Quantity vs Quality: Trying to become more efficient

With the advancement of technology, data analytics are becoming a bigger part of everything around us. This has also made its way to the recruiting field. We now have more information than ever regarding how to choose the correct candidates. With this being said we now have an opportunity as recruiters to make the process much more efficient.

In the past we have always focused our efforts on speaking to as many candidates as possible with the thought being the more phone calls made, the better shot you will have at finding the correct candidate. This was an old sales/cold calling theory and it broke down to something along these lines: 500 dials= 100 answers= 10 prospects =1 account/hire. [optinlocker]

With that being said, according to SocialTalent, in 2017 the average recruiter sourced 225 candidates for a single hire, an overall conversion rate of 0.4%.

This leads us to an age old question: Which is better, quality or quantity?

SocialTalent was also able to show the other end of the spectrum: Top performing recruiters, on the other hand, were 150% more efficient. They sourced 91 candidates on average for one hire for an overall conversion rate of 1.0%.

So there appears to be progress within the top end of how to make ourselves more efficient.  Is there really a need to attempt to contact 500 candidates in order to find 1? Out of these 500 resumes you have gone through, how many of these candidates are we speaking to in order to just hit metrics?

There seems to be an increased amount of data and tools becoming available in order to help us better understand a match with candidates. As recruiters, understanding the type of candidate needed for the role should be the first step in increasing our efficiency. Instead of worrying about quantity, using the proper data and tools while understanding the proper candidate should allow us to be able to become more efficient throughout the whole recruitment process.

By Peter Pabon | People Science Talent Advisor I

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