Imagine there’s a secret goldmine of resumes of qualified candidates who know your brand and want to work for your organization. Can you see it like a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Now, imagine that you have an open position and you choose to forego all of those goldmine candidates and go find new ones. Even more concerning, imagine you pay someone to bring you new candidates rather than engaging your company followers. If you have an Applicant Tracking System (ATS), this is not a dream. In-house recruiters who are often overburdened with Recruiting activities on top of their Human Resources or Onboarding activities are likely to overlook this goldmine of resume because they feel they don’t have time to tackle a search. Most applicant tracking systems maintain resumes for 3 or more years. Assuming the candidates who apply to you and are not selected continue working and growing their careers, you likely have several applicants who would fit a previously filled role right at your fingertips. I hear you. This won’t apply to every position you need to fill and not every ATS is search-friendly. However, let’s say you had a Customer Service Manager role available last year and you received 100 applications. Probably 50 of those were from people who didn’t meet your qualifications. Another 30 or so likely came in after you were far into the interview process. The remaining 20 were considered and maybe 10 or so went through your phone screen process. Of that 20, let’s say that 19 were disqualified for one reason or another and 1 person was hired. 80% of your applicants may not have been fully considered for this or similar roles and are just sitting in your ATS. Sticking with the above example… Let’s say you now need to open a Customer Service Supervisor requisition due to your company’s growth. You could start from scratch and wait two weeks for another 100 applicants. Rinse. Repeat. Or you could search through the candidates from that past requisition and likely find several within the 80 overflow candidates who didn’t meet your requirements for the Manager role but may be well qualified for a Supervisor position. These are likely passive candidates now who would welcome a call about a new role with an organization they were interested in previously. You could expedite your hiring process and strengthen your employer brand with just a few calls. Wouldn’t that investment of time be worth the upfront effort rather than relying on a posting model? Another potentially positive outcome of spending more time with your database is to fill additional positions from various applicant pools. Often, a well qualified candidate will be viewing more than one position on your site yet only apply to one role. It is the responsibility of the in-house recruiter or sourcer to determine the best fit and reassign that application for consideration under another, better-suited position. Yes, there are compliance needs you’ll need to track but most ATS systems make this an easy change. One phone call to the candidate will confirm whether they’re open to the opportunity. If they’re not, you can disqualify them from the active role and let them know in real-time. Then, it’s on to the next candidate. If they are open to another role, you may have just solved two requisition needs from one active list of candidates. In-house recruiters are in a unique position to have access to all positions and areas of the business. When your organization doesn’t have enough volume to justify a full-time resource, contract recruiters are a great option to consider. These resources will employ these tactics using your own candidate database and you’ll pay a part-time or hourly rate rather than a per-hire fee. Additionally, you’ll continue to own all of the candidate data to re-use for future requirements. Finding gold where it’s been found previously is often easier than looking for a whole new goldmine. Make sure your team is enabled to access the gold you already have. Ready to step up your hiring process? Schedule a time to talk with our team– we’d be happy to help.
