2�e Tru FilesNEW ROLE OF THE RECRUITER

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@BillBoorman and Maria Rosploch

We scoured presentations and conversations from the last twelve months of TRU events to bring you the best forward-looking ideas in the field of recruiting. 48

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ATTENDEES BIG IDEAS

10/03

IN A WORLD WHERE PROFESSIONALS AND HIRING MANAGERS ARE JUST THREE DEGREES OF SEPARATION FROM HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS (IF NOT MILLIONS) OF PEOPLE, WHAT EXACTLY IS THE ROLE OF A RECRUITER?

A LOOK AT THREE NEW RECRUITING ROLES

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THE THREE FUTURE ROLES OF RECRUITING

TALENT ATTRACTORS

SUPER RECRUITERS

LOGISTICS

In the 1970s the evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar posited that as members of social groups, people are able to manage approximately 150 relationships.

His groundbreaking work began with the study of monkeys and apes, but Dunbar extrapolated

his findings to apply to humans in business and the military. Beyond 150 individuals in your

tribe, Dunbar explained, and you exceed your cognitive limits.1 The theorem came to be known

among social scientists as Dunbar’s Number.

And of course it makes intuitive sense. Pre-Facebook and LinkedIn, a single individual could

only claim to know well a modest number of colleagues. Reaching beyond your immediate

network required significant effort (e.g. attending social events, making cold calls, asking

for introductions). In such a world, the role of the recruiter was tremendously powerful. The

recruiter’s black book was a network multiplier, reaching across companies and geographies to

identify and recruit talent for critical professional roles.

Dunbar’s Number still holds sway today. Look at your 500+ connections on LinkedIn, and it’s

likely you don’t really know but a small fraction of the whole very well. But what’s changed

is that job seekers no longer depend on the recruiter’s black book to reach beyond their

immediate network.

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1 http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20121206195559-1213-how-large-is-your-network-the-power-of-2nd-and-3rd-degree-connections

Through dozens of massive social networks and tens of thousands of niche networks,

candidates can identify jobs, and how members of their own network are connected to

those jobs. (LinkedIn alone hosted a staggering 5.7 billion professional searches in 2012.2)

Job seekers can also access what it’s like to work at a particular company, salary information,

corporate benefits and culture … all the information a recruiter once controlled. And the reverse

is also true: Companies seeking talent are no longer wholly dependent on recruiters—at least

not for 80 percent of the jobs they need to fill.

And keep in mind social media isn’t the only technology reshaping recruiters’ roles. Recruiters

used to screen the initial applicant pool and make recommendations for first- and second-round

interviews; however, more and more the initial screening and assessment function is handled by

an applicant tracking system (ATS). Applicant tracking systems have become more robust and

now include more refined capabilities—such as sourcing, assessing skills and fit based on data

gleaned from social networks, and hosting on-demand video interviews.

In a world in which professionals and hiring managers are just three degrees of separation from

hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of people, what exactly is the role of a recruiter? And

if applicant tracking systems continue to grow in scope and accuracy—essentially automating

many aspects of the recruiter’s job—what responsibilities will recruiters own in the future?

2 http://www.slideshare.net/r39132/linkedins-segmentation-targeting-platform

�e Tru FilesASSESSMENTS

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�e Tru FilesVIDEO INTERVIEWING

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For a more detailed look at

the technologies changing

how companies screen

potential candidates, see

Assessments ebook and

Video Interviewing ebook.

Visit www.kellyocg.com/Knowledge/The_Tru_Files/

/06

THE NEW ROLE OF THE RECRUITERBased on all these developments, we see three primary recruiting roles taking shape.

Super Recruiters: These are big-picture recruiting strategists who will steer the employer

brand, influence outsourcing and technology purchasing, and collaborate with corporate talent

management executives. Super recruiters won’t be involved in day-to-day hiring decisions, but

will help plan for future talent management needs and infrastructure.

Talent Attractors: This new breed of recruiter won’t be responsible for sourcing any

individual candidate, but rather will build long-term relationships with professionals who may

either become candidates in the future or influence future candidates. Talent

Attractors will borrow lessons from so-called content marketers. They will behave as publishers

and view professionals as their audience. Rather than promote their own brand, they will

answer questions and publish educational information to help would-be job seekers.

/07

Using social media channels, they will form relationships with in-demand professionals and

grow to understand their needs and interests. Essentially, Talent Attractors will take the long

view, forming connections that may bear fruit months or years from now.

Logistics: Finally, the largest portion of recruiters will continue to work as process

administrators through promoting open positions, sourcing talent from existing and new talent

pools, scheduling interviews for hiring managers and teams, and overseeing assessments.

These individuals will not influence hiring decisions—this role will fall to internal hiring

managers—but will manage the end-to-end hiring process. Most recruiters today occupy the

logistics category, even though they may describe themselves differently.

/08

/09

RECRUITMENT OUTSOURCINGWe believe companies will continue to wrest greater control over their relationship with job candidates and bring more and more recruiting activities in-house.

After all, if some portion of your recruiting team is engaged in longer-term relationship-

building with candidates, then it makes sense that it’s an internal function. The problem is that

many companies simply don’t have the skill sets in place to master the end-to-end recruiting

function—particularly in certain specialized fields or dispersed geographies. We see two

interesting trends evolving related to recruiting outsourcing:

Agency Outsourcing: In the past, companies would engage agencies to fill 80 percent

of open positions (i.e. a wide array of repeatable positions) and use internal recruiting teams

to source the more specialized 20 percent (i.e. scarce but strategically critical talent such as

developers or engineers). In fact, the situation should be reversed. Companies should hire

agencies to source the niche, high-demand roles—where access, speed and domain expertise

are critical—and source general administrative and operational roles using in-house recruiters.

We predict generalized recruiting agencies will struggle to compete against niche players

with unique access to specialized talent. For example, a niche player may employ a retired

automotive engineer to recruit a highly specialized type of engineering talent within a specific

geographical location. The margins for such engagements are much higher than generalized

recruiting, and a small player can compete against the largest agencies if they’ve built

relationships in these micro-communities.

By the same token, the largest agencies that employ recruiting generalists find strong

competition from in-house recruiters because the level of expertise needed to achieve general

administrative and operations recruiting is lower.

Recruitment Process Outsourcing: A second model is the RPO. As companies

try to pull more recruiting responsibility back in-house, RPOs offer companies an intermediate

step between outsourcing 80 percent of recruiting efforts and bringing the same percentage

in-house (which may take eight to ten years to complete). Like agencies, RPOs have expertise

in specific talent disciplines or geographies. But even more, RPOs also help companies develop

critical competencies, such as effective processes and procedures, and regulatory and risk-

management expertise.

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As parts and portions of the recruiting function get re-assigned, whether through automation or

outsourcing, it’s important to remember that the outlook for recruiters is actually quite exciting.

Some of the administrative, paper-pushing duties of recruiting will be taken up by technology

and recruiters will have more time to focus on attraction rather than rejection.

For recruiters hoping to evolve quickly and embrace the more strategic roles of Super Recruiters

and Talent Attractors, it’s critical they think about acquiring new skills in areas like financial

management, forecasting and statistics (for the former), and digital marketing and social media

(for the latter). We would compare the current rate of change in recruiting to that which felled

many marketers in the last five to seven years. As any veteran marketer would share, you must

adapt or suffer the ignominy of irrelevance.

Weighing the new role

of the recruiters in your

organization will take time,

and a long process of study

and analysis. Consider

beginning with these steps:

NEW ROLE OF THE RECRUITER: ACTIONABLE INSIGHTS

WHERE TO START?

Assess your current state.

Use a whiteboard session to

map out your current process

from the job candidates’

perspective. Discuss frankly

what’s working, and what’s

not working. Also look for

opportunities to introduce

technology to solve certain

labor-intensive recruiting

activities (see Assessment,

Video Interviewing and

Sourcing Technology ebooks).

Visit www.kellyocg.com/Knowledge/The_Tru_Files/

Envision a future state.

Imagine what would improve

if your organization adopted

the new roles of recruiting

outlined here. What

problems would be solved?

What new issues may arise?

Try to imagine the concrete

steps needed to adapt your

current recruiting activities.

Get C-level buy-in.

Changes this profound won’t

take place without senior

leadership on board. Before

proceeding any further,

package up initial findings

and secondary research to

understand whether senior

executives “get it.” Gauge

their level of buy-in, and

how it ties in to future

business imperatives.

To learn more about how the

role of recruiting ties in to

other key changes within your

talent attraction organization,

see Culture Branding ebook

and Candidate Experience

ebook.

Visit www.kellyocg.com/Knowledge/The_Tru_Files/

�e Tru FilesCULTURE BRANDING

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�e Tru FilesASSESSMENTS

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�e Tru FilesSOURCING TECHNOLOGY

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�e Tru FilesCANDIDATE EXPERIENCE

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/13

I first discovered the Unconference concept when I led a track at #RecruitFest in Toronto in

1999. I was taken aback by the way discussion flowed and how different the format was to a

traditional conference. I led a track all day under a tree and learnt far more than I gave.

Two months later and back in the UK, we ran the first #truLondon at Canary Wharf in November

2009. Today, we’re running dozens of #tru events a year across Europe, North America, Africa

and the Asia-Pacific. Thousands of recruiters, HR leaders and providers come together in an

informal spirit of information sharing and networking.

#tru is based on the BarCamp principle, which means that everybody can be an active

participant instead of listening to speakers and watching presentations all day. The emphasis is

on communication and the free exchange of ideas and experiences where the participants fuel

the conversations.

THE #TRU STORY

BILL BOORMAN

Recruitment activity today tends to be reactive, typically driven by the ratio of positions per

recruiter. Moving forward, the new role of the recruiter must consider longer-term objectives.

What are the company’s business goals? How does talent impact them? Recruiters need a

collaborative approach that adds long-term business value by finding and engaging key talent.

For optimal business impact, talent strategy should align directly to company objectives. Find

out what roles are considered key talent in your organization and create a plan to connect with

them now. It’s really about the transition from being a Recruiter to becoming a Talent Advisor.

Companies should start building a network of key people, while using the external and internal

brand to add value. This requires building trust and educating department heads to be more on

the leading edge in their business, using their connections and the recruiters to move the brand

forward. This will require a significant change in mind set, but one that’s well worth the effort.

There is still value in transaction-based recruiters, but if you stay in that mindset, that’s all you’ll

accomplish—and it doesn’t excuse you from thinking long-term. You need to maintain both

perspectives to stay competitive.

ADDING LONG-TERM BUSINESS VALUE

MARIA ROSPLOCH

MARIA ROSPLOCH, Vice President, Global Solutions Architecture and Enhanced Services

Maria consults globally with top performing organizations to ensure that client talent needs are clearly developed and defined, in order to deliver optimal recruitment process solutions. With a focus on best practices and lean processes, and founded on nearly two decades of recruitment process and delivery expertise, Maria is integral in designing the right strategic solutions for clients, and partners with delivery teams to ensure alignment with client expectations and consistently achieved program goals. Prior to 2002, Maria held roles in program management and account leadership for KellyOCG.

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For more thought leadership go to talentproject.com

This information may not be published, broadcast, sold, or otherwise distributed without prior written permission from the authorized party. All trademarks are property of their respective owners. An Equal Opportunity Employer. © 2014 Kelly Services, Inc.

ABOUT KELLY SERVICES®

Kelly Services, Inc. (NASDAQ: KELYA, KELYB) is a leader in providing workforce solutions. Kelly® offers a

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temporary-to-hire, and direct-hire basis. Serving clients around the globe, Kelly provided employment to

approximately 540,000 employees in 2013. Revenue in 2013 was $5.4 billion. Visit kellyservices.com and connect

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TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE FUTURE OF RECRUITING, DOWNLOAD OUR ENTIRE SET OF TRU FILES EBOOKS. Visit www.kellyocg.com/Knowledge/The_TruFiles/

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�e Tru FilesHIRE WORK, NOT WORKERS

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�e Tru FilesNEW ROLE OF THE RECRUITER

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