How “Social Recruiting” Has NOT Changed Recruitment
I feel a moral obligation to weigh in on “social recruiting” again.
I’m not trying to be a buzzkill – but with the continuing swell of momentum and hype that social recruiting is building up, someone has to play the devil’s advocate, refuse to become a victim of BSO (Bright Shiny Object) syndrome, and jump off of the bandwagon to be the voice of objective reason amidst the din of social recruiting cheerleading.
From the many blog posts I am seeing on the subject to the webinars I see popping up frequently, it’s clear that many people see social recruiting as a branding and/or money making opportunity for them.
On the flip side of the coin, there are many people who seem ready to view social recruiting as “the next big thing” and are eager to absorb (and pay for) the message that if you’re not performing “social recruiting” you’re behind the curve, you’ll be left behind, your competitors will laugh at your antiquated recruiting methods, and you’ll never make another hire.
Okay, maybe I’m getting a little dramatic with the last part(s).
But you get the point.
While social media/networking has undeniably added a new dimension to recruiting, it’s important to know that the emergence and evolution of LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and other sites have not changed many fundamental aspects of recruiting.
First, You Should Know That…
I use social media – I blog, use LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, and I’ve made and facilitated hires using them. I train recruiters on how to successfully recruit using every tool and resource available to them – including social media. I work with many recruiters who regularly use LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook to identify, engage, and recruit candidates – and yes…get results. One recruiter recently made 3 placements in a month using Facebook.
So I am no stranger to “social recruiting.” I just don’t like to call it that.
What Social Networks HAVE Changed In Recruiting
Access and Engagement
It’s never been easier in the history of recruiting to find and communicate with potential candidates and we’ve never had such easy access to them. The “Big 3″ social networks afford recruiters with unfettered access to 10’s to 100’s of millions of people that they can find, communicate with, engage, and build relationships with.
For free. That’s a BIG deal.
Listening
Social media allows recruiters the unprecedented ability to listen to/observe their target talent pool prior to making contact or engaging them.
Marketing
While social networks give companies fantastic new opportunities and mediums for employer branding – that’s social media marketing - NOT social recruiting, as far as I am concerned. Although marketing and recruiting often go hand in hand, they are two very separate and distinct concepts.
Talent Communities
LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and other online social networks can easily and effectively be used to create and/or tap into talent communities of like-skilled/minded professionals.
However, one could easily argue that this isn’t a new concept at all (let’s not forget about BBS’s) – but social networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and others definitely put a sexier spin on it along with more functionality.
What Social Networks Have NOT Changed In Recruiting
Job Posting
Yes – you have many options for posting jobs today aside from the job boards (which are supposed to be dying or dead, just as job boards were supposed to have killed recruiting agencies and executive search 10+ years ago).
You can post jobs on Facebook (manually, through services, and apps), on LinkedIn (paid or free in groups and status updates), and Twitter (manually, automatically through feeds, and through services).
So who cares?
Yes – you should be posting your jobs wherever they can be potentially seen by your target talent population.
However, posting jobs is posting jobs, regardless of where or how they are posted.
As I have written before, posting jobs is a passive and reactive talent acquisition strategy, affords no control over candidate qualifications, attracts active and casual job seekers only (the minority of all people), and is ineffective at snagging passive and non-job seekers.
Plus, posting jobs to social networks via social media is not ”social recruiting,” it’s social job posting. 
Would you even say that job posting is really “recruiting” anyway?
Engagement
While social media and social networks do give recruiters a new medium through which they can engage and interact with potential candidates, communicating electronically/digitally is not revolutionary and is definitely not limited to social networks.
Is an InMail, Twitter DM, or Facebook message any more “social” and engaging than an email? And where do most of those social media messages end up? In the person’s email inbox.
Which would you say is more engaging – a Twitter conversation, or a phone conversation?
You Still Have to Talk to People
Social media gives recruiters and employers one more medium through which they can interact with potential candidates. However, social networking sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook are neither replacements nor prerequisites for telephonic or in-person communication.
Just because you can, is it really necessary to use a social network to message or interact with a potential candidate before speaking with them over the phone?
Social
Recruiting has always been social – social networks did NOT put the “social” into recruiting.
Which is more “social” – having an exchange via Facebook/LinkedIn group or Twitter chat, or talking to someone on the phone or
Talent Identification
While LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and other social networking/media sites afford sourcers, recruiters and employers with unprecedented access to millions of potential candidates, some sites aren’t very searchable and most social profiles are very shallow sources of professional information.
Facebook is well-nigh unsearchable, for all practical intents and purposes (at least for anything more specific than a keyword or phrase), and very few people list employers, titles, and other information that would give you any sense of what a person does, how much experience they have, and what they are capable of doing.
Twitter has 160 character bios where some people will give away clues as to what they do professionally, but many don’t. Also, a great many people simply don’t tweet about what they do for a living.
Categorized as the most “professional” social network, while some LinkedIn profiles are fleshed out nearly as well as a typical resume, most contain employers and titles and little-to-nothing else. While that level of information can certainly be used for some degree of talent identification, it’s not as effective, efficient, nor as accurate as using deeper sources of data such as resumes (like the ones in your ATS/CRM – you know, the ones from people who at some point expressed interest in your company?).
While social networks have given recruiters unprecedented access to more people than ever in the history of recruitment – simply having access does not grant the ability to find and identify the right (and best!) people easily, quickly, or at all. If anything, having more access to more potential candidates only stresses the importance of good search skills.
Point to ponder – just because a recruiter uses a social network to find a potential candidate, does that mean they are performing “social recruiting?” For example, if you search LinkedIn, find a potential candidate, join a group they are in and send them a message – is that any more “social recruiting” than searching your ATS/CRM or an online resume database and emailing the candidate?
What if you find someone on LinkedIn and you research the main number for the company listed as their current employer and give them a call – is that any more “social recruiting” than searching your ATS/CRM or an online resume database and calling a candidate?
Is one of those methods more effective than the other?
Final Thoughts
Social media and social networks that enable and facilitate social interaction have unquestionably given recruiters unprecedented access to and the ability communicate with large populations of potential candidates where they live online, but social media is no more “social” than attending a user group/networking event or simply picking up the phone and speaking with a potential candidate.
The “human element” of recruiting – effectively communicating and building relationships with candidates, understanding candidate motivators, consultative selling, etc. – none of these have been changed or altered by the emergence of social media.
I fear that “Social Recruiting” has become it’s own box that recruiters and employers need to think outside of.
Hasn’t recruiting always been social?
Do you really need to use Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn to be a “social recruiter?”
I say that recruiting is recruiting – by any means available, applicable, and necessary, no matter how it is accomplished (ethically, professionally, and respectably – of course) or through which tool/medium. I don’t see how anything is gained by slapping another label on it.
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Hey Glen
Great article and I agree in whole with what you are saying, apart from I love the term Social Recruiting.
The reason I like so much is that it reminds recruiters of just what you were saying – recruitment is social. All this technology and these online social networks have expanded our world for sure and given us new avenues to explore and take advantage of, but they have also given us a term that reinforces that what we do is about being social.
Recruiters are probably some of the more social people out there but all this tech has enabled them to be even more so.
So yeah, it give us another thing to market and sell! That’s great news. I was getting tired of avoiding the word recruitment in our marketing. But add the word social in front of it and it all becomes more acceptable.
So even if Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn fade away I would like the term Social Recruitment to stay.
Glenn, well presented! I find it refreshing when someone who is knowledgable about “social recruiting” questions “social recruiting”.
I have ’social recruiting” and ’socialrecruiting’ as columns in Tweetdeck and I’m considering deleting them – I’m getting overwhelmed with the hype. I find it somewhat amusing how some of the people espousing the merits of social recruiting, and blindly quoting all matter of statistics and survey results, were only 3-6 months ago telling me that they thought social recruiting was a load of crap. In that 3-6 month period, they’ve signed up to Twitter, started a Facebook page and become social recruiting experts, consultants and commentators.
I don’t care if 90% of employers are using social recruiting, what matters to me is whether they have a genuine interest (followed by actions) in using the social web to build a closer understanding with jobseekers – and ultimately deriving value from their participation. Vomiting job listings on twitter etc to me is not social recruiting. Social recruiting to me is about being “social”, and engaging in honest and authentic conversations – and using the technologies / social networking platforms in such a way to facilitate this aim. It could be argued that many HR people and corporate and third-party recruiters don’t really want to be social and don’t really give two hoots about understanding and getting closer to their “audience”. If they did then they would be actively engaging on the social web – and potentially doing amazing things.
When I attended the Social Recruiting Summit in May I picked up that there does NOT seem to be a consensus on what ’social recruiting’ actually is. I’ve moved on from the argument that recruiting has always been social.
I would prefer the conversation to be around the value and relevancy of the recruitment and employment branding professions in 2010 and beyond, rather than the value of social recruiting per se. I’m not sure if some recruiters and HR professionals are in the right roles to really add value and tap into the opportunities, technologies, and potential new jobseeker audiences that are out there.
@Sam – thank you for your comment! Perhaps my biggest issue with the term “Social Recruiting” is that most people use it to describe mostly just posting jobs via social channels, and I would argue that’s not really recruiting, but marketing and branding. Granted, employer branding is a part of recruiting, but the operative word is “part.” I don’t think anyone would argue that if all a recruiter did was post jobs and process ad responses that they are really recruiting, but I guess that depends on the organization.
@Paul – I too have ’social recruiting” and ’socialrecruiting’ columns in Tweetdeck – I know exactly how you feel. I personally love capitalism, but I don’t like to see well-intentioned people get duped by others looking to make a buck.
As I said above in response to Sam, posting jobs via social channels is great and a no-brainer, but it isn’t revolutionary and posting jobs isn’t “social.” I totally agree with you regarding your thoughts on understanding and building relationships with individuals and talent communities.
I hope I wasn’t the only person who noticed Accenture’s specific language when they recently announced that they were planning on doubling their hiring this year and that they would heavily utilize social media. They did not use the term “social recruiting.” Instead, they said “Accenture uses social strategies in its recruitment efforts,” and that they use “social media as a recruiting tool.” It’s clear to me that they “get it.”
I love it. I really do.
The only thing that is close to revolutionary is the access piece. I don’t know if it is truly revolutionary but it is a big deal like you said.
Once you get past that access piece, you still have to recruit. That means building relationships. That means utilizing both active and passive candidates. And ultimately, people have to accept and start those jobs successfully.
It’s a piece of the pie. I don’t necessarily begrudge people who want to make some money to help companies tap into the access piece with better ease or efficiency. What I do have a problem with is over-complicating a process because you have skin in the game. That seems to happen more and more.
In concept, I agree with your points. However, I think you stated it well when you said
“Social media and social networks that enable and facilitate social interaction have unquestionably given recruiters unprecedented access to and the ability communicate with large populations of potential candidates where they live online.” Period.
What that means is that social networks are a game-changer, and ARE directly impacting how recruiting is being done today. That’s BIG stuff…which didn’t exist 2 – 3 years ago.
So, although i understand your backlash to all the hype that comes from game changing technology, it’s still game changing. ACCESS IS a BIG DEAL…just as the Telephone doesn’t change recruiting…but you know what, it’s still a big deal for recruiters.
I agree with the rest of the comments that once you get access, you still need to recruit, which hasn’t changed, but we’re in a major transition period in the recruiting industry…and this ride isn’t over yet. More hype will come, but don’t underestimate the real changes that are happening and will continue to happen in recruiting.
Aren’t Job Boards the ultimate social/professional networks. They facilitate putting candidates and recruiters in touch for conversations.
Hi Glen,
I couldn’t agree more that good recruitment has always been social.
But I also believe that because most recruiters can’t really afford the time and resources to go social as they wish, and having pressure for results, they end up having to resort to mass emails and advertising on social media instead of really engaging with candidates.
And here is where I think Social Technologies come into play. A technology tool will really add value to recruiting when it optimizes the social process of recruiting and engagement.
However, I do think that social networks have been used by recruiters, which ended up being branded as “Social Recruitment”, when in reality they haven’t really been built for that purpose.
I strongly believe that social technologies provide a fantastic opportunity for employers to build communities around their employer brand and have a real engaging longer-term relationship with their talent pool.
Best regards,
Ramon Bez
Social Media Marketing Manager
BraveNewTalent.com
Very well put. The tools are changing – not the game. I love the hype – it’s usually propagated by the people who aren’t making money in recruiting. No BSO!
Outstanding article, Glen. Rock solid. Personally, I’m a fringe player in the #SocialRecruiting game . . . . meaning I’m not tied to one particular clique or any prevailing groupthink du jour. Assuming this network position means you’re not always seen as “one of us”, however it allows for a perspective more reflective of the whole.
What I will say is that I believe Social Media manufactures a product. Marketing calls that product “Word-of-Mouth.”
From a Recruiting standpoint, I believe we can not only catalyze conversation, but also capitalize on conversation that we are passively ‘listening to.’
Currently, I’m working on researching the intersection of Social Network Analysis (SNA) as it relates to identifying talent pools that center around certain conversations, events, etc. The lifecycle of such ‘clusters’ is finite and fluid (i.e. a conference may only be a few days long and the hashtag associated with it may only ‘live’ a couple of weeks.)
Social Recruiting 1.0 focused on searching Bios’ (i.e. Twitter and LinkedIn), creating destinations such as Facebook Groups, and posting jobs to what you call the “Big 3″. In my opinion, Social Recruiting 2.0 will be more about conversation, meaning how we can catalyze it (to uncover hidden talent pools and self-organizing communities of interest), as well as capitalize on conversations that revolve around concepts that we listen to or are ‘tuned into’.
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