In many instances these systems have been purchased not implemented and in the times they were implemented, recruiters used them sparingly. The information was old, hard to get and came from a supply of candidates that usually did not match the needs of the company. As recruiters we instead relied on fresh candidate flow from postings, agencies or our own abilities to source candidates in the market.

Today we as recruiters can start our sourcing process with a new thought and approach. With the advent of the Internet it’s now possible for us to seriously consider establishing on-going meaningful recruitment relationships with every one we need to hire today or in the future globally. Smart competitive companies already have systems and processes in place to accomplish this lofty goal and it all starts with building a private talent community at your website.

In our world of recruiting traditional sourcing channels limit our reach, are time consuming and costly. And typically we rely on redundancy to find fresh candidates by working with only those candidates who reply to our most recent ad.

Today we rely a public talent pools and hope the right candidate responds to today’s posting. Many companies and organizations around the globe have proven they hire better quality, faster and at lower cost by constantly building and maintaining their own Private Talent Communities.

The key to their success is building a community of special private recruitment relationships by utilizing proven recruitment techniques through the Internet and new Talent Management technology.

The limitation of resume data banks as we know them today is that they are two-dimensional by their very nature and design. This is merely an electronic extension of the age old "buzz word matching" … a process which has never proven to be efficient enough to make recruitment a more productive process.

That being said, the author and I converge in our vision of future recruitment possibilities. The marketplace simply must learn to utilize the strengths of the Internet in facilitating the development of career-long, recruitment relationships with professional individuals. 

This is a very different mission than simply collecting static resumes.

Building dedicated TALENT COMMUNITIES, is a commitment on the part of both Companies and talented professionals to communicate and provide meaningful dialog even when they are not actively "looking."  As today's proactive professionals learn to do this to secure their futures, so should the Companies make the commitment.- The Pilot

The majority of companies today have a careers section at their website and ask for a resume or at the least contact information for the individual submitting. This is the wrong approach as it limits your flow of candidates to those who visit your site, have a resume on hand and or willing to share it with your HR Department.

The Internet technologies offer several ways to make this "sourcing" happen on a mutually advantageous, shared manner. Three that come right to mind are chat rooms and bulletin boards for focused networking and a professional’s own website (WhatIDo.com) to market their career continuity in a 24 X 7 manner.- The Pilot

Companies and Recruitment firms all over the world are building Private Talent Communities of high quality talent by establishing relationships with passive candidates at their website. They accomplish this by enticing individuals not really looking to make a career move at the time but interested in the organization a chance to quickly (under 120 seconds) choose what they want to do and do so anonymously by using a public email address for correspondence. No name, phone number or address is necessary a concept just the opposite of how most recruiters think.

In the past 8 months a company of 650 employees has built a private talent community at their website with the following results.

* 15,000 Prospective Candidates in the Community
* 132 Hires
* 75% Reduction in Agency Usage
* 60% Of All Hires Through the Corporate Website
* 40% Increase in Employee referrals
* 37% Time to fill reduction
* $775k Overall recruitment savings

Recently with email we can share interesting information or email a greeting. Today companies are sending very compelling and targeted digital marketing campaigns to segments of their private talent pools. They may not know who the candidate is by name but do know they are interested in certain messages. And with technology the companies are able to gauge specific coverage of a position type with the talent pool at all times. That is, the company knows at an instant and in real time how many people in the community are interested in financial or engineering positions.

Again, it is not necessary for the company to know the contact information at this point just to know they can market vital and compelling company and position information to a specific group within the pool. With experience the companies know that a position will be filled with the proper coverage within their Private Talent Community. If they do not have coverage they know how much marketing budget they need to spend in order to achieve the proper coverage.

What a concept... Instead of the HR screening process controlling the process, candidate flow becomes a shared, web based way of maintaining key relationships.

To many professionals, email has become the communication tool of choice, which works well within any one employer.  Unfortunately, a PRE-Solicited piece of email is too easily deleted by a would be receiver.  There's even electronic filters for that sort of thing.  The key, here, for both sides of this communication equation, is to operate in ways to create productive channels of SOLICITED resume flow.  This is where chat rooms and bulletin board activities come in.  They provide a controlled medium within which for both parties to get to know one another... thus creating visibility in a positive manner.

Instant messaging and email technology could be utilized to create the solicited connection... PRIVATE from public view.

We simply must learn to use HIGH TECH tools to leverage our time in this HIGH TOUCH process... a lesson to be learned by both sides. - The Pilot

At the end of the day recruiters deliver Interested, Qualified and Available candidates to the desktop of hiring managers. We source a set of candidates, qualify them, get their interest, present and hopefully close.

One of the virtues of a private talent community is the ability to automatically screen candidates at a first level. Typically we ask a series of questions in a first interview whether conducted over the phone, by email or in person to qualify the candidate to insure we are on the right trail. Companies that have established large private talent community also use technology to screen interested candidates.

When an individual receives a position of interest by email and chooses to submit they are directed to a series of question specific to the position. These are answered by
the candidate and immediately scored by the software managing the talent pool. The candidates immediately receive a response telling them they are qualified or not for the position while simultaneously those who are Interested, Qualified and Available are sent to the desktop of the recruiter and hiring authority for the next step in the process.

Companies who have adopted this process have reported returning calls to qualified candidates in minutes upon submission. This is unique to the recruitment process, highly competitive, cost effective and from candidate reports very much appreciated.

In conclusion the Virtues of a Private Talent Community are many. Specifically a private talent pool can increase candidate quality, cost per hire and time to productivity. Understanding the segments of the talent community gives the company great leverage in decisions when talent is a part of the equation. Do we have relationships with the number we need?

We see a number of prospective candidates from a certain part of the country or world have joined our pool in recent weeks, what does this mean, can we take advantage of the talent supply. Talent knowledge becomes strategic.

We have been in a competitive market for talent and by all world demographic accounts the competition for talent will only increase. If this is true then the need for companies and organizations to control, manage and optimize talent supply cost, quality and effectiveness will become greater.

Technology continues to play an important role as it allows us to scale the important recruitment relationship we all as recruiters have built our practices and careers on. We all must be challenged to understand and embrace new technology that can make us more productive and effective to the organizations we serve.

What we have, here, is the failure to merge two ineffective processes in to one very mutually advantageous one: Shared productivity in the world of recruitment.  The author proposes moving the screening process to a more ongoing level of the Talent Management Process, as a qualification step.  In my view, this is a credible FIRST step, but a timid one.

I would suggest use of the same media involved in qualification, taken into a more highly secure environment where private and proprietary information could be shared more freely.  Each party would still have the control of participation as their strength.

Recruitment can become a win-win proposition.  FIT HAPPENS!

Last note: As Private Talent Communities become the norm the recruiter will become a more strategic and valued part of the organization. By eliminating administrative work, technology enables the recruiter to spend more time on strategic planning and candidate delivery, two important issues facing companies when competing for talent.

Hank Stringer, President, Founder, and Chief Talent Officer, Hire.com

Hank Stringer founded Hire.com in 1996. He has over two decades of experience as a successful high tech industry recruiter, entrepreneur and innovator in the use of information technology in the recruitment and employment process. Stringer is a frequent featured speaker at industry conferences and seminars, and is a frequently quoted source for industry facts by the national press and industry publications.

Bob Maher, The Careerpilot

Bob created his online presence, www.careerpilot.com, in 1994.  He has over twenty years of successful experience in Corporate Recruitment, performance management and Career Management Services.  He is an entrepreneur and innovator in the use of information technology in the recruitment and employment process.  On the Founder's Council of the Association of Career Professionals - International and quite active in their Professional Development, Technology and Chapter Growth initiatives--a frequent speaker at industry conferences and seminars.