The Future of E-Recruitment

This is part 5 of a 5-part series on E-recruitment. Resource Management sponsored the “RPO and E-recruitment Forum” which took place on the 29th September.

Last week we had a look at whether e-recruitment was really worth it or whether it was just a passing bandwagon. This week, we look at how important social media will be in the future, and sum up the best tips for leveraging e-recruitment.


The Future of E-Recruitment

According to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), companies should:

• Align human resources, PR and marketing, and be clear on core organisational values
• Find ways to connect with the passive job seeker
• Broker and make use of peer-to-peer relationships
• Use web 2.0 technologies (blogs, web-based communities and social networking sites) to build personalised relationships online

All of these factors need to be considered in order to capitalise on the growing use of e-recruitment, especially the latter.

A survey conducted by Yasni.co.uk found that “32% of Business managers and HR people in Britain have searched for applicants online, using social media websites”.

Also, of the 68% of business people who had not searched for applicants’ online, 44% admitted that they probably would in the future.

According to the CIPD, marketers believe that the relationships formed with candidates and jobseekers will be an important factor in success with e-recruitment in the coming years. This is as companies begin to focus on branding and consumer insight in order to build loyalty and grow their businesses using social media.

Have a look at our tips below:


Top Tips for E-Recruiting

• Develop a policy with management on how you use social networks and company job-boards. This is one of the most important first steps as it will ensure that all employees are aware of what can and can’t be posted, and how to deal with applications received online.


• If you are looking for a social network to start on, begin with Linkedin. It’s a professional network so you’re more likely to get good results using the company profile job board, and discussion boards.


• Research other networks and decide which ones are best for your company. Twitter may work for you, or it may not. Include in this research, where the best place to find candidates might be.


• Even if you can’t source any quality candidates straight away, it doesn’t mean there aren’t any, or that social networks aren’t right for your company. Continue to use existing methods like posting to job boards whilst you try out social media.


• As mentioned earlier in this series, always provide candidates and jobseekers with other means to contact you i.e. a phone number or an email address.


• Don’t use jargon, as this will alienate potential candidates.


• Monitor how you are using social media and get feedback from candidates about their experiences of using it. If they are having problems, you need to address this straight away.


• Also remember that only 1 in 4 job hunters are reported as using social media in their job search. Whilst this figure is changing all the time, it’s not yet ubiquitous, but soon might be.

Any important ones we've missed? Share your tips for leveraging e-recruitment in the comments below.


Image source: Flickr Creative Commons - (p_a_h)