiters any premium or purpose-built tools or resources
  • The recently conducted sourcing compensation survey illustrated that 23% of the respondents make less than $40,000 annually Continue reading →

Talent Sourcing: Beyond Tips, Tricks, Hacks and the Internet

13 Replies

It’s bothered me for quite some time now that many people essentially equate sourcing with Internet search – using search engines such as Google and Bing to find resumes, lists, press releases, etc.

It bothers me because sourcing is so much more than that.

It also bothers me because I am aware that many companies (some quite large and well respected) limit their sourcers and recruiters primarily to the Internet as the only source of information.

I believe a major contributing factor as to why sourcing isn’t highly valued by some organizations and why sourcing doesn’t get as much widespread respect and recognition as it should is because too many people associate sourcing primarily with Internet search.

The future of talent sourcing will involve a shift from manual Internet search and ATS/CRM systems with only rudimentary search and analysis capability to highly specialized tools specifically designed for mining vast and proprietary human capital data sets dynamically compiled from multiple sources that enables predictive analytics.

It’s coming – will you be ready? Will you be ahead of the curve or behind it? Continue reading →