Hiring – Job Boards Vs IT Staffing Agencies
Jonathan Ward | President and CEO | Twitter | LinkedIn
Many companies looking to hire IT resources believe posting a hiring need on Job Boards is just as effective as using IT Staffing Agencies. Although the initial cost of posting on a Job Board is substantially less money than using an agency the total costs are often much more significant and should be considered.
Below I have summarized some of the Pros and Cons of using a job board and using an agency.
Using Job Boards
Pros
Cost (short term cost) – If we are just talking about the cost to post on a paid job board you can usually post a job between $150-500/post depending on the Job Board.
Control – you will have access to all the candidates that apply and sole control over who you contact and the screening and interviewing process in general
By Product Candidates – From your post you might receive applications from candidates that aren’t good for the role you posted but could be good for another hiring need in your company. Branding – Your post can have your company name/logo on it to help build brand awareness and to let the public know your company is hiring/growing.
Cons
Screening Resumes – Simply put, this takes valuable time away from an already busy day. If you get hundreds of resumes it will take a lot of time to go through them especially if you aren’t used to actively reviewing resumes. On the other hand, if you don’t get many resumes odds are you won’t find a suitable candidate from your limited replies to your job post.
Limited supply of candidates – There are several sources of candidates and solely posting a job on one site significantly limits your reach to relevant job seekers.
Visibility of Job Post – the minute after you post your job other jobs will be posted on the same job board which pushes your post further down the list. After a couple days your job will no longer be at the top of the list and will become less effective as each day goes by.
Using IT Staffing Agencies
Pros
Time Savings – IT Staffing Agencies focus on helping clients hire talent. As a result they have efficient processes in place to make the hiring process as easily as possible for you. They source candidates from several places, screen them, and present you with the top 2-3 candidates for your role. This saves you a lot of time in screening and interviewing. Since Agencies have access to significantly more people than you will receive from 1 job posting there is a higher likelihood that your agency hire will be a better fit . This will also save you time in dealing with replacing a bad hire and the related training and interviewing time put into hiring twice for the same role.
Insight into Market Rates – IT Staffing Agencies that specialize should have a very good understanding of market rates for your job opening and they can help to make sure your targeted salary or rate expectations are realistic. This is important as you won’t find good people if you are paying below market rates. You also don’t want to overpay but get fair value for your investment in your new hire.
Access to their extensive network and proprietary database – IT Staffing Agencies are in the business of people. The best candidates are often found through referrals so naturally, agencies build up their network and database of candidates over the years so they have a far greater reach than a single job post.
Access to multiple Job Boards, User Groups – IT Staffing Agencies are in the business of recruiting every day so they use a variety of boards and user groups to recruit from that you might not be aware of.
Resume Screening – IT Staffing Agencies are experts in their field. They actively screen 1000s of resumes (ideally in your industry) and should be able to filter through candidates that aren’t worth your time. An agencies you should work with should filter and provide you with top 2-3 candidates.
Red/yellow flag detection – Staffing Agencies interview/screen thousands of candidates each year and can quickly identify red/yellow flags with specific candidates so you don’t waste your time on them
Cons
Price – You will generally pay more using an agency then you will posting a job on a job board. But be aware that there are many more costs to include besides the cost of the job posting. These include time spent screening resumes and conducting initial interviews, the cost of hiring the wrong person, training the wrong person and then having to go through the entire hiring process again for the same role.
In Summary
There is no doubt that working with agencies comes with a cost. And there are certainly alternatives like using a job board to source candidates. However, like most things, I believe you really get what you pay for. The agency world is certainly saturated with a variety of different vendors to choose from, so it’s important to choose the correct agency to work with.
Agencies draw talent from a variety of sources. They help with the resume screening process, access to multiple boards and tapping into extensive networks of agency partners. Although I may be slightly biased, I believe that working with an agency provides clear value!
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