Attracting the right employees for a successful future is one of the biggest challenges for any company. All activities aimed at attracting employees to the company are considered recruitment. Recruitment, today often referred to as "personnel recruitment", is thus a sub-area of human resources management. Its task is to cover the previously defined personnel requirements.
Recruitment activities can be aimed at the internal or external labour market. Both recruiting workers from the external labor market and internal recruitment have their advantages and disadvantages. Their goal is always to keep time and costs as low as possible and to find the most suitable employees.
1. External Recruitment
When looking for suitable employees, the first thing that is often looked at is the open market. External recruiting measures include classic job advertisements (e.g. print advertisements), e-recruiting measures (social media recruiting, online job boards, mobile recruiting, etc.), employee recruitment programs as well as job fairs or similar career events. So-called passive recruitment is also possible. This area includes incoming unsolicited applications and the maintenance of the talent pool. Of course, recruiting is never really "passive", e.g. you are constantly working on the reputation of the company (employer branding).
Benefits of External Recruitment
The external recruitment of new employees has the following advantages, for example:
- External experience is brought into the company, which leads to a reduction in operational blindness
- Fresh know-how and new impulses come into the company
- Business processes are being looked at in a new way
- Lower training costs, as employees with the required skills are specifically selected for the advertised position
Disadvantages of External Recruitment
However, a major disadvantage of external recruiting is that it is relatively time-consuming and costly. In addition, the risk of making the wrong appointment is higher than if the position was filled internally. So before you look outwards, it can't hurt to take a look around internally first.
2. Internal Recruitment
Internal recruiting measures primarily refer to internal job advertisements, e.g. on the intranet or an in-house magazine. However, this also includes the long-term promotion and further training of employees for a specific position as well as the internal transfer (inplacement) of employees of a company. In principle, internal staffing should be preferred to external staffing. Filling vacancies in-house usually brings significant advantages.
Benefits of In-House Recruitment
- Cost and time savings in recruiting
- Shorter training period
- Motivation of employees by opening up opportunities for advancement
- Employees are guided by the company's salary level, which is thus maintained
- More successful staffing, because the employee and his way of working are already known to the company
Disadvantages of Internal Recruitment
However, in order to successfully recruit internally, your employees need to be aware that internal applications are desired. In addition, you should know exactly about the knowledge, competencies and skills of your employees as well as their development and change wishes – only then can internal recruiting be successful. Under no circumstances should you ignore the fact that internal recruitment often entails external recruitment, as it does not solve the personnel requirements quantitatively.
3. Job advertisement as a prerequisite for recruitment
Whether internal or external, a good job advertisement is the necessary prerequisite for finding suitable applicants. Here you will find tips on how to design job postings.
Ultimately, which way of recruiting you choose always depends on the current situation and position. No matter what you choose, you are always responsible for organizing the recruitment process and having as complete information as possible about each candidate. Therefore, the easiest way to organize your recruiting is with a professional one. This gives you a comprehensive overview of all applicants at all times.
