Where Employers Find Employees

Posted by • July 13th, 2012 • 12 Comments

If you’re going to find a job, it’s good to understand where employers think they find their new employees. Each year, the Career Crossroads Source of Hire Survey attempts to illuminate the question. They gather a group of big company recruiters together and try to harvest the data necessary to make a usable answer.

The authors are quick to point out that their conclusions are only as good as the input they get (and they’re not all that excited about the quality of the data). But, if you ask around the industry, the survey is regarded as a good approximation of the answer.

Here are the numbers:

 You can see that almost 60% of new hires come from either referrals or a Job Board (including the company career site as a job board). Generally speaking, it takes 10 referrals to generate one new hire. It takes about 100 job board submissions to do the same.

In other words, finding a way to get referred is worth 10 resumes you submit to various online employment web sites. The other 40% of hiring approaches are either specialized (new graduates, rehires, recruiter initiated or 3rd party search) or a long shot. But, roughly 1 out of 100 times you walk into the place you want to work and apply, you’ll get a job.

Here are the five most important things you should take away from this data:

  • While Social Media is fun and entertaining, it’s currently a long shot for getting a job. Focus your efforts on other things.
  • In spite of what you might hear, people do get jobs from job boards. The odds don’t get better because you apply more often. So, devote about 20% of your time to looking for work on job boards and company career sites.
  • Almost 30% of jobs are given to referrals. This means work to get yourself referred. Put about 30% of your energy into networking in general.
  • You may get sold on the idea that temping is a great way to have your foot in the door. The stats don’t support the idea. Get a temp job if you want a temp job, not because you want a permanent job.
  • As always, the best jobs come from deciding where you want to work and relentlessly networking your way into the organization. Use the other 50% of your time to figure out what you want and then go get it.

Guest Blogger John Sumser, a member of the Glassdoor Clearview Collection, is the founder and editor-in-chief of HRExaminer, a weekly online magazine about the people and technology of HR. Widely respected as an independent analyst, Sumser has been chronicling and critiquing the HRTechnology industry for eighteen years. During that time, he has consulted with more than 100 HR vendors on matters of strategy and positioning in the market. Prior to his involvement in the HR Technology industry, Sumser was a senior executive in Defense Technology. From large scale software development to naval architecture, he was the leader of tech development teams in a broad variety of settings. His passion is the intersection of people and technology.

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Career Advice, HR/Recruiter Advice
  • http://guymanningham.com/ Guy Manningham

    For the most part, getting a job is usually a result of having an “in” (knowing someone within the company). As the old adage goes, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. That’s why networking groups are so important.

  • http://twitter.com/careerheadlines Kay Riley

    Great information!!  I
    am not surprised to see that employers are still using job boards to find
    employees.  It’s what they know and how
    they’ve done it for so long, it’s natural to continue to do what works for
    them.  Twitter and other networking sites
    are still coming of age and while job seekers are looking there, it’s clear
    from the stats that employers aren’t hiring from there as often yet.  I wonder where LinkedIn fits into these statistics;
    as a job board, or a social networking site? 
    It clearly falls into a way to getting a referral, so it’s interesting
    to think about how other sites might bleed over into more than one category.

    I also agree that the first step to any job search is
    knowing what you want and where you want to work (geographically and
    company-wise). Simply going onto a job board and clicking on all available jobs
    you think you may qualify for does not improve your chances of getting “picked”
    off the job board.

  • http://1389blog.com/ 1389AD

    Walk-ins are rare these days simply because large companies and organizations do not accept them. I got my current job that way, but now they’ve changed their policy, and all applicants must go online.