Recruiters Face Roadblocks from Fully Utilizing Social Media

If you feel supported as you incorporate social media into your work recruiting new talent, consider yourself lucky.  Many recruiters find that they are not able to fully explore the possibilities of social media such as Facebook and LinkedIn because they are discouraged by their employers.

StepStone Solutions conducted a global survey of HR professionals to see how firms encourage or discourage recruiters to utilize social media.  According to the press release by StepStone Solutions, the survey reveals that corporate policies and lack of understanding are stifling recruiters’ use of social media such as Facebook and LinkedIn to acquire new talent, despite the fact that two thirds of employers say they want to hire more people in the coming year.

According to StepStone, sixty percent of the employers surveyed already use social media as part of their recruitment strategy and over a quarter of employers yet to explore social media plan to do so in the near future. Yet 28 per cent said that corporate policies restricting access to social networking sites were a problem, and a lack of awareness of social media was cited by 69 per cent of respondents as the greatest barrier to implementation.

StepStone Solutions CEO, Matthew Parker, explains: “Recruiters’ interest in social media is growing — 96% of recruiters said that social media has a role to play in recruitment – because it’s one of best ways to reach out to potential employees worldwide and build new talent pools, especially for high demand skills like mobile application developers or managers with experience in emerging markets. However, many recruiters aren’t opening Twitter accounts or LinkedIn pages in the absence of clear corporate support. Red tape and a lack of understanding may be harming the uptake of social media despite the fact that recruitment tools with built in capabilities are there to support them.”