Thursday, 09 February 2012

Volume of candidates causing recruiters to miss quality candidates

Tue, 31 Aug 2010

Despite high levels of unemployment, more than half of recruiters say that the lack of quality candidates is slowing the recruitment process, according to a new survey.

The KellyOGC Global RPO Report 2010 found that 54% of respondents cited quality of candidates as slowing the recruitment process.

Zachary Misko, global director at Kelly Services, Outsourcing & Consulting Group (OGC), told Recruiter: “Many companies assume that because the economy has been poor, finding and attracting quality candidates should be easy.  Not necessarily.  Companies are posting positions and receiving more responses from candidates than they can effectively manage and review to ensure quality candidates are not missed. 

“The sheer numbers of candidates who respond to job postings today make it very difficult to effectively review, screen and qualify candidates in a timely and efficient manner.”

The report was based on responses from 536, mainly HR managers across Europe, the Middle East and Africa, the Americas and Asia Pacific.  It was produced in conjunction with the Human Resources Outsourcing Association.

See Recruiter (1 September), for more reaction to the report.

Readers' comments (2)

  • James Wren | Tue, 31 Aug 2010 3:17 pm

    Kelly Services' Zachary Misko is correct – while the economy was down application rates per job soared.

    Job boards generally need to do a better job of sorting the wheat from the chaff if they want to keep their customers happy.

    We have the technology to apply a unique candidate screening process to qualify candidates based on their application and save our customers time and money. We call it P4P, more information here www.jobserve.com/P4P
    James Wren
    General manager - Search Products & User Experience

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  • Andy Young | Fri, 3 Sep 2010 12:40 pm

    This is a key issue, not just in terms of the recession and the resulting increase in application, but ongoing. Recruiters and clients want to find the quality more speedily and more cost effectively than ever before. Part of the answer will be continuing to invest in technologies capable of improving this area, hopefully significantly. However, there is an ever increasing need to ensure that the candidate experience is enhanced and many are missing this element. Rejected candidates are potentially future candidates further down the line - as well as potential advocates of your business if they get a great experience, rejected or not.

    To this end, at Stopgap we have invested in a team of 'Candidate Support' people. They speak to each and every candidate that chooses to engage with us. It has the dual benefit of making them feel looked after and valued, regardless of whether we can help them or not, as well as remove workload from over-stretched consultants.

    Some will no doubt baulk at the idea of the investment that this will require, but you know what? Already it is paying dividends, both in terms of our enhanced reputation in the marketplace, as well as actually being able to identify the truly talented and more placeable candidates far more rapidly — and that's a win-win for Stopgap and our clients!

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