Recruitment Sourcing Strategy

What is a recruitment sourcing strategy?

A recruitment sourcing strategy is a strategy by which viable candidates are identified by organizations with a hiring need or by the executive recruiters or search consultants who have been hired by those organizations. This strategy is composed of multiple candidate sourcing techniques, which are typically used in combination to maximize results.

Basically, there is more than one recruitment sourcing method. The way in which these methods are used depends upon a wide array of factors, some of which include:

• The types of candidates needed
• The preferences of the hiring authorities or recruiters
• Past success (or lack of success) using the method
• The resources at the disposal of the person (or people) utilizing the strategy
• The personnel available to utilize the strategy

And the list goes on and on. The point is this: an overriding talent sourcing strategy is composed of individual candidate sourcing techniques. The way in which the overriding strategy is composed depends at least in part on the factors listed above.

6 of the best sourcing techniques for recruiters

Okay, so now that we know what a recruitment sourcing strategy is and how it’s composed of multiple candidate sourcing techniques, what are some of those techniques?

#1—Sourcing candidates through a recruiting database

Of course, many hiring authorities and recruiters (both in-house and third-part) maintain their own recruiting database of candidates. When these hiring authorities and recruiters have a job order, they often automatically check their own database first as a way of sourcing candidates. Of course, the better your recruiting applicant tracking system is, the more quickly you’ll find the candidates you need.

#2—Sourcing candidates through social media

LinkedIn has become all the rage during the last several years, as countless companies and recruiters have added it to their talent sourcing strategy. They “camp out” within the social media platform on an almost daily, hoping to source high-quality candidates and then recruit them. While it’s true that they also use other social media platforms for sourcing, LinkedIn is most definitely the most effective and most popular method of sourcing candidates through social media.

#3—Sourcing candidates through online job postings

It seems almost everybody does this, right? Well, while just about every company does it, not all recruiters do. There is still a contingent of search consultants that refuse to add job posting boards and job board integration to their candidate sourcing methods. One reason is that online job postings usually attract active job seekers but aren’t great passive recruiting strategies. The latter are usually top performers at their current employer, are busy and compensated well, and aren’t even looking at online job postings.

So do job boards really work? The effectiveness of this candidate sourcing method depends on who you ask.

In addition to searching candidates that have applied to job board postings, try a Google resume search. Many people, especially in the tech space, will have their own websites that frequently host an updated copy of their resume.

#4—Sourcing candidates via referrals

Now this is one of the old-school sourcing strategies for recruiters that never actually gets old. That’s because it’s so darn effective. Organizations have official employee referral programs whereby employees are paid a referral bonus if they refer a candidate who is actually hired. Recruiters also employ such methods of sourcing. Offering a referral fee to candidates that suggest friends or colleagues that are later placed successfully is a very viable technique. The best place to find more candidates like the one you just placed is to ask that individual who they know.

#5—Sourcing candidates from within the organization

This is a technique that organizations often employ, especially if they’re heavy into succession planning. Of course, with this method, the organization does not need the services of a third-party recruiter. That’s because the talent is right there within the company. However, the talent still needs to be convinced to make a move, even though it’s with their current employer.

#6—Sourcing candidates through a recruiter network

We are currently in the midst of a “candidate’s” market.” That means candidates have the upper hand in the marketplace. That means the really good candidates are interviewing with more than one company, they’re often receiving multiple offers of employment, and they have plenty of options from which to choose. On the other hand, we have hiring managers and authorities who never seem to find the candidate they want. A recruiting network can provide a solution, since the recruiters within the network share candidates and job orders.

Happy Hunting !!

Candidate Sourcing Best Practices

I firmly believe that candidate identification is the most critical step in the talent acquisition/recruiting life cycle – you can’t build a relationship with, receive a referral from, network with, or hire someone you haven’t found in the first place.

From the very beginning of my recruiting career, I’ve leveraged technology for talent identification. I’ve learned that searching databases, the Internet, and social media offers intrinsic advantages over other methods of candidate sourcing, and I’ve compiled a list of what I believe are the top 10 best practices for searching for candidates.

So whether you’re searching LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Monster, your ATS/CRM, or you’re Googling for candidate leads on the Internet – following and integrating these search best practices into your candidate sourcing routine can dramatically increase your ability to more quickly find more of the right people.

In no particular order:

#1: Think Before You Search

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the axe.” – Abraham Lincoln

That’s become one of my favorite quotes to use when stressing the importance of thinking before throwing some keywords together and hitting “search.”

Too many sourcers and recruiters are unknowingly picking up dull axes and begin taking swings. I’m not sure if you’ve ever tried chopping down a tree with a dull axe, but it’s neither efficient nor effective, and it requires considerably more effort than necessary. If you just take the time to think, develop some semblance of a search strategy, and experiment with various searches (sharpen your axe!) – you can get to more relevant results more quickly.

For many hiring profiles, you should spend at least 10 -20 minutes thinking about and researching your search strategy, as well as experimenting with search strings and reviewing the results for relevance before you start using the results to begin making calls.

Here is how you can sharpen your axe before you take your first cut:

1. Analyze, interpret, and fully understand the job opening/position requirements.
2. Adhere to the Cardinal Rule of Candidate Sourcing: take your understanding of the position and intelligently select titles, skills, technologies, companies, responsibilities, terms, etc. to include (or purposefully exclude!) in a query employing appropriate Boolean / Extended Boolean operators, query modifiers, and semantic search techniques.
3. While reviewing the results of your initial searches to assess relevance, scan the results for additional and alternate relevant titles, search terms, phrases, and companies that you can incorporate into your next search
4. Based upon the observed relevance of and intel gained from each successive search, modify the search strings appropriately and run them again.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until an acceptably large volume of highly relevant results is achieved.

You should always take time to analyze your search criteria to assess the possibility that your search terms may not find all qualified candidates, and in fact might actually be eliminating viable candidates. I have found that the more time I spend on the front-end of a search, the more relevant my results become, which in turn increases my productivity by enabling me to find more and better candidates more quickly. Imagine that!

Here are a couple of examples of applying the Cardinal Rule of Candidate Sourcing: #1 Searching for Java Developers with JMS, and #2 Searching for LMS Plateau professionals.

#2: Do Not Overanalyze Resumes

Chances are that the people you are trying to find and recruit are not professional resume writers. Whether they are software engineers, lawyers, physical therapists, project managers, or database administrators – they are NOT professional resume writers, nor do I think we should expect them to be.

Writing a great and 100% complete resume isn’t easy. What IS easy is to forget to add some of your responsibilities and every little detail of your professional experience (applications, environments, etc.). Candidates may not think to express every last bit of their experience in their resume – and if you’re looking specifically for one of those little bits and it’s not there, it’s all too easy to assume that the person who wrote the resume doesn’t have the requisite experience you’re looking for. Don’t make assumptions about candidates from their resumes – give them the benefit of the doubt. Ever hear the phrase, “Don’t judge a book by its cover?”

Resumes are by nature imperfect and are poor representations of a person’s experience and capabilities, so I suggest you apply what I call the “10-second rule:” Don’t read resumes – scan them. If you can’t absolutely disqualify/rule out a candidate based on reviewing their resume in 10 seconds, pick up the phone and call them.

You’ll be pleasantly surprised. You’ll call people you would not likely have called before, and you’ll find out that some of those candidates actually DO have the skills and experience you need – it just wasn’t obviously or explicitly expressed in their resume.

Always remember – you (and/or your clients) hire PEOPLE, not PAPER.

#3: Do Not Run Overly Generic/Basic Searches

If you run generic searches with perhaps one title and a couple of basic keywords – you’ll be sure to get correspondingly generic and basic results. I’ve heard many a recruiter complain about getting “too many results.” People making this mistake unknowingly increase the size of the Hidden Talent Pool of candidates they don’t find.

Don’t rely solely or heavily on title-based searches. Not all companies use the same titles for the same roles and responsibilities – so making this mistake contributes to you populating Hidden Talent Pools with every candidate that matches your hiring profile or job order but has a title that you didn’t think of and include in your search. See best practice #1 above.

Don’t rely solely on using skill/tech terms (e.g., Java, Oracle, Accounts Payable, SOX, etc.) when creating your Boolean search strings. Technical terms such as programming languages, operating systems, and databases will only give you results of people who mention those terms in their resumes. Mentioning buzz words does not imply any degree of responsibility or capability.

The most effective searches reach beyond skill/technology term matching and into the realm of semantic search by include responsibility terms (administer, configure, create, manage, reconcile, coordinate, design, etc.) and environmental terms (enterprise, host*, etc.) where applicable. This is the first step in moving beyond simple buzz-word bingo.

#4: See Each Resume as More than a Potential Match for the Position You’re Working on

Any source of candidates you have access to can be leveraged in much the same way as LinkedIn can – every person is actually a conduit to a larger network of people. So even if a particular resume or social media profile you’re reviewing doesn’t appear to be an ideal match – they actually might be (see #3 above), and they may know someone who is.

If you find yourself scanning a search result that appears to be under- or over-qualified – remember to not make assumptions about candidates based on their resume/profile, and also be aware that people who are in fact too junior or too senior for your current needs might fit future needs. Additionally, people who are either too junior or too senior for a particular position might work with or know someone who is an exact match.

#5: Run Multiple Searches Across Multiple Sources

Now matter how strong your sourcing skills are or how many times you’ve recruited for the same position, you should always run multiple searches. It’s impossible for one Boolean search to find all qualified candidates.

It is also critical to leverage every resource you have available to you. You may be in love with LinkedIn, but the best candidates for that special position you’re working on may be tucked away in your database/ATS, or on Twitter!

If you think you’ve exhausted a particular source of candidates – believing that you’ve found all of the available matches and cannot find any more – you’re wrong. Invariably you’ve left behind Hidden Talent Pools of people who do match your positions, but you could not find them because your Boolean search strings and perhaps even your entire search strategy made it impossible to do so.

Being aware of this is a major step on the path towards sourcing enlightenment. See best practices #1 and #3.

#6: Search ALL Resumes

I’m aware that there are MANY users of resume databases (online or internal) who focus specifically on resumes posted/entered in the last 30 days, assuming these are the candidates to target because they are “on the market.”

You do NOT know anything about a candidate until you establish contact with them. Just because their resume was posted yesterday, it does not mean they are “actively” seeking a new position. I’ve spoken to many people who happened to recently post their resume into my own database on on a job board, and once I made contact, they explained they were just “checking to see what’s out there.”  Doesn’t sound too “active” to me!

Also, just because a resume is 3-6+ months old – you have NO idea what their job search status is. You cannot safely assume they are not looking and are “off the market.”

They could be:

1. Still passively looking, having not found the right match yet.
2. Available because they are finishing up a contract position they took 3-6 months ago.
3. In a new position, but extremely unhappy because it’s nothing like they were led to believe it would be.
4. In a new position, but their a) boss is leaving, b) position is in jeopardy due to layoffs, c) division is being acquired, etc. – you get the drift.

Ultimately, you should want to find the BEST candidates possible, regardless of silly job search status labels (active, passive, blech!). Everyone is a candidate!

Never limit yourself to only searching resumes posted in the last 30 days – some of the best passive and active candidates have resumes 31 to 365 + days “old.”

And most people don’t call them.

#7: Don’t be a Sourcing Snob

Despite popular opinion to the contrary, job board resume databases are not filled with desperate, low quality candidates. In fact, it’s statistically impossible. There are plenty of “A” candidates available in each and every job board resume database – major or niche.

If your experience suggests otherwise, perhaps it’s your searches or your search strategy. If you go fishing in the ocean and don’t catch the particular species of fish you were hoping to, would you be able to assume that there were no fish of that type in the ocean that day? Of course not. Just because YOU didn’t catch the fish you were looking for, it doesn’t mean they weren’t there to be caught.

And if you’re the type who believes that the job board resume databases are filled with “active” candidates, you might be surprised to know that approximately 75% of all resumes in the major job boards resume databases are dated over 30 days old. Some are 2-4+ years old. Are they still “active” candidates? Do you think anyone’s calling them?

Don’t be a sourcing snob. As I pointed out in best practice #6 – your goal should be to find the BEST possible candidates, regardless of what “side of the tracks” they live on.

#8: Don’t Submit the First 2 -3 Candidates You Find/Speak With

Sound crazy? I can hear someone asking, “Why shouldn’t I submit the first candidates I find that fit the requirements?”

Well, ask yourself this – what’s the statistical probability that the first two people you find and speak to magically happen to be the BEST candidates you can possibly find? Or the most closeable and controllable?

Recruiting candidates should not be conducted on a FIFO basis, but on a BIFO (Best In, First Out) basis.  Find and speak to 10-15 candidates and then submit your BEST.

Talent selection based on FIFO methods is like a single person walking into a bar and leaving with the first person that speaks to them. There is no “selection.”

You saw it here first. Think about it.

#9: Seek to Continually Improve Your Candidate Sourcing Skills

As a sourcing/recruiting professional, one of your goals should be to get better at what you do on a daily basis.  Not just meeting your objectives and KPI’s – but actually improving your sourcing and recruiting skills and ability.

Geoff Colvin cuts to the root of the matter, pointing out that “Most fundamentally, what we generally do at work is directly opposed to the first principle [of deliberate practice]: It isn’t designed by anyone to make us better at anything. Usually it isn’t designed at all: We are just given an objective that’s necessary to meeting the employer’s goals and then expected to get on with it.” Ouch – that hurts Geoff…but you’re right on the money!

As a sourcer/recruiter, you can perform deliberate practice, which is specifically designed to improve performance by getting you out of your comfort zone and continually stretching you just beyond your current ability. Ever hear the cliche of, “If you’re not getting better, you’re getting worse?”

Unfortunately, when most people “practice” on the job, they are just doing what they’ve always done, going through the same old motions – which does nothing to improveperformance. Unlike many professional athletes, most business professionals (including sourcers and recruiters) do not go to work every day specifically trying to get better at what they do. It’s something many people may talk about, but very few people actually do.

Be one of those few.

#10: Spend 80% of Your Sourcing Time Using High-Yield Sources

Why spend a lot of time trying to squeeze blood from a stone? I feel there are many sourcers and recruiters spending too much time focusing on intrinsically low-yield candidate sources.

For example – some people spend countless hours searching the Internet for candidate leads at the expense of not heavily/effectively leveraging their internal resume database/ATS. While you can certainly find great people on the Internet, the Internet is not indexed specifically to enable sourcing and requires many tricks and tweaks to yield relevant results.

If you have access to an ATS or internal resume database – it’s specifically designed to store and retrieve resumes, and probably has more local and more qualified candidates than the Internet, and might actually have a better search interface enabling more precise searching to find more of the right people more quickly.

To top it off, your ATS/CRM is filled with people that have already expressed interest in your company (at some point in time) and with candidates that you or other sourcers/recruiters found elsewhere and entered in! And when it comes to finding candidates on the Internet vs. the job board resume databases, see these two articles for an eye-opening apples-to-apples comparison of Monster vs. Google search results, see Monster vs. Google Round 1 and Round 2. Facts are facts, folks.

High yield sources of candidates are #1 Highly Searchable, and #2 Deep on candidate data. Of the social networking sites out there, LinkedIn is the most searchable and has the deepest candidate data, and you don’t need more than a free account to leverage it like a rock star. Also – if you have access to any of the major job boards – they have highly effective search capability, actually have a larger percentage of “passive” job seekers than “active,” and they have some fantastic candidates – see best practices #6 and #7.

Final Thoughts

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I feel it represents some of the highest impact candidate sourcing best practices. If you have a candidate sourcing best practice to add to the list – please let me know.

Thanks, and happy hunting!

This article is part of the Boolean Black Belt archives here on SourceCon.

Recruitment Process Steps

The recruitment process. That process by which organizations find new employees. Sounds simple, right?

Wrong! If it was simple, every organization would do it and they would do it well. The fact of the matter is that they don’t. That’s one of the many reasons they hire executive search consultants to help them. (Or at least they should.)

What is the recruitment process?

A recruitment process is an organization-specific model of candidate sourcing for the purpose of finding and hiring new employees. Typically, the ownership of the recruitment process resides within the Human Resources function, although companies also use third-party recruiting firms. Ownership can vary depending upon the specific organizational structure of the company carrying out the process.

Are the hiring process steps always the same?

Of course, every organization and company is different. What works well for one company may not work well for another. That’s why the ability to be self-aware is a crucial component of the recruiting process. You can’t do what sounds like it might work within your organization. You must do what does work.

One thing that organizations (your clients) must remember is that the recruitment procedure involves actual recruiting. That’s because these organizations should be going after top-shelf, A-level candidates. These type of candidates need to be recruited. Why? Because they’re not actually looking for a job! They’re probably already being paid well and treated well by their current employer. However, recruiting passive candidates is NOT easy.

That’s why a company’s recruitment procedure should not just consist of submitting a position to online job posting boards, sitting back, and waiting for the applications to roll in. That’s not going to result in the sourcing and hiring of the best candidates possible. It might result in the sourcing and hiring of the best candidates actively looking for a new job. It’s not the same thing.

When company officials examine their organization’s hiring process steps, they must have a proactive mindset. In other words, their focus should be on identifying, recruiting, interviewing, hiring, and retaining the best candidates available in the marketplace. (Regardless of whether they’re actively seeking new employment). That—in a nutshell—is what the recruitment process is all about.

Recruitment process steps

But . . . there’s a little more to it than that, as you might imagine. Okay, so company officials must be self-aware and know what works for their organization and what doesn’t. They must also act proactively and have the proper frame of mind at the outset. Creating a basic recruitment flowchart can sometimes be helpful to keep you on track.

With all of this in mind, below are the 10 basic steps in the recruitment process. (Remember, the process in individual to each organization, meaning they might omit steps, add steps, move them around, or all three.)

#1—Identifying the hiring need

You can’t find what you need . . . if you don’t know what you need. It’s not enough to know that you need [insert position title here]. You must also know the complete job description. However, you must know the description as the last employee who left in the position left it, NOT the description when that person took the job. That’s because chances are good that they took on new/additional responsibilities while in the position. Now the job when they left is different than they job when they arrived.

#2—Planning

Once you’ve identified exactly what you need (both in terms of hard skills and soft skills), then it’s time to put a plan together to find what you need. You know what they say: “When you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” Yadda-yadda-yadda . . . except it’s absolutely correct. Make sure that you get the “buy in” of everybody involved with the hiring process on the steps that will be taken and the communication channels that will be used. All it takes is one misstep to blow everything up.

#3—Searching

This is a case where you need to be a “hunter” and not a “gatherer.” Too many companies are “gatherers,” thinking that superstar candidates are going to rain down from the sky like so much manna. No, they are not. Once again, this is why companies hire “headhunters.” They hunt, they do not gather. Not only that, but they’re good at what they do. Hiring authorities and even companies with internal recruiters often cannot match the expertise and connections of a recruiter who “works in the trenches” of the industry day after day.

#4—Identifying viable candidates

Finding candidate is also not enough. An organization (or its recruiter) must also find qualified candidates. Anybody can find candidates. They’re everywhere. But those high-level A-players, the kind of candidates your competition would kill for? They’re NOT everywhere. So searching for them, finding them, and identifying them will be more difficult if the first three steps in the process have not been undertaken.

#5—Recruiting of A-level candidates

Once viable candidates have been identified, they must be recruited. In other words, they must be sold on not only the opportunity, but also on the organization. Some organizations miss this important distinction. Top candidates are not just interested in a great new job. They’re interested in a great new job with a great new employer. If they like the job, but they don’t also like the employer, then they’re not going to take the job. As mentioned above, recruiting is a major facet of the recruitment process.

#6—(Telephone) screening

Sure, you have a batch of viable candidates, most likely passive candidates, who are interested in the position. But not every single one of them are going to make it through the process. That brings us to the first screening stage of the process, the telephone interview. Ideally, you would have a list of 10 to 15 very strong candidates, all of whom are interested in the position. The phone screening serves to whittle that list down, so that you can move to the next stage of the process, which is . . .

#7—(Face-to-face) interviewing

There are two important aspects of this part of the recruitment process:

1. It can’t stretch out too long, or candidates involved will lose interest.
2. Employers must communicate to candidates where they are in the process and what to expect in the near term or they will start looking elsewhere. This is a particular danger with top candidates, since they are more than likely interviewing with more than one organization.

Sure, there are other important aspects of the interview stage, but these are the two that companies neglect the most, with predictably dire consequences.

#8—Offering of employment

The offer stage is one of the most delicate stages of the recruiting process. A hiring manager should never take for granted that a candidate is going to accept an offer. However, if they’ve done all of the proper work beforehand and they’ve double and triple-checked everything, then the candidate should accept the majority of the time. Here’s an important note: if an organization is working with a search consultant, the hiring manager of that organization should let the search consultant extend the offer. That’s what the candidate expects, and that’s what should happen.

#9—Hiring of the candidate

Why are the offer step and the hire step not combined into one step? Because not every offer of employment is accepted. If every offer was accepted, then yes, we could do that. If a #1 candidate rejects the offer, then the company might extend the offer to their #2 candidate . . . or their #3 candidate, if #2 falls through. Once a candidate does accept the offer of employment, though, that’s when the official hire can be made.

#10—Onboarding of the candidate

What’s the point of hiring the best candidates in the marketplace if you can’t retain those candidates after you’ve hired them? A comprehensive onboarding process is perhaps the most crucial steps in the recruiting process. When we refer to onboarding, we’re talking about more than just new employee paperwork and knowing where the bathrooms are located. We’re talking about continuing to make the candidate/new employee feel wanted before they officially join the organization. Many a company has failed to do that, only to see their new employee never show up for their first day of work.

Thankyou!! Happy Hunting!!

Lets try to Understand Human Resources Job Titles and Duties

Hi Friends,

Hope you are doing Well!!

Today, Lets get an idea about the HR Job Titles and their Duties. HR’s career ladder is never quite clear. But lets try to find out the HR  career ladder.

Today we’ll look at some of the various common titles as well as some career development choices you’ll have to make as an HR pro (generalist, specialist, or recruiting tracks).

List of Human Resources Job Titles and Duties

• HR Assistant/Intern-Performs lower level, repetitive HR tasks. Takes direction from senior HR staff. More info on this specific role in the Entry Level HR Jobs guide.

• HR Specialist/Generalist/Administrator-Performs tasks within a range of focus areas and of varying complexity. (See chart below for different career tracks of specialist and generalist.)

• HR Manager-Manages HR department staff and accomplishes high level HR activities reserved for senior level staff (negotiating with vendors, creating policies, etc.).

• HR Director-In some companies this position is very similar to the HR Manager role. The key difference is that in smaller companies the HR director can report directly to the CEO.

• VP of HR-Normally seen only in mid-size or larger companies, this is a top level HR position. Decisions are made at high levels with significant impact to the organization. Strategically focused.

• Chief HR Officer (CHRO)-Normally seen only in mid-size or larger companies, this is a top level HR position. Decisions are made at high levels with significant impact to the organization. Strategically focused. Works with other “C-suite” individuals to develop HR plans affecting the entire company.

Human Resources Job Titles-Progressing Up the Ladder

Check out the diagram below for a general idea of the career progression for an HR pro. The basic idea (in my opinion) is the higher up the chain you go, the less hands-on HR work you do (recruiting, employee relations, etc.) and the more strategic you get (negotiating with vendors, working to forecast staffing levels and recruiting plans, etc.). Also, the higher you go, the bigger the decision-making power and impact.

One thing to note is the split after the first row. There are numerous career tracks, and there are rarely two people who follow the exact same path.

Human Resources Job Titles-Specialist vs. Generalist

Do you want to be a specialist or a generalist? It depends on a number of factors, including personal preference. Some people love training and development. Others want to work in labor relations. If that’s your calling, then by all means go for it and find a job that will sustain your passion for HR in that niche. Company size can also affect the call toward either side of the spectrum.

A smaller company will want a generalist that can handle the variety of tasks that fall under the HR umbrella.

Larger companies need subject matter experts. As an example, they want someone who doesn’t just have a grasp on the Family Medical Leave Act-they want someone who can tell them the nuances of it, where their legal risk might be, and how to develop training to ensure managers handle it well.

Recruiting-HR’s Cousin

This is a question I get quite a few times, so I wanted to cover it here. For a new HR pro, recruiting can be a differentiation tool. Learning to recruit and source candidates is a highly marketable skill, and it can set you apart from other candidates all other things being equal.

One word of caution-I’ve worked with people who spent years in recruiting roles who wanted to move to HR, but their extensive recruiting experience pigeonholed them as a “recruiter,” not as an HR pro. I would say that there is a limit to how many years you can work as a recruiter and still be a viable candidate for HR positions.

50+ Recruitment terms you need to know about

Hi Friends, 

Here we are starting with some basics terms of recruitment Industry about them you should aware. Some terms are very simple you will understand through its name only and some you can read. However i have tried to explain all the basic terms if you have any term apart from these in your mind, can comment below. Will try to revert you shortly. 

1. Job seeker - any individual looking at job opportunities, with minimal to significant interest in actually applying and accepting a new role.

     2. Active job seeker - an individual very interested in finding a new job             opportunity. may or may not be currently unemployed but is motivated            to fill out applications and take interviews.

3. Passive job seeker - an individual who is less interested in finding a new job immediately. They may be employed and just looking at job opportunities to ‘get a sense of what is out there.’

4. Candidates - job seekers who have successfully applied for a job and meet the qualifications to proceed to pre-screening.

5. Hiring team - the collection of employees chosen to give feedback on candidates and participate in pre-determined stages of the selection process. Could be a combination of hiring manager, direct managers, recruiters, or other employees. Who makes up the hiring team can vary or depend entirely on the role to be filled. 

6. Recruitment agency - an outside organization that may be enlisted to help source qualified candidates for an important or difficult-to-fill role. 

7. Recruiter - a professional that works inside an organization or externally (through a recruitment agency or as an independent) to source candidates.

8. Candidate sourcing - the process of attracting candidates to a job posting and enticing them applying into the talent pool.

9. Candidate selection - selecting the best candidate to make an offer to. This entire process includes pre-screening, interviewing, deliberation, and other checks or assessments.

10. Hiring funnel - the steps that move a candidate from application to offer. The steps of a hiring funnel depend on the practices of the hiring team Ex: How many interview rounds are involved.

11. Strategic hiring - any approach to hiring that considers business goals, recruitment or industry trends, and/or recruitment analytics when making smart job promotion and hiring decisions.

12. Job posting - or, job ad. An outline of an open job opportunity that is promoted to attract candidates.  Includes information about the company, role, and requirements. It should be engaging but realistic

13. Qualifications - the requirements for a role. Typically includes education, years of experience, certifications, language requirements, skills, etc.

14. Core Skills - the necessary skills a candidate needs to have to do the job successfully. Less formal than qualifications, core skills may include items like teamwork, public speaking, and writing.

15. Cover Letter - a professional letter written by the job seeker to express their interest in a job opportunity and express why they are the best fit. Some organizations require cover letters, but others do not, depending on their selection requirements.

16. Resume - formal document created by the job seeker that is used to present a summary of their career. Resumes should list contact info, education, skills, and employment history. Some job seekers also include volunteerism, references, or portfolio items.

17. Job board - a website or page of a website for job seekers, where employers and recruiters promote job postings.

18. Culture fit - identifying candidates that not only have the skills and qualifications for the role but also share company values and would enjoy working in the team and work environment.

19. Phone interview - typically the first interview conducted with the candidate, which involves a brief round of questions to ensure they qualify for the role. Phone interviews help to determine whether the candidate will be move to the next round of interviews.

20. Panel interview - an in-person or video interview with two or more interviewers. Sometimes several job seekers participate in the same interview, depending on the situation.

21. Introduction questions - used to start the interview and help the candidate feel comfortable. Typically open-ended questions such as, “Tell me more about you” and, “Why do you think you’d be a good fit for this job”?

22. Behavioural questions - give interviewers an opportunity to ask the candidate more about their past work experience and what they’ve learned from it. Ex: “Tell me about a time when you…”

23. Situational questions - questions that help determine how the candidate thinks through and responds to hypothetical scenarios they could face in the role you’re looking to fill. It’s a chance to see how they draw from their experience, as well as, plan out how to react to challenges. Ex: “What is the first thing you would you do when dealing with a frustrated customer’s complaint?”

24. Culture fit questions - interview questions that aim to get insights from the candidate about their personality, ideal work environment, and the work style. See #30 “Culture fit.”

25. Role-specific questions - interview questions that are directly related to the role the candidate wants to fill. For example, if you’re hiring an accountant, you may want to ask about reporting software and gauge their understanding of accounting terminology.

26. Interview scorecard - a customized scoring tool some hiring teams use to measure candidates’ interview responses against key criteria. Usually designed in-house by the hiring team. An interview scorecard can help to reduce bias and standardize the hiring process.

27. Background check - a candidate screening practice often completed for positions of high security or trust (Ex: roles in banking or a school system). Background checks are processed by a government agency or private company. Most commonly check for criminal history, but may also involve commercial and financial records.

28. Personality and behaviour assessments - a candidate screening practice some employers use to gain insights into the candidate's personality or behaviours in the workplace. Usually involves written or online tests that assess for role and culture fit.

29. Onboarding process - an HR Best Practice for introducing a new hire to the team and work environment. This organized process may begin after an offer is accepted, and may go for several weeks. Onboarding includes but is not limited to; a company tour, meeting new colleagues, getting setup with software, email accounts, passwords, and job training.

30.Recruitment - Recruitment is the process of identifying, screening and hiring the most suitable candidate for a job vacancy.
- The candidate might be hired internally or from external sources
- The process must be performed in timely and cost effective manner

31. Sourcing - Sourcing is the process of finding resumes within the recruitment process. Sourcing refers to the initial part of recruiting (actually finding the candidates through a variety of methods.) Some recruiters perform the sourcing function through to placement; other recruiting professionals specialize in only one aspect of the recruitment cycle. Professional recruiters who specialize only in the initial procurement of names and candidates are called sourcers.

32. Sourcing and Social Recruitment - These are two different terms that are indirectly connected with each other. Social recruiting refers to the use of social media for finding and recruiting candidates. Sourcing refers to networking and searching in different professional streams for finding candidates including the social media and professional conferences.

33. Talent Acquisition - Some positions in the companies require specific types of talent for job completion. The ability to hire specific talent for a specific job is called talent acquisition.

34. Talent Pool or Pipeline - Most of the companies establish pools of profiles as backup storage of talented candidates. These are called talent pools or talent pipelines. If any one of the employees resigns from the post without completing post-resignation tenure, the position can be immediately refilled with the use of talent pools or pipelines.

35. Recruitment Timeline - The process, steps, and time required for completing the recruitment of one candidate is called recruitment timeline.

36. JD - Job Description (sometimes known as JS/Job Specification) - A list of the responsibilities, requirements, qualifications, preferred skills, application process, benefits and other relevant information. Often forms part of a job advert.

37. Head Hunter - A recruiter who focuses on searching for a qualified candidate for a specific role, usually for more senior positions, sometimes approaching those who might not be actively seeking a new role.

38. In-house Recruiter - A recruitment professional that finds and places candidates in the company they currently work for.

      39. Niche Recruiter - Refers to a recruiter who operates solely within a specific field          and/ or sector.

40. C-Level Jobs - C-level jobs refer to highest level senior jobs like CEO and CTO.

41. Entry Level Job - A position that does not require in depth experience, largely aimed at graduates and those entering a specialism for the first time.

42. Internship - Usually an unpaid position for someone to gain work experience. Popular with the Graduate recruitment market.

43. Company Culture - Company culture is the sum of the business and includes the values, routines, work environment, management structures, expectations, and objectives of a company.

44. Direct Hire - Term used when a candidate is not an employee of the staffing company but is directly on the client company payroll.

45. Human Resources - A department responsible for the management of employees. Responsibilities generally include (but are not limited to) recruitment, training and retention.

46. Job Analysis - The process of gathering information about a job to identify and describe the duties, tasks, and abilities necessary to perform the job.

47. Job Board 
A job board is a place to look for or advertise a job online. Recruitment professionals can utilise job boards to get their positions in front of the right candidates.

48. Recruitment Software - Software that helps recruitment professionals find, engage and place candidates with clients.

49. RPO - Recruitment Process Outsourcing - A form of business process outsourcing where an employer transfers all or part of its recruitment processes to an external provider. RPO providers can manage the entire recruiting/hiring process or can manage one or two aspects of the process, essentially serving as an extension of the company’s HR department. This can form part or full transfer of your recruitment operations to a capable recruitment agency. The nominated agency can act on behalf of the company and actively create efficiencies, cost savings and process improvements. An RPO looks at efficiencies and uses agency experience, reputation and capability to source direct candidates and implement talent pooling while reinforcing the company brand and EVP.

50. HRIS (Human Resources Information System) - A technology solution used to manage personnel and includes facilities such as holiday and sickness reporting and monitoring.

51. Boolean or Boolean Search - George Boole, the famous computer pioneer and mathematician created this term. Boolean search or Boolean is a systematic process of logical thinking and finding ways of optimising your search for specific jobs. For example, if you want to search candidates for Project Managers in the field of Construction, you can use different keywords like Construction Project Manager, Construction Engineer, and others to optimise your online search. The tactics of Boolean search differ on the basis of medium you are using to search the candidates.

52. KPI (Key Performance Indicator) - A value to measure performance against a target. An example of this in a recruitment context is ‘time to hire’ where the value is the amount of days to recruit from a job going live to a candidate’s offer or  start date.

53. PES (Pre Employment Screening) - The process of performing background checks of potential employees and validating the applicant’s work and experience. PES can also uncover any criminal history, workers compensation claims or previous employment issues.

54. SLA (Service Level Agreements) - An agreement of commitment between the service provider and client to set out the expected performance level.

55. On-Boarding - This is the process for new employees to gain the essential company knowledge, skills, values and behaviours to become effective as soon as possible.

Happy Sourcing!!