Searching for the right candidate? Try a blog

Blogs are the latest fad to catch the fancy of recruiters. Companies and headhunters have started spending hours on blogs to search for potential candidates and seek out additional details about them. The blogosphere helps them home in on quality talent — especially in highly specialised fields — and also helps cut down on recruitment costs by at least 15%. What’s more, these firms have started hiring specialised bloggers to locate such candidates. Such people have the mandate to regularly scan blogs floated by students from reputed educational institutes, professionals, industry forums on specialised subject and even job blogs. HR circles say blogs are a happy hunting ground to expand their talent pool across levels.

“Blogs as a recruitment channel have gained credibility for technological talent. Several IT and BPO firms use it to their advantage. Even other sectors such as retail, banking, finance and insurance services are experimenting with it,” said Ma Foi Management Consultants CEO E Balaji. Ma Foi is one of India’s largest HR consultancy firms. Wipro BPO, for instance, taps campus and BPO blogs to search for people with none to five years experience. “The hit rate is much better in such places,” Wipro BPO Vice-President (people supply chain & employee branding) V Anandkumar told ET. “Technical blogs which talk about specific skill sets are also a fertile ground.

Number of employable candidates from there may be still small but it will surely blossom,” he added. Interestingly, the blogosphere has its own code of ethics. Under its codes, a blogger has to be truthful and provide credible information on whatever subject he expresses an opinion. In such a case, recruiters often get valuable information about a candidate’s background, extracurricular and even career goals. It then helps them in selection. The advantages are more than one for companies. “Tapping an unconventional talent source like blogs enable significant savings in recruitment costs of nearly 15-20%,” said LG Electronics India director (HR) YV Verma. It is precisely this that had led even old economy sectors to log onto blogs.

Even knowledge-based sectors are now tuning into big opportunities. This is specially true of talent-starved profiles such as scientific talent for new drug development. Piramal Healthcare president (HR) Sanjay Muthal added: “There are blogs on drug discovery in western countries which can emerge as a talent source. However, the possibility of blogs replacing the routine talent source is still limited.” Headhunters nowadays even get resumes where jobseekers leave their blog addresses along with other details. “Candidates, too, scan blogs to understand the work culture in an organisation. It then helps them to make a much more informed choice,” added Mr Balaji. The future of a blog is immense in the recruitment game. Companies in the west often use professional bloggers to poach talent from other firms. In the same logic, companies which have floated their own blogs may risk the chance of loosing talent as well, warn HR experts.