4 Things Corporate Recruiting Departments Should Do to Survive

Have you noted the increased pressure on the corporate talent-acquisition team to partner with external headhunters to resolve open positions? No offense, external parties — you have a business to run — but that doesn’t negate it’s impacting our appreciation for what corporate recruiters can offer to its organization. 

So, here are some suggestions to “survive” as a corporate talent-acquisition department (join me at the fall 2016 ERE conference in New Orleans and I’ll talk more about all of this).

• Have a talent-acquisition roadmap. Where is your department headed, and is it what the company needs? Are your team’s competencies aligned for what your organization is looking for?
• Review your employer relations. How does the business think of you, appreciate you, value you; are your delivering what it needs?
• Metrics. Yes, we’ve all talked about this a million times. But the key question is what are you measuring? Are you measuring the success of the individual recruiter, the TA team, and the organization? What’s your record of corporate wide applications to hire; hire to 90-day retention; and internal application to promotion?
• Have a “bring them back home” initiative and/or a “3 for 1″ (no, that’s not a cocktail opportunity). I’m talking about a) efforts to get regrettable losses to return, and b) asking recently hired candidates refer at least three qualified professionals who’d be interested in your organization.
• Remember that what’s old is new again. Brush of your team’s phone and your researching tools.