If the extent of your company’s effort when it comes to candidate searches roughly entails posting a canned job ad on Craig’s list and doing a quick search on LinkedIn, there’s a lot of opportunity to improve the number of viable applicants currently being captured.
In 2014, 76% of all career seekers started their search on either Google, Yahoo or Bing; of those, 59% went to the potential employer’s career page and only 23% were still relying on the “traditional” job boards. Which means people interested in working at your company are typically going to your company’s website to learn about the open position, and as importantly what it would be like to work within your organization.

Today’s career seeker has changed the way companies source candidates for open positions materially:

If you’re experiencing tough times in today’s market when it comes to hiring the right candidate for the right job, you’re not alone. Even with the most recent activity on Wall Street, the economic forecast still dictates that it’s an employee’s market when it comes to job seeking. Competition for talent has become as much as an imperative in many organizations as it has for new location wins.

A survey conducted at the end of 2014 stated that roughly 74% of adults in the world have a social media account, and it is easy to say that Social media is becoming part of everyday life in all kinds of new ways. Having these accounts is not just for entertainment anymore and has become a way for individuals to get connected to others for career purposes that used to be impossible unless you knew someone who knew someone. These sites make it much easier to view your name, picture and showcase of your experience to the masses. With all of this exposure, it is important to remember the purpose of particular sites and how to utilize them to your advantage.

Jobvite recently released their 2015 Job Seeker survey that included questions regarding both job satisfaction and career opportunities objectives. Interestingly enough, the results have revealed that in the current recovery economy job seekers are in the driver’s seat. Some interesting stats to support this conclusion:

I was out to dinner last evening and observed a waiter who broke a water glass on a table where a couple was having dinner. This was an honest mistake that anyone could have made, but what he did next was a conscious choice. He did a preliminary clean up of the water and glass on the table and then proceeded to ignore the table for several minutes while delivering drinks and providing service to other tables in his area.