Fictional AI illustration
The role’s objectives, essential expertise and hiring urgency influence the choice of search approach. At reQruitz, we assess recruiting through job advertisements and headhunting against the same underlying need.
If a new hire must handle the role independently from the outset, the job advertisement needs to emphasise the expertise required. When the employer has time and the capacity to provide training and guidance, there may be more room to learn on the job. This affects both the people you can reasonably target and what you can promise about the work.
The search approach should therefore follow the needs of the role. An attractive advert cannot settle which responsibilities require existing expertise and where the job allows room to learn. Once that is clear, you can also explain the search approach: when recruiting through job ads may suffice and when direct outreach is needed alongside it.
Recruitment campaign planning starts with the role’s objectives
The job advertisement should explain what the employee will do and what they are expected to achieve. Depending on the role, it can describe, for example, the results expected over the next 6–12 months and what the employee needs to learn to achieve those goals. This helps applicants assess how the role fits their career plans and what opportunities it offers to develop their expertise.
The employer has a part to play in achieving the objective. If a new employee is expected to improve a way of working, they should know whether they can change it, who will be involved and where guidance and support will come from. Applicants can then assess whether the role matches their expertise and the work they want to do next.
The direction of the work can appeal to different people for different reasons. One may want to deepen familiar specialist expertise, another to build something new. Growth can also mean working more independently in the same role. The job advertisement should describe the opportunity so that applicants can assess it. The job advertisement template can help organise this information, but the substance comes from the actual work.
Urgency affects where there is room for flexibility
Separate essential expertise from useful additional experience in relation to the start of the work. If a particular qualification or educational background is necessary for the work, it forms part of the role’s requirements. For other experience, the question is what the employee must already be able to do and what the employer can teach. A willingness to learn cannot, on its own, replace readiness for work where help is unavailable.
The opportunity to learn on the job changes both the potential applicant pool and the message. The job advertisement needs to explain what the new hire is expected to handle independently and what they can learn within the company. A recruitment strategy can set the direction for the expertise a company wants to strengthen, but the promise made to applicants must reflect the time and support available in that search.
Job advertising and headhunting can be combined
reQruitz headhunting assignments include direct outreach and job advertisements. For us, headhunting, or direct search, and recruiting through job ads are not mutually exclusive alternatives. A job advertisement makes the role discoverable, while direct outreach lets us discuss it with professionals we have specifically identified.
If we judge a search based on job advertising alone to be sufficient for the need, we recommend it. This can also be the case when a client initially asks for headhunting. The scope of the service should follow the role and the situation. If that approach proves insufficient, adding direct search can be considered in light of whom the employer needs to reach and what has been learned from the search so far.
Campaign planning should therefore distinguish how candidates can find the role from what they learn about it. The job advertisement and the first conversation should explain the objectives, employment terms and support. When an employer seeks help with recruitment marketing, these should form a coherent account of the same role.
If interest does not lead to suitable applicants, narrow down the cause
We would start by looking at where the job advertisement has actually been published. Are relevant job portals included, and is the advert also in LinkedIn’s Jobs section?
We would then examine the job advertisement’s content: can readers understand the work, the challenge it presents and the expertise expected? If enquiries repeatedly concern something the advert was meant to make clear, the message may need clarification. If applicants lack immediately necessary expertise, revisit the requirements and the backgrounds the search is targeting too.
Applicants also encounter the advert as part of a wider impression of the employer. Familiarity with the company, its reputation and its website can affect how the role appears. A well-written job advertisement cannot, on its own, change how a company operates or resolve a mismatch between its promises and what people find elsewhere.
Use these observations to decide what the campaign needs next. Is the answer another way to reach people, a more precise account of the work, or an employer decision about the role’s terms or support? A new job advertisement or the addition of direct search is justified when there is a clear reason to expect it to address the problem identified.
