At the CIPD Recruitment and Retention Expo at Olympia this week Graham Martin of the University of Glasgow presented the CIPD's recent research on HR and Web 2.0. The talk was advertised as "Web 2.0 and social networking in HR: latest CIPD research" and was oversubscribed with more than 100 eager listeners, including fellow bloggers Peter Gold and Andy Headworth.
When Graham asked the audience how many out of 100 were using Web 2.0 technologies in HR, only six hands went up.
This is not a surprise considering all the negative press about the lack of adoption of Web 2.0 technologies in HR in the UK. As Graham went on, we were all waiting for more of the same news from his research.
And we got it.
They found there are very few examples of companies using Web 2.0 technologies such as blogs, social networking and wikis in HR. IBM and Cisco dabble in SecondLife and T-mobile uses Facebook. Blogs seem to be the most popular, with the Microsoft Jobsblog mentioned as the most popular example.
What do all these companies have in common? They are technology companies and technology companies are consistently early adopters.
What Graham did say is that there is hope. They found that it was a two or three stage adoption process – once companies got over the initial barrier of what he termed the "mouthing off stage" - where employees go crazy with their new found freedom to voice their opinions - they realised the advantages.
This made me think about a recent visit to a corporate recruiting manager where the subject of RSS feeds came up. As we explained what an RSS feed was and how they could be used in recruiting, we got a blank stare. Clearly, the mass market in the UK is not ready to adopt Web 2.0.
But they will be, sooner rather than later. Remember back in 1998, when there wasn't a chance in heck that you would type your credit card details on a web site and purchase something?
We'd like to hear from you. Why are you hesitant to adopt Web 2.0 strategies for recruiting? Leave a comment on this blog and see how fun and educational using Web 2.0 can be.
-Susanna
Susanna,
Firstly it was good to meet you yesterday at the show. With regards to your good post, I am beginning to think it is about a certain condition that HR people have - web 2.0 labotomy!! Alternatively they can also get whats called web 2.0itus - this is where, at the mention of the word web 2.0, their eyes glaze over,their arms suddenly fold, and they start chanting the mantra, " who needs the web we still like paper cv's"!!
Another telling quick survey was done by Dan McGuire from Broadbean yesterday. During his online recruiting presentation, he asked how many companies used ATS's as a tool for their onlinr recruitment - the answer was 6 out of about 70 people!!
That actually had the effect of stunning Dan into silence for a few seconds!!
I don't know why HR seem to be resisting change, but it will only have a negative result on their companies recruitment in years to come.
Andy
Posted by: Andy Headworth | June 19, 2008 at 18:19
I look after a number of job boards and in my opinion, many of the trends associated with Web 2.0 are not necessarily of much value to the online recruiter.
As regards social media - i.e. blogging, social book-marking, etc - the issue is one of return on investment. I judge the success of recruitment sites on their rate of candidate capture, not raw numbers of visitors. Social media can be an effective means of drawing large numbers of traffic to a site, but this often tends to be fairly low-quality traffic which does little for your rate of candidate acquisition.
In general, the majority of candidates have a fairly brief period of engagement with recruiters and only take an interest in the job market when they are actively job seeking. This does serve to limit a job board’s potential for enduring engagement with their audience.
It’s a matter of how and where you are inclined to dispose of your resources. Social media is time-consuming to engage with and does not necessarily offer the kind of returns that recruiters want from their websites.
There are elements of the whole Web 2.0 agenda that recruiters should be paying closer attention to, particularly those that serve to enhance the candidate experience. Richer interfaces, multi-media and flexible information sources such as RSS can really help to engage with candidates. In this respect, I would very much agree that recruitment web sites have a long way to go.
If, like me, you spend a lot of time looking at recruitment web sites, you’ll be disappointed at how little recruiters have genuinely engaged with online. This is particularly surprising given the fact that recruitment is the single biggest sector for online advertising spend. The potential is enormous, yet many have yet to engage properly with Web 1.0 let alone Web 2.0!
Posted by: Ben Morris | June 19, 2008 at 18:33
You have made some good points here.
We all agree that the potential of Web 2.0 is enormous -- it's just a matter of time.
We just have to keep reminding people that the early bird catches the worm.
-Susanna
Posted by: Susanna Cesar Morton | June 23, 2008 at 11:44
Hi Susanna,
Thanks for connecting on Twitter.
Is it because of the fear of experimenting? Web 2.0 is all about experimentation. Once you get over that & jump in, the results are amazing. (I'm speaking in terms of all possibilities of reaching customers, building brand, recruitment, marketing, networking, prof. growth, etc). (Can you tell that I'm a proponent?! :) )
Posted by: Connie Bensen | June 23, 2008 at 13:49
Susanna,
Thanks for the post as I didn't get to the event (but my post on the CIPD's article is here: http://social-business.blogspot.com/2008/06/cipd-hr-use-of-web-20.html).
Also, I agree with your comment on the need to experiment: http://social-business.blogspot.com/2008/06/come-on-in-and-play.html.
HR's being offered a huge opportunity on a plate - it's time to take it (and stretching the metaphor - carry it to 'the table').
Posted by: Jon Ingham | June 24, 2008 at 09:29