by Charlotte Gurney
One of the key challenges that any business faces today is a shortage of jobseekers. This has created a situation where it’s simply no longer enough to sit back and wait for people to come to you. Enter, direct sourcing - a proactive talent strategy that is designed to help organizations overcome the challenges that are presented by a lack of jobseekers and to upgrade the recruitment process.
What is direct sourcing?
It means identifying, engaging with and hiring your candidates directly. That might sound like a lot of additional work but partnering with a managed service provider (MSP) can provide all the benefits of this talent strategy without any of the wasted time and confusion that can come from trying to handle the entire process in-house. Direct sourcing means creating and nurturing talent pools for your business, whether those are drawing on former staff, freelancers or using different channels, such as independently advertising each role. There are lots of benefits to this approach, not least that you’ll avoid skills shortages and connect with candidates that are likely to be a better fit for your organization. Plus, you can reduce both recruitment costs and time to hire.
Direct sourcing requires a strong employer brand
With many potential candidates fielding multiple offers and opportunities right now it’s vital to ensure that your business stands out from the crowd. Employer brand is a key distinguishing feature - being able to build and communicate a strong employer value proposition enables businesses to reduce compensation premium by 50% and reach 50% deeper into the employment market. An employer brand is essentially the business’ reputation as an employer. A great starting point for identifying this is asking existing employees how they feel about the business, what great stories they can share - and where there is room for improvement. Once you have a clear idea of the business culture you can make any necessary tweaks and use this as the basis for a robust, clear employer brand that will help attract candidates to you. This should communicate values, people, strategy and policies.
Contingent workers are a key part of the picture
The rise of the contingent worker means that many workforces today are made up of agency workers, freelancers and contractors in addition to full time staff - plus, 60% of firms plan to hire more freelancers over the next three years. Direct sourcing strategy should reflect this new mix and capitalize on contingent workers to help ensure that the business has the skills it needs to grow. Having access to a pool of contingent workers can solve immediate skills shortages, bring niche skills into the business and help cope with temporary spikes in demand. With a strong employer brand there is no limit to the ways in which contingent workers can make a business more agile.
Direct sourcing makes a lot of sense as a talent strategy today for any organization and industry - and a strong employer brand, as well as the use of contingent workers, will be vital to making this successful.