There’s a lyric in an old Stephen Stills folk song that says, “…if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with.”
And I’m reminded of that lyric as I have conversations with other recruiting leaders, most of whom are operating with flat, if not reduced, budgets going into 2025. While they may have the need or desire to improve the mix of tools and technology for their teams, they simply don’t have the money to do so.
We are in a season that we must do more with less, optimizing the tools we have. While some may see this as a down time, it’s an opportunity for recruiting leaders to stand out. We will be pushed to get the most out of what we have while analyzing the real value of what we are paying for (I’m looking at you, LinkedIn Recruiter!). And our lack of additional resources cannot be an excuse for lack of delivery. We must make hires. Ultimately this review process is healthy for our recruiting teams.
As such, recruiting leaders should establish a formal process to review every tool, technology, and process. What do recruiters love? What are they truly using? What isn’t working and why? What do recruiters feel like is holding them back? What is the measurable ROI of these tools?
In these meetings focus on two key areas:
For example, your teams may truly have a need for an upgraded CRM to message candidates more effectively at scale. However, most ATS’s have some functionality that allows recruiters to message candidates but not in the most efficient way. It may be time to make do with what is already embedded in your ATS.
Lastly, this process of review will likely involve members of your team who have never seen how corporate recruiting teams function in a slow economy. This process may cause them concern. As the leader, you need to champion this as a positive, helping team members understand this is a normal business cycle. Now is the time to focus on cost effective, pragmatic solutions.
