As surprising as this might be, prospective candidates that engage with your employment brand are not always ready to apply the moment they become aware of available employment opportunities. Think about the candidates that find your career site using an iPad or iPhone. Yet, many employers force candidates to make an application decision. This can either lead to a rushed application in an attempt to signal interest or an abandoned/incomplete application because the candidate is not prepared…

The future death of social networking

As I stated in my previous blog post, it's becoming more and more difficult to place the unemployed. Some companies are omitting them from the job search process, sight unseen, to the point where they're telling job seekers not to apply in their job posting and…

The five-year-olds on the baseball field deserve better. At least that’s what I told myself as I walked off the field last night. The game ended in a tie, of course, as all games at this age do given we don’t count outs and runs, but my feeling of failure last night as a head coach had nothing to do with the game result. Looking back on the game the kids had fun, we avoided any significant injuries, the players generally understood where to be and what to do, and the flow of…

Traditionally, recruiters have sought out job seekers who are already employed, as opposed to those who are not.

Apparently, they are even more prone to doing so in the current economic climate.

According to a recent CNNMoney.com article ("Looking for Work? Unemployed Need Not…

I was interested to see reports of a survey last week showing that poor treatment of failed job applicants can damage a consumer brand and seriously affect the bottom line. It’s something that I hear candidates talk about and am always amazed at the number of…

A couple of weeks ago, we wrote a blog post about the recovery of the technology job market, referencing positive indicators found on Indeed.com. Well, the trend continues and it’s now evident that we’ve undergone a shift

from an employer’s market to a candidate’s market.…

It’s true; most employers prefer passive candidates. A passive candidate is a gainfully employed professional who is open to hearing about career opportunities and would actually accept a new job if it made sense to them and their family.

Employers believe that a person is employed because they are the top of crop. When I say employers I refer to specific managers who maintain this mindset. I don’t personally know of any managers who think this way, but I have come across…

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I am writing this on a plane on my way back from a week visiting the Aquent offices in Japan. It was a great week, and the business is tracking well, but as I had not been to Japan for a while, I spent my

time meeting with virtually every recruiter, looking at activities and shining the light on efficiency and productivity…

Over the last two weeks I have used this analogy when talking to recruiters within my company that recruiting via the social networks is more like a garden and not a grocery store. It seems to have connected with them and I know there are hundreds of other analogies out there describing "social recruiting" and this one just came out of my mouth during a conversation. My point is when a recruiter is using the social networks to find candidates and…

It’s a well known fact that some people lie on their resumes. There are plenty of statistics around that show the percentages. Some people embellish a little, some embellish a lot, and some outright lie. Most of the time, that lie is about their education. According to the Society for Human Resource Management, one in four candidates misrepresents his or her educational attainment. If someone lies on their resume, how can you trust them as an employee?

I can remember several…