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Finding the right candidate for the right job is one of the most critical aspects of recruiting.
According to Glassdoor’s research, the average US company spends approximately $4,000 and 24 days to hire a new employee. Terms like cost per hire (CPH) and candidate experience become important when assessing ROI and top recruiting trends, especially in external recruitment.
Therefore, it is paramount for HR operations to evolve to meet changing candidate expectations and market dynamics.
What is external recruitment?
External recruitment is a method of identifying and attracting job candidates from outside the existing workforce. This approach is often used when the necessary skills or expertise are not available within the current staff. While an existing employee can fill an externally advertised job vacancy, the primary aim is to tap into a larger pool of talent and bring in fresh perspectives.
Nevertheless, an organization needs to have a balance between hiring externally and championing internal employees. Proactive practices like cultivating a diverse internal talent pool and openly communicating opportunities for advancement in the company help the strengths and mitigate the weaknesses of both methods.
Internal vs. external recruitment
The challenge facing every recruitment and hiring manager is knowing whether to fill roles internally or cast a wider net.
Internal recruitment is cost-effective, and promoting employees from within the company means they can hit the ground running while leveraging their knowledge of the company’s culture.
External recruitment is more expensive, but employees from outside organizations infuse a fresh perspective into the company and help it evolve. A larger pool of candidates helps the company stay competitive and ahead of market trends.
Advantages and disadvantages of external recruitment
External recruitment is the right choice for a company that is looking to hire from a wide network of candidates to bring innovation, specialized skills, and healthy competition into the company.
Advantages of external recruitment
- Access to a wider talent pool: While internal recruitment is limited to the employees in your organization, external recruiting attracts talent from a wider net of candidates with new skill sets and backgrounds.
- Introduction of fresh perspectives and ideas: External candidates come from different companies and career trajectories, bringing with them a wealth of knowledge and experience that can encourage innovation in the company. For example, someone from a different industry might offer insights that challenge the status quo and drive change.
- Opportunity to acquire specialized skills: External candidates are motivated to develop specialized skills and apply them to their new position. Sometimes, external candidates have more specialized training and fill in skill gaps that your team needs to improve.
- Potential for increased diversity: Hiring externally opens the door for more diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). As data from McKinsey reveals that diverse teams outperform their less diverse competitors financially by 39%, leading to a healthier bottom line for the company.
- Ability to meet rapid growth needs: When your company needs to grow quickly, external recruitment can be the fastest way to meet increased demand. This is particularly true for startups and businesses undergoing rapid expansion.
Disadvantages of external recruitment
- Higher costs compared to internal recruitment: External recruitment comes with higher costs due to the time required for every stage of the hiring process, as well as additional expenses like paid job boards and recruitment agency fees.
- Longer onboarding periods: External recruiting face more extended onboarding periods than internal recruitment because the candidate has to get to know the ins and outs of their role and needs ramp-up time. iCIMS’ onboarding software simplifies employee onboarding with automated processes that maximize engagement and productivity.
- Potential impact on employee morale: Employees might suffer from a decrease in morale and motivation if they thought they were a good fit for a role that an external candidate filled. In some cases, this can result in resentment towards the new hire, making it difficult for them to collaborate with their colleagues.
- Risk of cultural misfit: Regardless of the interview process and initial screening, hiring outside of the organization is a gamble. iCIMS has specifically built capabilities for diversity, equity and inclusion so you can foster more authentic and inclusive relationships in your company.
- Increased time-to-hire: Recruiting externally is a much longer process than recruiting internally because narrowing down the field from a large pool of candidates takes a long time. This can result in positions being left open longer than you’d like.
Common external recruitment methods
For Talent Acquisition leaders, various external recruitment strategies are effective in sourcing the right talent, including:
- Job boards and career sites: Online job boards are popular in the talent acquisition process. While some are free, others require job board fees for premium features like open networking or extended search.
- Social media recruitment: Social media is a powerful way to build an employer brand (through channels like Instagram or Facebook) and reach out to potential candidates on (through LinkedIn).
- Employee referral programs: Employee referral programs offer a cash bonus or other incentives to existing employees who can find and bring somebody into the company. This encourages people to spread the word about job openings among their friends and peers, who may be in a similar industry and looking to move.
- Recruitment agencies: These agencies specialize in sourcing candidates for high-level executive roles, highly skilled and technical positions, and any other important roles that are too challenging or sensitive to list on regular job sites.
- Campus recruitment: Campus recruitment is the process of finding, attracting, and hiring talent from colleges and universities for internships and entry-level positions. Campus recruitment provides access to a diverse pool of high-potential candidates who are pursuing relevant academic programs and have leadership potential.
- AI-powered sourcing tools: These tools offer a streamlined and efficient way for recruiters to focus less on manual tasks and more on getting the right candidate hired. In every step of the hiring process, iCIMS ATS makes the recruiting process easy. iCIMS ATS delivers 282% ROI and 22% decrease in time to fill for positions compared to industry benchmarks.
External recruitment in action
Here is a step-by-step guide to implementing an effective external recruitment strategy:
- Defining job requirements: Attracting the right candidate starts with defining the job requirements and outlining the role and responsibilities that align with the ideal candidate’s experience. By determining essential job duties, HR can screen candidates with the right background and skill set.
- Sourcing candidates: Whether from social media or job sites, there is usually a vast pool of qualified candidates looking for their next opportunity. iCIMS CXM is a relationship management software that combines behavior-based marketing automation with AI insights to help build talent pipelines.
- Screening and assessment: Forget manually looking through piles of resumes, modern ATS systems leverage AI to automate the sorting and tracking of applications making sure no candidate is missed. iCIMS ATS has robust capabilities to optimize your recruitment processes, deliver reporting and analytics, and get the right candidate hired in less time.
- Interviewing: Interviewing is an integral part of the recruitment process that has changed a lot with remote work culture. Instead of doing in person interviews, a lot of companies are leveraging video to conduct multiple interview rounds with ease and efficiency.
- Offer management: iCIMS’ offer management capabilities can streamline how you create compliant offers, manage the offers you’ve made, and help applicants accept jobs faster. By empowering candidates to accept offers online, on any device, iCIMS speeds up the offer process so you can fulfill business goals faster.
- Onboarding: A smooth onboarding process is essential to setting up a new employee for success in the company. iCIMS cloud-based onboarding software automates the new hire experience that maximizes engagement, accelerates productivity, and creates excitement in the process.
Best practices in external recruitment
External recruitment is not a one-size-fits-all approach. Depending on the industry, role, and company size, it may have different goals and approaches. Here are some actionable tips for optimizing external recruitment:
- Emphasize the importance of a strong employer brand: Building a strong employer brand is the foundation for success in a competitive marketplace with discerning job seekers. It significantly influences a company’s ability to attract and retain top talent. A well-defined employer brand communicates the mission, values, and culture of the company which should align with prospective employers personal beliefs and career aspirations.
- Discuss the value of data-driven recruitment decisions: Whether you are a startup or a large enterprise, you can improve the quality of hires, reduce bias in decision-making, and streamline recruitment operations with data-driven recruitment decisions. Data helps recruiters to identify top-performing candidates more accurately, leading to better job fit and reducing time to hire.
- Highlight the need for a positive candidate experience: In every step of the recruitment process, a company wants to ensure a positive candidate experience. From seamless video interviewing to smooth onboarding, iCIMS ensures that your candidate feels valued and enthusiastic about the recruitment process. According to Forbes, 42% of job seekers have declined offers due to poor candidate experience because it is a reflection on how the company treats their people.
- Explain the significance of diversity and inclusion initiatives in recruitment: Diversity, equity, and inclusion are not just buzzwords, they are the foundation of building a company with a diverse workforce and equitable hiring practices. iCIMS recruiting software empowers you to build authentic relationships with historically excluded groups by letting them know that they are welcomed and valued in your company.
- Stress the importance of continuous learning and adaptation in recruitment strategies: Recruiters can be on the top of their game by leveraging cutting-edge technology, embracing the power of AI and committing to continuous improvement. Whether creating inclusive hiring experiences or learning skills-based hiring approaches, recruitment strategies are constantly evolving with changes in the job market and overall economic conditions that influence the labor market.
Effective external recruitment with iCIMS
Finding the right candidate for the job is a complex process. iCIMS simplifies and streamlines the process with an all-in-one recruiting software that can help you manage the external recruitment process from start to finish.
You can use iCIMS to personalize the candidate experience at scale with ATS, build talent pipelines with our CXM, and ensure smooth onboarding and offer acceptance with our cloud based software solutions. Keep track of the entire hiring process in one place with iCIMS and deliver a positive candidate experience every time while driving ROI for your company.
Want to see iCIMS recruitment software in action? Request a demo.