Modern corporate staffing is built on three sets of relationships: those with candidates, those with hiring managers, and those with senior management. All have been steadily evolving over the past decade, none more so than those with candidates.
The driver of this evolution has been candidate access to information, specifically via the Internet. Information has always bestowed power. He who has it has the advantage over he who does not. This is particularly true in economic markets like the one for jobs. Candidates who know where and how to look for opportunities will be hired faster than those who don’t. Employers who know what candidates are looking for, where they are looking, and how best to present job openings to them will land a disproportionate share of the best available talent.
(Source: Mastering Internet Recruiting:Job Seeker Attitudes & Behaviors )
Over the past decade the Internet has dramatically altered the dynamics of the job market. While employers have certainly benefited, candidates have benefited even more. They can now access enormous amounts of company- and job-related information, which has given them power they never enjoyed before. And they are using it both for and against you.
Finding jobs in the pre-Internet job marketplace meant relying largely on
- Proximity – knowledge of local firms
- Connections – personal introductions to firms further afield
- Advertisements – in newspapers and trade press
- Research – in a library business section
- Referrals – from family, friends or recruiters.
These search mechanisms still exist, but each has been turbocharged by the Internet.
Employer Implications
Our research shows that candidates are taking full advantage of the rich, new information resources available to them. They are searching more frequently, applying more often, and filtering opportunities more carefully. Passive candidates are as likely to benefit as active candidates. In fact, since information access is so easy, we believe the old, hard distinction between active and passive candidates is no longer valid. Everyone is in the market today; it’s just a question of to what extent.
Easy candidate access to information has a number of implications for employers. Two of the most important are:
- The quality and quantity of information they present on their websites to attract candidates
- The method with which they process candidates through their recruiting funnel.
When information was scarcer, employers could get away with a lot. For instance, they didn’t have to show much, if any, HR-related information to candidates at the top of the recruiting funnel. That information was reserved for the interview stage, when 90% of the candidates had been eliminated. HR information was considered proprietary, to be concealed from all but the most serious candidates.
The Internet has changed this situation from the candidates’ perspective. They know what they want to see (above chart) and now expect to find it. Increasingly they will penalize the company that doesn’t provide it. Whether they begin their job hunt with a keyword search, a visit to a large job board, or a visit to a company website (the three most popular ways to begin a search), candidates can now screen multiple employers in a single session. They tell us that their decisions to probe an opportunity more deeply, and perhaps apply, are directly related to the amount of information provided, its quality and its presentation.
(Source:Mastering Internet Recruiting:Job Seeker Attitudes & Behaviors)
Candidates’ thirst for information has also revealed flaws in the typical candidate screening process. Those flaws are the legacy of recruiting funnels built to eliminate as many candidates as possible as quickly as possible so as to focus attention on a select few. Extensive candidate communication bogged down this model. Thus the universal candidate complaint about the “black hole” into which candidate resumes and other inquiries disappear with no meaningful response.
But again, the Internet has changed candidates’ expectations. Easy access to so many employers now allows candidates to differentiate between companies that welcome candidate interaction and those that don’t. Preferred employers now offer numerous ways to interact, including facility and day-in-the-life-of tours, blogs and RSS feeds, chat rooms, affinity groups, email contact with recruiters and employees, and even ways to rate themselves as potential candidates.
In short, the new dynamics of today’s job market are no different from those we observe in other B to C markets for complex products. Whether the purchase is an automobile, a mutual fund, a health insurance plan or a job, easy access to ample information has empowered buyers to make better decisions. Employers (sellers) who realize this are benefiting.
Many individual employers still assume they have the same job market status they enjoyed in the pre-Internet era. They reason that increased Internet exposure and a continuing flow of candidates validate this assumption. No adjustments are needed. What they don’t see is that the majority of recruiters and hiring managers also report that candidate quality has not improved and that competition for top talent is increasing. We can also report that recruiting efficiency metrics have not changed significantly since the pre-Internet era.
These employers are not gaining ground; rather, they are slowly losing it. As candidate choice has increased, the significance of the individual firm has diminished. No company is exempt. Even household names with a stellar employment brand and an international footprint must now compete for candidates with all other firms of similar status. Those that understand what is happening are rethinking their recruiting models, improving candidate attraction and candidate quality. They are adapting to the information-empowered candidate.
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