SmartPulse — our weekly reader poll in Smartbrief on Workforce — tracks feedback from leading managers and HR practitioners. We run the poll question each Wednesday in our e-newsletter.
Last week, we asked: Are employee referrals your best source for hires?
- Yes, for some positions, 51%
- No, 22%
- Yes, for most positions, 21%
- We don’t track sources for hires, 6%
I’ll let you in on a little secret: Employee referrals has never been my best source of hire. It seems like every recruiting conference I ever went to was trying to tell me how we must boost employee referral rates because they give us the best source of candidates. I thought there was something wrong with me. It is nice to see that most, like myself, use employee referrals somewhat selectively. While referrals do make up a nice piece of the overall recruiting mix, I don’t know if it is worth investing significant resources in beefing it up.
Lance Haun is community director for ERE.net, the main guy over at Rehaul.com and a member of the SmartBrief on Workforce Advisory Board.