Not too long ago, Jim Stroud posted a graph on The Recruiters Lounge illustrating who makes more deniro: Recruiters or Sourcers. And the graph inspired me to ponder this: Who the heck is hiring sourcers? Shouldn’t we, as recruiters, be able to handle the work A-Z? If not, why are we getting paid so much with the happy illusion of job security?
At first, I was embarrassed and hid in the corner until the shame subsided. But, then I realized that there is indeed a reason to hire sourcers. And, a darn-tootin’ good one to. Because we need to.
“What?” you say. “Why don’t you quit slacking and pick up the phone?” you add.
Well, yes…I do that. But, I can only do that so much.
Sourcers aren’t hired to do our jobs. They are hired to build pipes. We hand them a profile and we say Go! At that point, they do what sourcers do best. They get on the phone, they mine the web, they start finding people. They are adding to our existing efforts. It’s essentially a way of doubling down on our highest priorities. Now… if things run smoothly, ideally, with the added effort, recruiters begin to see postings come down as positions are filled faster than they would be if only one of you were working on it. If that’s not the case, clearly, you need to examine your ROI.
Back in the day, when I was the sole person recruiting for Xbox software, I was managing over 100 open requisitions. Yes, I will accept your pity, but only briefly. If I wanted to be successful filling those reqs with someone other than a breathing person, or at the very least, a zombie, I needed the help of a sourcer. And, I had a good one, too (she has since moved on to help those evil geniuses at Zynga who kill way too much of my regular day with that stupid Farmville). We followed Kelly’s guidelines, we put together a strategy, and we went at it. With her help, we brought 60+ people into Xbox from outside the company. Without her help… I probably would have cracked and, who knows… Xbox may have come out as little more than the Playstation 3 (oh, SNAP!)
On the flip side, when the economy tanked and both hiring and Microsoft slowed down significantly, the first people to go were the sourcers. Why? Because there was no longer a business need. The work load was such that we could do it ourselves.
My point… corporate recruiters should be able to handle recruiting efforts from front to back. Part of this is sourcing, part is consulting with the hiring manager on candidates, part is interviewing, part is negotiating, etc. But, a good recruiter also knows when to raise his or her hand and say, “I can’t keep this up without some help.”
Just like the dodo bird wrangler, sourcers will be around as long as we need them.
The business reasoning behind using sourcers is sound; however, organizations should be careful that they are not damaging their employment brand when using them. In my case, I am a management consultant. Over the last year, one firm has reached out to me through 3 different sourcers using LinkedIn. There appears to be no communication among the sourcers and none between the sourcers and the firm. Had there been, the sourcers would be aware that I completed the interview process with that firm last spring and eventually turned down their employment offer. They would also be aware that I am on good terms with the internal recruiter and keep in touch currently. With each additional one-off contact from a sourcer, this firm’s communications with me move from legitimate to spam territory.
Chris…this is a very excellent point. And, one that we’ve addressed with our team, in the past. I won’t pretend that we’re different. With a corporation as large as Microsoft, there are many different sourcers working with many different teams. However, within our own business, we tend try to sync pretty frequently. I’ve also become a HUGE fan of LinkedIn Recruiter. We have a group plan. With it, I can see if any of my peers have already reached out to someone. Love that feature.
I gotta confess, I’m doing more and more of my own sourcing these days. This is a throw back to my salad days of 2004. It’s a pain in the neck, what I’m finding is that while sourcers are good at sourcing resumes, they miss alot of opportunities to to match “near-misses” with other searches in my portfolio. Not their fault, exactly, but I have found I was leaving a TON of money on the table by using them. End to end is the way to go.
The perception of the expendability of a Sourcer is directly linked to the misperception of the utilization and skills of a Sourcer. I am not here to scrub the job boards for you. I am not here to run search strings all day and conduct name generation for you. I am not a second class citizen to the “Recruiter”. We are part of a symbiotic relationship. We need each other to survive. I’m recruiting, I’m networking, I’m on the phone, I’m searching the web. We are partners in a marathon, but I will run 75% of the race for you and hand over the baton when it comes to the offer stage. I will take a healthy portion of your engagements and manage the frontend activities and you will close the candidates.
If your company’s utilization of Sourcers is to only conduct simple Boolean logic algorithms and/or fall down the rabbit hole of Job Boards and Applicant Tracking Systems, then you are wasting a valuable resource.