Finding and approaching candidates in Switzerland in 2015

At the same time as a survey concerning flexible employment models (click here for the article), we conducted a survey about job search in Switzerland in 2015. The goal was to find out, among others, which tools are used the most and how candidates look for a job in Switzerland. This information will obviously help companies determine how to find candidates and which recruiting strategy to deploy. We will also discuss some aspects of approaching prospective candidates directly on social networks. 

LinkedIn the "go-to solution"?

According to our survey, the tool used the most to find a job in Switzerland in 2015 is LinkedIn: 100% of respondents use or would use LinkedIn, ahead of their professional network (82%), private network (79%), job boards (71%) and recruitment agencies (64%).

This result is interesting, especially considering that 82% of respondents live in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, where XING used to be stronger than LinkedIn. XING, however, only gets to 36%, slightly ahead of attending networking events (32%). 21% of respondents indicated the use of CV-databases and 11% industry relevant magazines. Twitter and Facebook are somewhat used (both 4%), whereas none of the respondents use or would use newspapers to find a job.

LinkedIn is also the clear winner when it comes to being approached directly by a recruiter when there is no previously established connection: 96% wish to be approached by LinkedIn, ahead of email (93%), phone (68%) and XING (43%).

Approaching prospective candidates directly

Interestingly all of the respondents are open to being contacted by recruiters, even the ones not looking for a new job. Obviously, the better the role matches their profile, the more likely they are to respond to any direct messages. There are a lot of articles about drafting effective messages to approach prospective candidates directly on social networks, so we won't elaborate on the how of your message. On top, we think that a focus on how you write a message often seems to miss the point. True, a personalized message free of mistakes is advisable and will help increase the response rate of your message, but this is not the goal: the goal is to fill a vacancy. An 80% response rate with everyone kindly declining the role you are proposing doesn't get you anywhere near this goal. Therefore, we would like to add a few points about the what of your message and who you are targeting. Regarding the who, difficult as it may be, it is important to try and determine if a prospective candidate might actually be willing to change jobs and leave their employer for the role you are proposing. If they are, they would probably not mind a few spelling errors and will respond to your message regardless. If they are not, a badly drafted message is more likely to irritate them. Nonetheless, before thinking about how to write your message, put yourself in their shoes and try to assess their willingness to change jobs. Someone with less than two years of experience in their current role is probably not interested, whereas someone with four-five years in their current role might be a better target. Obviously, these are generalizations and there can be a lot of exceptions. In addition, a lot depends on what you are proposing. 

Let's start by rephrasing this sentence: the better the role matches their profile aspirations, the more likely they are to respond. Employees that are (very) unhappy are probably actively looking for a new job and likely to respond to your job ad; there is little need to go and actively look for them as long as you make sure you can be found. In our experience though, few employees are willing to change to a similar company for a similar role and a similar paycheck if they are (moderately) happy. However, too often such prospective candidates are approached for roles similar to their own, or at least they perceive it this way, because the message didn't convey the potential for improvement properly. Either way, it is important to cater to prospective candidates' aspirations and offer them something more, something bigger, something better. They will probably be enticed to enter the conversation if you you can offer some incentive such as the following examples:

• a role with more responsibilities, more flexibility (something more)
• a role in a bigger company, managing a bigger team, having a bigger scope (something bigger)
• a role with a better salary, a better work-life balance, in a better industry, at a company with a better reputation (something better)

In addition, provided the prospective candidate has the required experience and / or skills, the prospect of a promotion is a great incentive to trigger a positive response as well: few people in a (Function) Manager position for example would turn down the opportunity to discuss a (Function) Director position. 

Conclusion

In conclusion and given the limitations of the survey we conducted, we advise companies to use a combination of at least two or three tools in their search strategy, even though LinkedIn seems the most effective and the go-to solution. Also, regardless of where you publish a vacancy (company website, LinkedIn, XING, job board), make sure to adopt an active approach: share the link within your social networks, post an update in relevant online groups, ask colleagues to like and / or share your update and strive to do this on a regular basis. Last but not least, when contacting prospective candidates directly, make sure your message addresses their question "so what's in it for me?" with something more, something bigger or something better.