Mobile Recruiting Trends and Stats

Researchers at the Aberdeen Group report that between October and November 2011, 73 percent of organizations use or are intending to use mobile technology to supplement their recruitment efforts.

The question remains, however, as to which mobile solutions offer the greatest efficiencies in the realms of communication and candidate engagement. This is an especially relevant question today, as modern recruiting departments face a number increasing pressures, including cost containment and productivity. There is so much current interest among the recruiting community that a dedicated mobile recruiting  conference has been arranged, scheduled for September.

A few of the top stresses faced by talent acquisition teams as reported by Aberdeen’s 2011 Talent Acquisition Lifecycle report were increased competition for talent (52 percent), a shortage of essential skills (49 percent), and an inability to meet organizational goals (49 percent). Identifying and engaging top talent has become a primary goal of recruiting departments despite the expanding talent pool.

One of the ways to address these issues is through mobile apps. Aberdeen’s 2011 Enterprise B2E Mobile App report indicated that the primary motivations for seeking out mobile solutions were a need for heightened efficiency (47 percent), differentiation from competition (44 percent), and speeding up the decision-making process (40 percent). Despite these needs and the proliferation of mobile recruiting platforms, many organizations still struggle in determining which solution is most appropriate for their initiatives. Sometimes, the advertised capabilities of these job apps do not actually exist, or do not perform as hyped by providers. There is a large gap between solutions that an organization has in place and those that it would like to have in place.

Just 13 percent of surveyed organizations have access to mobile applicant tracking data, but 66 percent desire this information. Only 3 percent of organizations allow external applicants to take assessments on mobile devices while 66 percent want this functionality. The mobile talent acquisition arena is underserving its clients and not providing to them what they need from their mobile providers.  Mobile solutions are typically found to fail at providing adequate two-way communication between employers and applicants with most apps creating with hiring managers in mind instead of job candidates. Most mobile recruitment apps act only to broadcast job market posting that do nothing to improve the experience of candidates; only adding the additional step of visiting a career site to apply. While the demand for mobile talent acquisition apps is strong, providers are still in the process of maturing in the functionality of the mobile products they develop.