Big News: The Day the Postings Died
Stacy Donovan Zapar
Founder, The Talent Agency ♦ Executive Search ♦ Recruiter Training ♦ Sourcing as a Service ♦ Keynote Speaker
I may be dating myself a bit here, but I've had Don McLean's American Pie stuck in my head for the past few days and I couldn't figure out why. Then I started writing this blog post and it all made sense... ;)
A long, long time ago
I can still remember when recruiting used to make me smile…
Back in the day, when I first cut my teeth as an agency recruiter in the mid-90's, recruiting was all about relationships. Cold-calling. Networking. Referrals. Conversations. We got to know people, stayed in touch, followed up from time to time. When an opening became available, we reached out to our trusted network, asked them to spread the word, followed up with referrals that came our way. We proactively sourced, cold-called, got out there, met new people, offered to help others along the way. And we made time to give feedback, provide closure, say thank you. We actually cared about the candidate experience. Because that's what you have to do in a relationship-based recruiting model. And it was a beautiful thing.
But the job board era made me shiver
With every sign-off I'd deliver…
Then in the 2000s, things got a little too easy for recruiters, a little too spoon-fed. The job board era came upon us and the recruiting industry took a turn for the worse. Post-and-pray became the norm for many recruiters, reactive recruiting took charge and lazy recruiters found that they could skate by and still make placements. It became a numbers game, highly transactional, where bulk messaging became the norm and candidates went from being valued contacts to faceless resumes that got passed around and quickly discarded. Hundreds of candidates would enter the funnel, one would pop out the end and it was rejection email after rejection email (assuming candidates got any closure at all). Jobseeking was not a pleasant experience. Relationships died, networking stymied and candidate experience suffered.
There we all were in one place
A generation lost in space…
Thankfully, relationship-based recruiting has started to make a comeback in recent years. New technologies have emerged that have enabled us to focus on people, relationships, networks and helping others again. Many recruiters are starting to get back to our old-school networking roots and get out there, meet new people, build relationships, stay in touch.
But those stubborn job postings still persist, getting in the way of that. Dragging us down, distracting from the real focus, interrupting those conversations, leading us down a transactional path. What value do they really add? Spam-blasting job postings on Twitter all day? Does that really work or drive conversations? Posting job after job to your LinkedIn network until your connections finally mute you? Forcing you to disappoint dozens of people for every one person you hire?
Job postings are a conversation killer. A job posting is that bright shiny object in the room that distracts from the real conversation and networking to be had. It's a dead end road, a recruiting black hole where applicants go to die or leave with a negative experience and impression of your company. They're one-way conversations where your candidates don't really have a voice. They're that sore thumb sticking out as we make this evolution back to old-school, relationship-based recruiting.
I can't remember if I cried
When we flipped the switch on our new site
But something touched me deep inside
The day the postings died...
I'm happy to announce that Zappos has launched a brand new careers site and officially turned off job postings. Gone. Poof. Done.*
In preparation for this day, we've built a brand new "Inside Zappos" presence on social media over the past couple of months on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Pinterest (where we've never posted a single job posting, by the way). We've used these social channels to share our company culture, our people, our campus, our events, the way we do business and also to get to know the people who might like to work for us someday.
We've also created an exciting new Zappos Insider program where people can sign up, stay in touch, talk to real people with real names and real faces, get to know us and allow us to get to know them. Our Insiders are people who might like to work for Zappos someday… today, tomorrow or at some point in the future. They want to stand out, be heard, get updates, have access to our team members, join in events (both online and onsite), have those two-way conversations. It's super exciting and we are thrilled to be the first company of our size to make this change.
Instead of reviewing applications all day and sending countless sign-off emails, our recruiters are focusing on proactive sourcing, driving people to join our Insider program, having two-way conversations, meeting people, networking, chatting with Insiders, answering questions, engaging on social media, employer branding and proactive pipelining so that we know EXACTLY who we want to interview once a position becomes available. It's old-school recruiting, made new and fresh again. And, once again, it's a beautiful thing. :)
So what do you think?
Can it work? Could it work for other companies or other industries? Share your thoughts! I think it’s the exciting start of a whole new era and I’m curious to hear your thoughts, feedback and predictions!
UPDATE: Just wrote this follow-up post to clear up some misconceptions and answer a few questions... check it out!
Want to learn more? Ask questions? Join our next #InsideZappos Tweetchat at 1pm ET / 10am PT on Thursday 6/5. They're a ton of fun and all are welcome!
reprinted from @StacyZapar's Blog
* It has been noted by some that our legacy Tech jobs are still posted on a back page of the site. They are a legacy of our old system and in the process of being phased out in the coming months and not a sign of our new direction. All of other postings for all other departments are already gone. This is the real message... a new direction for our company and our recruiters are already out there building relationships!
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Stacy Donovan Zapar is a 16-year recruiting veteran for Fortune 500 tech companies and Founder/CEO of Tenfold Social Training, a recruiter training company for talent acquisition and staffing teams around the world. She is currently working at Zappos, leading their social recruiting, employer branding, talent pipelining and candidate experience initiatives. Stacy is also the Most Connected Woman on LinkedIn since 2008 with more than 40,000 1st-level connections, making her the #5 most connected person out of 300 million users worldwide. She has been featured on Forbes, Huffington Post, Business Insider, Business Review Weekly, LinkedIn's Talent Blog, Undercover Recruiter and many others. Stacy served as Technical Editor for Wiley's LinkedIn Marketing: An Hour a Day and speaks regularly at HR / Recruiting conferences globally, including SourceCon, LinkedIn Talent Connect, Social Recruiting Strategies Conference, #truLondon and Sourcing Summit Australia. She is #6 on Huffington Post's Top 100 Most Social HR Experts on Twitter and #5 on ERE.net's 50 People Most Mentioned by Recruiters on Twitter. Feel free to connect with Stacy on LinkedIn and Twitter (@StacyZapar).
Interested in having Stacy train YOUR recruiting team? Contact Tenfold Social Training today via Facebook, LinkedIn or training@tenfoldsocial.com!
Senior Software Engineer (Full-Stack) with a proven track record in scalable high-growth product development and profit generation.
9yGreat idea! Personally, when I apply for a job with a company with an interesting project, mission, or technology stack, I get really excited about the opportunity to engage in a conversation about what they're doing. If I have something to contribute, great. However, I would love to have more of those conversations, for their own sake; even if they don't result in a job offer.
CEO CoFounder Dream Factory Coop
9yI appreciate your work. More specifically, I appreciate and value how you network. It is a process I'm learning. I love your statement "We've used these social channels to share our company culture, our people, our campus, our events, the way we do business and also to get to know the people who might like to work for us someday." I'm in a lean startup and the number one question I had was "How do I recruit?" Your approach is one that connected with how I wanted to do business. Have gone to vegas and experienced how Zappo's works in the community from adopt a road to community service, I was impressed with your culture and people. I plan to visit the campus in my next trip to Las Vegas to visit you campus and experience your events. I hope to meet you some day and learn even more in person. I wish you continued success and prosperity.
LION. Lifetime Marketer, Enabling Your Double Glazing Local Business To Prosper Through Online Marketing & SEO.
9yHi Stacy. It's about time- a return of humanity to Recruiting. It sounds like the program will deliver new staff members who will have the equivalent experience of having worked a number of months already. They'll find their job more fulfilling, Zappo's will get higher productivity sooner. I'm sure that the PR spinoff from this great program is a real plus for Zappo's, too. Congratulations on a true Win-Win outcome..
Business Process and Data Enablement | Women Owned Company (WBE + WOSB Certified)
9yKudos. Relationship building is the key to almost anything. Now we need to get rid of the pesky random emails from recruiters who don't even read your resume but just email you random roles daily across the globe. Time suck and clutters email.
As a VP, if my recruiting group told me this is how they were going to source candidates for any open position i might have, i'd almost certainly leave the company. NONE of my top performers had EVER head of my company before coming across a job posting. relying on folks who've not only already known of your company but also singed up as an insider so limits the pool of candidates that it's naive to think this would work well. relying on marketing to find candidates would only figure to lessen the effectiveness of both functions. i'm all for thinking outside of the box but only in cases when it makes sense. no such impression in this case.