Anyone Can Learn the “Art” of Sourcing
Anyone Can Learn the “Art” of Sourcing
In my recruiting career, I’ve come across many people who believe that sourcing is difficult to learn. I think that there are a number of contributing factors to this belief, including the idea that sourcing is more art than science, exposure to poor and/or ineffective training, the lack of 
access to a sourcing mentor, and in some cases – the absence of a true desire to master the craft.
I feel that sourcing is more science than art and can be relatively easy to learn, provided you actually WANT to learn and have access to the proper training and resources.
Art vs. Science
Dr. John Sullivan believes that “The primary difference between a function that is driven by science versus one driven by ‘art’ is that the scientific approach allows a business or recruiting process to be repeated again and again with the exact same level of quality and results.”
What some expert sourcers can do quite literally appears to be magic – I can understand where the idea that sourcing is an “art” comes from. However, I am here to tell you that candidate sourcing CAN be broken down to a process that can be repeated by anyone, and breaking the sourcing process down to a repeatable science does NOT remove creativity from the equation.
Some people call sourcing an art simply because they are not able to break down their own sourcing process into a series of repeatable steps, including the analytical thought processes applied. The goal is not to remove thought from the process – in fact, it’s quite necessary. However, even the creative thought processes applied by sourcing “magicians” can be broken down into a process that anyone can follow and execute repeatedly, with excellent results.
How Do People Learn?
Part of the reason why some people believe that sourcing is an “art” is because of how they were trained, or more correctly, how they were NOT trained.
Mastery of the sourcing process does not come from reading books, blogs, or cheatsheets, nor does it come from attending seminars. Although quite a bit of information can be transferred from these training materials and means, the most effective method of learning exactly how to expertly source top talent comes from a combination of #1 Training that involves the ability to practice the sourcing techniques and strategies being learned with immediate feedback from the trainer, and #2 Having access to a sourcing coach or mentor who can provide you regular feedback and coaching on your sourcing efforts.
Occupational training studies have shown that the vast majority of people learn by DOING, not by reading and watching. Thus it is critical that any effective sourcing training will allow you to use the techniques you’re being taught under the guidance and evaluation of the trainer
After the formal training sessions are over, it is critical to have ongoing access to a sourcing mentor. Without a mentor, sourcers and recruiters don’t have any basis of comparison when it comes to the quality and effectiveness of their sourcing strategies and tactics. Without a basis of comparison, most people are simply not capable of objectively judging the quality and quantity of their search efforts. It’s similar to taking a single golf lesson and then going to play golf without the instructor watching and coaching you and expecting to become a professional golfer.
Lacking the ability to apply what you’ve been trained on under the guidance of an expert coach, there is no way for you to receive immediate feedback on the sourcing techniques you’re applying. Until a highly proficient mentor reviews and assesses your sourcing efforts and results objectively, you may actually be in a dangerous state of ignorant bliss. You don’t know what you don’t know.
Disturbing Statistics
I recently read Shally Steckerl’s excellent ERE post referencing the findings from the Arbita Recruitment Genome Report (a link is provided in the post to download the report) and learned that 81% of the 482 respondents feel Internet sourcing is a major part of their recruitment strategy, 79% manage Internet sourcing internally, and that 47% feel their team has inadequate training on Internet research and sourcing.
If most companies highly value sourcing and feel it is a major part of their recruiting strategy, and most manage the process internally, yet nearly half feel their team has inadequate training – the $64,000 question is WHY is the training inadequate for such a critical function?
Perhaps it is because many companies simply don’t possess strong in-house sourcing expertise? Or could it be due to a poorly designed and executed sourcing training program? The worst case scenario is that it could be both.
If a sourcing and recruiting team doesn’t already posses at least 1 sourcing expert – buying training materials, watching webinars, and attending seminars will not magically convert the team into a group of sourcing experts. What’s missing from these training methods is that when the team members who participate in the training go back to their office, the training has little chance of sticking without a highly proficient sourcing mentor on the team to evaluate their efforts and provide feedback, guidance, and a basis of comparison.
Ideally, a team with at least 1 sourcing expert can leverage that person to assimilate (Borg-style, if you will) all training materials, strategies, and tactics they are exposed to and incorporate them into an effective training program involving interactive feedback that is critical for learning and lots of deliberate practice.
Master your Craft
I’ve been told that sourcers and recruiters don’t want to know “this Boolean stuff,” that they just want resumes delivered to them with the least amount of effort, and that sourcers and recruiters want sourcing solutions that require little-to-no thinking.
That’s like being on the golf course and overhearing other golfers complain about how hard golf is, that they don’t want to put the effort into learning the rules or even a proper swing, and that they just want to swing a club and have the ball go into the cup, get it over with, and go home. Why are they even on the golf course if all they do is complain and they have no real interest in playing the game? Get off the course!
Similarly, if you’re a sourcer or a recruiter who is responsible for the finding candidates and you’re not interested in and dedicated to mastering your craft, you should look for another job. Unlike golf, which is a hobby for most, if you are a sourcer or recruiter, finding candidates is your job – it’s at least part of, if not all of what you get paid to do. But maybe that’s the issue – if finding candidates is just a job and not a passion, you will never master the craft of talent identification.
A Call to Action
- If you are a sourcer or recruiter and you’re not already a sourcing guru, commit to becoming one. You can’t hire or place someone you can’t find.
- Seek out training that #1 goes beyond the “what” and deeply into the “how” and the “why,” and #2 allows you to use the techniques you’re being taught under the guidance and evaluation of the trainer.
- Find and engage a sourcing mentor who is capable of expertly and objectively judging the quality and quantity of your sourcing efforts as well as capable of consistently challenging and pushing you just beyond your current ability.
- Perform deliberate practice of sourcing best practices under the guidance of an expert coach or mentor.
- If you manage sourcers or recruiters who are responsible for sourcing and you don’t already have at least 1 person with expert-level sourcing expertise – acquire one. If you want to have the best talent identification and acquisition team in the world, upgrade your entire team.
- Taking a golf lesson from Tiger Woods will not make you play as well as Tiger Woods. It’s what you DO with the training – be sure to attack the unfamiliar and the uncomfortable with passion, seek to figure out the “why” and the “how” and to continually improve your skills and ability.
About Glen:
Glen Cathey is the author of www.booleanblackbelt.com, a blog about sharing best practices for leveraging the Internet, job boards, resume databases, and social networks for sourcing and recruiting. With over 12 years of experience in the recruiting and staffing industry, he currently serves as the V.P. of Recruitment for a large staffing firm and trains hundreds of recruiters every year in the art and science of leveraging technology for talent identification and acquisition.
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You hit the ‘nail on the head’ Glen! A ‘sourcing’ expert in-house will go a long way to provide the proper training and feedback to build world class sourcing functions.
Another great post!
I agree that sourcing expertise is something that can be learned effectively. A large Boolean string at first glance can seem like a foreign language but broken down piece by piece it is easier to digest. It’s just finding the right person that you can connect with to mentor you through the process step by step. A lot of tips can be picked up from webinars, online chats and reading articles or blog posts but it becomes more relevant if you start with the essentials and build from there.
There are individuals who just provide names sourcing but if you are a recruiter sourcing for candidates to fill positions whether by phone or internet I think you miss out if all you are looking for is a resume delivered to you through ads or other means. Automation and ad placement does save time and is a tool in the process but sourcing provides much more than just resumes. It links you to information about the candidates, their peers, competitors, possible job leads and other useful information that can be used in not only mastering sourcing of candidates but becoming very knowledgeable about the industry in which you work.
Of course Glenn this makes sense but this is what I am seeing in the field while interviewing. Many companies are asking the researcher/sourcer to take on recruiting responsibilities because they cannot justify the budget for “just” a researcher/ sourcer. I recently had to accept that turn in my career because I came across this too many times. It’s likely that to get your foot in a company initially, while the market is down, that role will be broad but once things pick up sourcing/ research/ competitive intell will separate out. Would like to hear of other interviewing experiences.
Amen Brother! I’ve been both sourcer only and recruiter only but most of the time done it all myself. A good sourcer (someone who doesn’t just scrape job boards) can make all the difference to a recruiter. Twitter: @leslie12002
I feel that Sourcing is both a science AND an art form. The science of sourcing can be learned, but the art cannot. It takes a certain kind of person to take the mechanics of sourcing and turn them into a passion. And to be a really great sourcer one has to be naturally inquisitive, intuitive, and innovative; THAT can’t be taught.
Twitter: @steffenson
I feel that sourcing is both a science AND an art form. The science of sourcing can be learned, but the art cannot. It takes a certain kind of person to take the mechanics and turn them into a passion. And to be a really great sourcer one has to be naturally inquisitive, intuitive, and innovative; THAT can’t be taught.
Twitter: @steffenson
Great article as usual Glen. I agree with the majority of your points however, I believe that the problem with Boolean and/or progressive sourcing is that recruiters are underexposed. This is still a relatively new skill for most of the recruiters I know. In my 1st degree network, I can only think of two recruiters that I “might” consider experts. Honesty, I just do not know that many expert sourcers and I have recruited for 6 years.
I think the disconnect is not so much a direct mentor, I think it has a lot to do with the environment you work within (this may be a little biased due to me only working as an internal recruiter). I can tell you that my eyes were opened two years ago due to my last job. I never considered unorthodox recruiting because I was just never exposed to it. I was exposed to you through my previous co-workers. I can say that honest to god- your articles have been the closest mentor to Boolean search expertise I have had to date (I’m really not trying to float your boat).
I would have never been so interested or intrigued by true sourcing had I never been lucky enough to be exposed to it. Once I became exposed, I took the reigns from there and have tried my best to self teach and learn from others like yourself but I still have a long way to go!
Great post. While the “science” may seem simple enough, the “art” is what separates those who are truly experts and masters and those who should “get off the course.”
Twitter: @SkillStorm
@Gary, Shannon, Leslie – thanks!!!
@Dorothy – I’m glad you brought that up. I plan on writing about that soon – splitting the sourcing and recruiting role or asking one person to do both. Personally, I’ve always had to do both, and I have found that having exceptionally strong candidate sourcing ability has been my significant competitive advantage, and in truth it’s made recruiting relatively easy. If I can find them, I can recruit them. I will say, however, that an exceptionally strong sourcer could probably support 3-4 recruiters and keep them on the phones and not worrying about having to find people to call.
@Erica – I agree with you. Sourcing is both a science and an art, but my opinion is that it’s about 80% science and 20% art. The 20% is the human element – what the person brings to the execution of the process.
@Candice – You raise an excellent point. A few years back, after learning more about my background, I had a manager tell me that I was a product of my environment. I had never thought of it that way until he mentioned it – but if you read my bio on my blog, you’ll see my introduction to recruiting was basically, “Here’s our candidate database – this is how you find candidates.” I was shown basic Boolean (AND, NOT), and literally nothing else. Add my curiosity, my analytical nature, my competitive obsession with being the best, and my “failure is not an option” mentality – and the rest is history. So I 100% agree that if you’re in an environment that doesn’t value or heavily leveraging technology for talent identification, it’s highly unlikely that you will master it.
@Melissa – Thank you! Actually, I’ve found that the “science” behind the most effective sourcing techniques and strategies are not that simple, at least inasmuch as they aren’t obvious to most people. People often excuse-away what I can do by saying I have a talent for it. Which is actually offensive, because I’ve worked VERY hard at mastering my craft – it never came “easy” to me.
When I train people, I am often asked, “How did you figure that out?” My answer is always the same, “I just figured it out.” Of course I go into more detail after that, but essentially I was faced with a challenge, and until I found a way to get the right results, I would not give up – I would keep thinking and trying different things until I “solved the puzzle.” Which is really the scientific method, although it never occurred to me when I was working a desk – it took stepping out of an individual producing role and into a management role to have the time to reflect and achieve the proper perspective. I can literally trace most of my sourcing techniques and strategies to breakthrough moments that I figured out while trying to “crack the code” of a touch position I was trying to fill.
Glen
@BooleanBlackBlt
http://www.cruitertalk.com – da best. Keep it going!
Thanks
Joker
I enjoy your comments and thinking; and this post is not exception.
I agree that sourcing|recruiting is both an art and a science. And your 80% science|20% art seems correct based on my experience. And I agree that training is a necessary part of developing one’s craft. I believe the art of recruiting is the human touch and the science of recruiting, the technology touch. I find the art of sourcing to be about 80% scientific with building in a discipline to the profiles that one sources for and about 20% artistic in being able to generate names and or lists of the targeted talent. Sourcing, as is recruiting, is a redundant process—but a great sourcer can aggregate data from a variety of sources to reach deep within the talent pools. I find that recruiters do not have time for sourcing. Recruiting, at least in the corporate environment, has become very much a transaction. It has become a task of taking the best available candidate as opposed to finding the best candidate. And despite all the great training, recruiters cannot remember how to use Boolean and other techniques to add to their slate of candidates. Use it or lose it certainly applies here. It is almost like we need a quick refresher course prior to a recruiter engaging in sourcing. Perhaps you have a solution for that?
Marvin,
Great insight. Your comment – “Recruiting, at least in the corporate environment, has become very much a transaction.” What are your thoughts on this? Recruiting as a transaction can be dangerours and walks that fine line of providing less than extreme service. Though in cases I understand it's un avoidable, but I'm interested to learn your thoughts.
Marvin,
Great insight. Your comment – “Recruiting, at least in the corporate environment, has become very much a transaction.” What are your thoughts on this? Recruiting as a transaction can be dangerours and walks that fine line of providing less than extreme service. Though in cases I understand it's un avoidable, but I'm interested to learn your thoughts.