Social Media: Let's Get Some Perspective

The rise of social media is a modern-day phenomenon and the idea that any business, particularly a recruitment business, should want to ignore it is madness. Clearly, social media is particularly well-suited to recruitment: it provides ease of access to information about individuals and their networks; it provides the ability to exchange information rapidly with a community of interested and interesting individuals; it communicates with people in a way that they want to be communicated with. It is an entirely rational response that an industry such as ours is fascinated by the possibilities on offer to improve performance by leveraging its potential.

But I confess to feeling a little uneasy about the prevalence of social media as the only game in town for recruitment at the moment. Social media is about candidate sourcing, and that is not the same as recruitment. Good recruitment consists of 3 main elements: defining and articulating the requirement, sourcing candidates, and assessing them against the requirement. Of these, the first is the most important. In truth all 3 are intertwined and have to be performed effectively to produce a good outcome.

I suppose it may be something to do with the online company I keep, but my unease stems from the nagging concern that some people think that there is some sort of 'Silver Bullet' solution out there - some killer application, some piece of social-media-manipulating software which will 'solve' all our recruitment problems. The truth is that competitive advantage in recruitment, as in most other industries, comes from doing 100 things across the entire span of activity 1% better than the competition, rather than looking for a complete game changer.

A further danger is that the real value-add for good recruiters, i.e. their ability to spot the right talent for the right job, is diminished if the perception of the client is that somehow the only skill that counts is how and where you find candidates.

Please don't think that I do not value the potential of social media to enhance top class recruitment, because I do. I am very interested to experiment and to learn how others have used social media to improve the quality of the work they do. I just know that it isn't the whole recruitment story.

Defining the shape of the hole you are trying to fill is the most critical issue in recruitment. If you don't get that bit right, everything else you do, no matter how up-to-date your methods of sourcing and assessment, will be misplaced.

The development of an individual company's skill to produce a competency model of 'what talent looks like in our organisation' (and it will differ from one organisation to the next), and the ability to assess candidates effectively against this, is at least as important as the development of social media in recruitment. I would be very interested to hear about companies who might be taking a more scientific approach to talent acquisition to generate a greater and more long-lasting return on their recruiting investment. Now that really would be something to talk about!

Comment by Tim Spagnola on October 19, 2011 at 11:16am: Great post Ian - there is no 'silver bullet' - thanks for sharing.

Comment by Sandra McCartt on October 19, 2011 at 2:38pm: It seems to me that the recruiters who are recruiters are starting to take the position that the emperor is not totally nude but he is trying to march around in new underwear and call it being dressed.

Good post Ian and a tone that i am beginning to see reflected in many sectors. I wrote an article early on in all this that social media is like a Texas Dirt Devil, it blows in with a sound and a fury, scatters stuff all around then when the dust settles there are some good changes as the old stuff has partially blown away. It doesn't make much sense to stand in the middle of a dust devil and try to bring order. Let's see what blows away and what's worth keeping after the storm is over. Beware of those who think the dust devil is the place to be, it can be a real mess if one gets lost in the middle of it.

Comment by Stuart Collins on October 21, 2011 at 12:18pm: Very interesting post Ian - I would be interested in your thoughts on my attached article - 'Do you take account of social media when hiring?':

http://interviewcoordinator.blogspot.com/2011/09/social-media-viewi...

Comment by Chase Delano on November 4, 2011 at 1:57pm: Mr. Harvey,

I found your article very interesting, and decided to write a response if you'd like to take a look.

http://employers.identified.com/blog/bid/71004/Is-Social-Recruiting...

Although I'm not a recruiter myself, I write for a social recruitment blog. The opinions I've developed are a combination of the articles I read of experienced recruiters/HR professionals, like yourself, and the personal experience I've acquired as a twenty-two year old who's come of age alongside social media and technology.

After re-reading your article, I realize that I haven't addressed certain points you've made in your argument.

"Social media is about candidate sourcing, and that is not the same as recruitment. Good recruitment consists of 3 main elements: defining and articulating the requirement, sourcing candidates, and assessing them against the requirement."

Social media can, and is, used not only for candidate sourcing, but also for employer branding, building talent pools of both passive and active candidates, creating targeted ad campaigns and job postings, and increasing awareness and engagement of companies with their fans and candidates. I believe all of these qualities can fit into your description of good recruitment, as long as the recruiter takes a smart and creative approach to their social recruitment strategy.

You mentioned you'd be interested to hear about companies taking a more scientific approach to talent acquisition to generate a greater and more long-lasting return on their recruiting investment. I'm a Community Management Intern for Identified, which is a tech company that specializes in providing Facebook recruiting solutions for the social employer. We just launched 3 enterprise recruiting tools that all work in different ways, but ultimately serve to provide employers with a long-lasting return on their recruiting investment. I would love to know what you think.

http://employers.identified.com

Chase Delano

Community Management Intern at Identified