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Unit 5: Recruiting HR

5.5.2 E-Recruitment Notes

The term e-recruitment means using Information Technology (IT) to speed up or enhance parts
of the recruitment process. It ranges from the applicant interface for advertising vacancies and
making job applications, to the back office processes, which allow a liaison between human
resources (HR) and line managers to set up a talent pool or database of potential recruits.

Used correctly e-recruitment can:
 enhance the applicant experience
 communicate the employer's image and culture better
 make the recruitment process faster, more accountable and standardised

 increase the diversity of applicants
 provide better management information on applicants
 find the right candidate for the job.
According to one survey, internet postings result in nearly ten times as many hires as newspaper
advertisements.
In terms of HRM, the internet has radically changed the recruitment function from the
organisational and job seekers' perspective. Conventional methods of recruitment processes
are readily acknowledged as being time-consuming with high costs and limited geographic
reach. However, recruitment through World Wide Web (WWW) provides global coverage and
easiness. Likewise, the speedy integration of the internet into recruitment processes is primarily
recognised due to the internet's unrivalled communications capabilities, which enable recruiters
for written communications through e-mails, blogs and job portals.

Advantages of e-recruitment

1. E-recruitment can produce cashable savings, such as reduced advertising spend or postage
costs and non-cashable productivity gains as HR staff are freed up to carry out higher
value tasks.
2. E-recruitment is part of a wider move in HR away from transactional activities, which are
increasingly automated or outsourced, towards strategic activities supporting
organizational goals. This is a major goal of the Local Government Workforce Strategy.
3. Beyond the online job ad: The full benefits of e-recruitment are often realised when it is
part of an end-to-end process. Examples of this include allowing line managers to view
applications online and seamless transfer of candidate information to employee records.
While this may be in part an IT procurement issue, careful measurement of costs and
employee time can provide quantifiable efficiency gains.

4. Greater use of e-recruitment can also help combat longer-term recruitment issues through
the use of talent pools and better management information about applicants and new
hires.
5. Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) have also been used extensively by employers all over
the world now to attract, gather, screen, compile and manage thousands of applications
forwarded by job seekers. A well known ATS is recruitsoff.com which collects applications
from job seekers, evaluates and ranks the applicants and finally matches the qualified
with specific job openings-like any other placement agency. Many online recruitment
companies are using testing and assessment on the internet to target so called passive

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