I’ve spent the past nine years in corporate recruiting, with the last four leading the function. My team
filled 150 jobs per year, which represented 10% of the overall corporate workforce. I had a full service
recruiting team – they did it all: sourced candidates, schmoozed hiring managers, reviewed thousands
of resumes, scheduled interviews, dispositioned people, ran reports, and – oh, yeah – hired 150 people
per year. They did it all. But they struggled. Applicant pools were huge, few were qualified, they were
overburdened with administration and meetings. So they had limited time for sourcing efforts to find
and bring in the right talent.

I’ve since left that role and started contracting. I don’t post jobs – I source, screen and present qualified
candidates to our clients. When I first joined the firm, I thought this would be a breeze. Employee
morale and engagement is at an all-time low … ergo everyone wants a new job. I am recruiting for great
clients with high salaries. In this role, I review thousands of resumes, call and email hundreds of people,
yet my response rate is less than 20%! Additionally, top candidates continue to obtain multiple job
offers and have plenty of options.

What is going on? Candidates are pounding on the doors to get jobs, but when great jobs are
presented, they don’t respond. And the good people – where are they hiding? This is what I’ve learned:

Traditional job postings and job boards just don’t work anymore.
Crowds come to job postings to test the market, but few have the technical skills required to make it
past the filtering process. Candidates must have a solid online presence that describes their technical
expertise. In my experience, a job posting is an important online marketing tool that explains the jobs
available within the company. But you have to find the right candidates first, then point them to the job
description.

There is a talent dilemma: What’s available and what’s needed is not the same.
Recruiters have a real-time view of the talent marketplace. Hiring managers want what they want and
don’t compromise. In the world of Recruiting, technical skill is still king. One of my recruiting mantras
is: “separate what’s interesting about a candidate from what’s relevant.” Smart, well educated,
strategic visionaries need not apply if their technical skills aren’t up to par. Recruiters need to articulate
candidates’ relevancy to the job and present the candidates to the hiring managers. If the recruiters
can’t do it, dissect the problem (sourcing, screening, priority, etc.) and consider outsourcing.

So in the war for talent, who wins? Corporate Recruiting or Contract Recruiting? The winner goes to the
recruiter with access to the right talent pools. It’s not corporate vs. contract staff – it’s obtaining access
to today’s talent marketplace and quickly establishing a presence. Acknowledging that the world has
changed helps create a new future.